Safeties coach Ephraim Banda (8.20.23)
The ball has kind of found (Ronnie) Hickman in the games. He is a strong safety. How is he close to the box?
“You know what? I’ll be honest with you. Right now, as you guys have seen, we’re playing him everywhere, strong and free. There is not really a strong and free, we’re still staying with that model. And what’s come of that is a young man who actually finds the ball at the third level really well. And, yeah, he has played a lot of that in his time, and he has a knack for it. So that was the benefit of that, of playing them everywhere and seeing what they can do in Coach (Jim) Schwartz’s system, which is a very visual system at the safety position. And that’s been a positive. So the biggest thing he’s done is he’s done exactly what’s asked from me and Coach Schwartz in terms of the technique. And he’s come away with the ball, which is nice.”
What have you seen Juan (Thornhill) add to this group?
“Energy, you know, right away. But it’s funny, the Juan that you guys see is not the Juan that I have in the meeting room. Juan is like, he comes, he’s got such great attitude and he’s so energetic, and you feel it and sense it, but when he’s in the meeting room, he’s a whole different guy. He is in the front row, first seat, locked in, asking questions, writing notes. I mean, he is awesome to work with. So, he’s brought the energy on the field, like you guys see, and obviously the leadership. He’s been to places and won nice shiny things, so he knows what it takes and knows what it looks like. But more importantly, the part you guys don’t see is really the effort that he puts in the meeting room and in him just helping those young guys.”
How does he kind of try to translate the Super Bowls he won with Kansas City to the guys here? You know what I mean? The experience of getting there. How does he translate that to the guys here?
“I think, again, he knows what it looks like. It’s like anything. If you’ve already walked a trail that you know and that you just kind of know when to take a right or a left and don’t go down that way or you’re going to fall down this way. He just knows what those pitfalls are. He knows also how to take advantage of what’s coming towards him and what’s ahead of him. So, he’s a great barometer, if you will, of where we need to be and where we need to head. And he’s very aware, even dating back to when I, unfortunately, had to coach against him at Miami, he just was that guy. He had great awareness. He found the ball and just played with great spirit. So, I hated it. I’m glad he’s on our team now.”
Would you say four versus five safeties is one of issues to be decided this final week? Keeping four or five?
“Again, that’s out of my ballpark. My job is to just get them to play as good as possible, to compete, and at the end of the day, make it hard on personnel. That’s really what you want to do. Personnel has done a great job. AB (Andrew Berry) and his staff have just done a phenomenal job of bringing in talent across the board, especially at those positions. So, it’s a good problem to have, and we’re looking forward to see what this week brings and to help AB and his staff make the best decision possible.”
Grant (Delpit) talked at the Greenbrier about wanting to reach his potential and being great. He doesn’t feel like he’s accomplished what he wanted to get. So, what are you seeing from now?
“What I see in Grant is an extremely hungry young man. A man that is very locked into where he is currently, very aware. I think that is sometimes an issue with a young man is just not being aware of where he really is. He is aware. And to your point, he is wanting to be great. He wants to take the next step like he did at LSU and wants to win big shiny things too, like he’s done there. And I think what he’s realized is, is that I need to be that person and have that mentality that I did there here, and he’s doing that right now at a high level. I’m extremely proud of Grant. I mean, like, Juan (Thornhill) he has just come into every single meeting locked in, focused, attentive, coming out here and practicing extremely hard. The young man does not miss anything. I’m telling you. He went and graduated and still flew back to be on the sideline with his teammates. I mean, if that doesn’t scream I’m all in, I don’t know what does.”
We saw Grant (Delpit) and Juan (Thornhill) in a little bump man today and those kind of things. Are you comfortable with this safety group playing man-bump coverage? And what kind of concerns do you have if you got your safeties up at the line of scrimmage?
“No concerns. I don’t. I believe in what we do. See, the biggest thing that benefits safeties in bump and run man in this system, is how hard coach (Jim) Schwartz pushes dominating the leverage. And when he builds the defense around that, then you can say, I have no concerns. Because so long as we understand where to push our man into where our help is, you can really dominate leverage and play that type of man coverage, like you saw at other stops he’s had. But it centers around coach Schwartz’s design of what we do. Now in other things and other places I’ve been, yeah, it’s a little different, and you got to have the right type of human, and we do have the right type of human. Again, personnel has done a phenomenal job. This room’s loaded, it’s talented. So, again, it goes back to Coach Schwartz and how he designed the whole thing.”
Go back to (Ronnie) Hickman, though. When you have a guy who’s undrafted, but it just seems like he’s always around the ball, he’s always making plays, what can that do? What kind of energy does that bring to the room when you have an undrafted guy like that?
“Just think about what Rod (Rodney McLeod) has done in his career. That’s another undrafted free agent who’s been in this league for twelve years, and how his play in every room he’s ever been in raised the level of everyone in the room, and Ronnie’s done that. But what’s great to see is TMAC (Tanner McCalister) answering the belt. People forget about how well TMAC played last week. I mean, he had seven tackles, he had a PBU, he had a sack coming off an injury with no practice. So you’re seeing young guys raise the level, and then you’re seeing other guys trying to touch it, and it’s just bringing the whole room up. So, again, personnel, you know, great job with those guys, bringing those guys in. Obviously, they’re coached well. I know they’re coaches at Ohio State. They were coached well coming in. They’re eager, they’re super urgent, they’re tough. They’re exactly what you want on a free agent. And I’ll be honest with you, if they were drafted, I’d be fired up, too. I’m just even more now.”
A year ago, that guy was D’Anthony Bell.
“Yeah.”
What kind of year has he had?
“You know what? D Bell played his best ball. He took 64. He took every snap in that game. I don’t think that he had an ME or a real mental error. He played clean, efficient ball. But the best thing about D Bell is he’s a violent tackler. Coaching safeties for as long as I have, the one thing that people kind of, you know they think about man coverage, right? Or they think about the third level. The most important thing that you do at safety every play is tackle. And that young man can bring his feet all the way to a ball carry. And the other thing he does really well is when he violently wraps you, when he sinks his teeth into you, ball carriers go down, and that’s probably what he does best. But I’m proud of him. He’s done a great job to this point, too.”
Some of these big plays and the takeaways, even in the preseason, I mean, how do you expect that to translate into the regular season? Is there an emphasis, a plan that you guys have to kind of keep carrying over? Is it just natural?
“It’s not natural. It’s definitely well, to some players it is natural, but we’re working hard on it out know, Coach (Jim) Schwartz has, know, tracking deep balls pretty much every day we can. He’s big on again, when I say visual safeties, he’s big on those safeties. Finding the ball and getting as visual as soon as you can. When I say that, you may have to read a key, take your eyes there. But as soon as I can get my eyes back on that quarterback, that’s the positive of this defense. So, we’re hoping that it carries over. We’re going to keep doing the things you guys see us doing out here. We’re throwing balls constantly, shooting jugs constantly. And then my job, to provide Coach Schwartz with what he wants in terms of visual safeties and getting our eyes back to the quarterback soon as we can.”
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