 I think he continues to get better, you know, with the decision making, he has a lot of room, a lot of room to improve on certain things, whether it's, you know, certain cuts, when the return, when not the return continues to get better. There was one that he lost in the sun last week that I thought he did a good job of allowing that one to bounce into the end zone. It's great having a player like Avery back there that we can trust, that we trust with the football, we trust with making decisions for our team and putting our, trying to put our offense in the best field position as possible. So we're excited for him and he continues to get better with each and every rep. I definitely just don't know the answer to this. Like, has his move to running back in some ways helped him as a returner, you think? I think so because those are more opportunities for him whether he's in practice or in games with the ball in his hands. You know, he's a defensive back coming out of college, playing his last year at NFL's Rookie, and you don't get the ball in your hands as many times as you do at practice as an offensive player. So I think there are strong correlations to him being on offense now and how it correlates to the return game. So yes, I do believe that is helping him. Was he close to breaking one there? It looked like he might have been one away at one block or one step away. Oh yeah, he's been close whether it was a kickoff return that we had and then the last punt return that we had. We've been close and it goes back to like I talk about D-led. Not only is the returner a playmaker out there, but the other 10 guys out there are blocking. Those guys are playmakers. It's a long run play, six to seven seconds. It's a long play. So we got to hold on to our blocks a little bit longer to put our offense in the best position possible, which we did on that last punt return. And I was listening to Coach Shanahan yesterday and he talked about your, you all's ability to block kicks and that they've had some troubles there and what led not some returns too. I couldn't find the block kicks though, but what are you seeing in their units? Their field goal protection they did give up to this year so far. And then that's something throughout the league, whether it's technique at the protection or timing, operation. It happens throughout the league. They have a really good special teams unit starting with Coach Snyder. He does a great job with those guys. It's been an NFL for over 20, or even Coach Special Teams for over 21 years. I know he spent a lot of long time in Seattle. Those guys are physical over there. They have a really good unit. They did a good job in improving their overall unit with some free-agent acquisitions off this offseason with Odom number 30. He's a really physical fast player. And I want to say two years ago, he led the NFL in tackles. And in the last three years, he's had over 35 special teams tackles. So he does a great job. Ray Ray McLeod, he's doing a great job out there for those guys as well when it comes to returning and averaging almost 10 yards of return on punt return. But our guys are going back to your question. Those guys are rushing hard and any opportunity that we have to affect the kick, we're going to try to do that to help our offense and defense out in any way possible. Getting Kyle back if he can make it to Sunday. Yeah, I think anytime, you know, obviously we have players, you know, any out of the lineups. Anytime you get certain players back, if he's able to come back, great. If not, you know, we'll obviously have plans accordingly. And we'll see, we'll see how it goes during the week. Coach said, you know, last week they, you know, jumping in the gap, dropping back and not trying to get stuff over top. How did the guys adjust to, you know, how you all were able to attack them and get those touchdowns laid? Yeah, I think it was more about persistence. You know, obviously things weren't going the way we wanted to early and into the third. And then guys just kept chipping away and a credit to obviously what Tampa did defensively and then a credit to what the guys' mindset was going into fourth. And obviously we ran out of time, but, you know, trying to build off some of the things that we did well and correct the things that obviously we need to improve on. And the 49ers defense, I know a lot of Coach Kyle gave an injury update, so I don't know, a lot of people are, you know, questionable or whatever. But how's that unit been playing? What do you see in that unit? Yeah, I mean, I don't. Look, D'Amico has done an unbelievable job there. Kyle's known Kyle a long time. Kyle's done a great job of setting the tone. They have a great coaching staff over there, all through the position coaches. And I have a ton of respect for the culture and the type of the way they play football. And you can see it defensively. You can see how they play with a certain type of violence with the defensive line and linebackers. They close the cushions all over the field with the DBs. They got guys playing fast. And you always watch it on film. The teams that play fast, you know, they're obviously very well coached, but the players play with a ton of confidence. And you can see it on film. This defense obviously is going to provide a number of challenges for us in just the way they play, regardless of who's out there or not. It's the mindset in which they play. And I have nothing but the utmost respect, not just for the players, but the coaching staff over there. What do you consider an on-target pass versus a pass that is not on target? Well, we're going analytics on me on the very first question. Is it a trick question? On-target? You didn't prep me for that question walking in here, Mike. On-target would be near the offensive player. Off-target would be not near. I'm just trying to get, like, as a coaching staff when you're watching... No, I think a lot of that... Look, let me go a different way with it. I think sometimes when it comes to passes, right, the reality is what you want to have happen obviously is a completion. But what goes into that completion sometimes is, you know, everybody sees the end result, right? The reality is what goes into that end result is really what makes the end result possible, which I mean is route depth, route craft, timing in the pocket, trust on the throw, like, there's a lot of things that go into completing the football, especially in the NFL level, that isn't just was that ball on target. Like, the quarterback might have let it go with the anticipation of the receiver being in a certain spot, and just for whatever reason wasn't there, and vice versa. The quarterback might have threw it too late or too early, and therefore it looks like it's an off-target throw. There is nothing that will ever replace timing, spacing, and trust in the pass game. There's just nothing. And so when you see, you know, operations of certain offenses and completions and what offenses, certain offenses are trying to do because obviously we're all different, completing the ball takes a lot more than just, hey, the guy's open, it's an on-target throw. And I think when you look at it and you see the offenses and really the quarterbacks who are successful at certain times, right? It's just a trust factor, a belief factor, and the ability to be on the same page with the line-outs. And so when a ball is sometimes off-target, right, there is the element of sometimes a quarterback does just throw a bad ball, right, and you don't want to over-coach it. You know, play it and coach this position for a decent amount of time. Like sometimes a ball just comes out funky, right, and you don't want to sit there and be like, ah, dissect it all. Sometimes it's just a bad ball. And, you know, sometimes a receiver, right, it all comes back to fundamentals, and sometimes we're not in the right spot, or our eyes are not in the right spot, and negative things happen, which we don't want. And that's why we always will always go back, as I'm a broken record up here, to the fundamentals. And it starts every single day with pre-practice, end of practice, at the end of practice. I don't, regardless, and I've coached at every different level, regardless of level, it does not matter. It always goes back to belief and trust in your fundamentals. Was that okay? Did I just talk around the whole question basic of what I did there, right? Delay was on his phone, he's on Twitter, he doesn't care what I said, which is great. No doubt about it, right? So we're good. It's awesome. Look, trying to make it work here, babe. Just stay with that answer. I got nothing else for you at this point. I'm going to go there. We'll have the next question of you right now. You can make a question of me all you want, if you want. I mean, you act like I've never made the next question before. But, you know, when you do look at it, like, I guess, is that something that you can tell us as an old quarterback too, if the ball comes out, whether it's like you said a funky ball, or like you just look at, there's times where, you know, I think every quarterback is different, though, right? You look at certain quarterbacks and they can play with their feet all over the place. And some can play at, like, hall of fame levels. Some quarterbacks, when their feet aren't set, like, legitimately struggle to complete the ball. And I think, like, people get in the trap sometimes, like, oh, his feet and his mechanics. Like, at the end of the day, the most important thing that a quarterback has is confidence. And if he's got confidence, it's like a basketball player has seen the ball go through the hoop. Like, Steph Curry sees the ball go through the hoop and a couple of three is going to back up six or seven feet. And it's probably going to go in because he's got confidence the ball is going to go in. The reality is it might not be perfect fundamentally all the time. And just like a quarterback, right? Sometimes the pocket, this is the one thing I do think sets apart quarterbacks in the NFL and in college football, is the pockets are way different when you get to the different levels. And so the ability to throw when you can't step into a throw, the ability to change your arm angle, the ability to see, right, when sometimes it's just a little bit cloudy out there and you can't see everything but trusting, right, is really the difference from the quarterbacks that can have careers in this league and the ones that just, you know, don't last as you're talking to one right here, right? I mean, there are things that, you know, legitimately come with the utmost confidence and you have to have it at the position. And if you're searching for it, sometimes obviously you're going to struggle. Kind of sticking on this a little bit. When you look at, you know, I know you made a lot of on-target versus off-target in that. Do you think that gets overblown in terms of when the public looks at it because they don't necessarily know whether it was their secret that made the mistake or it was a quarterback? I'm just trying to understand that. No, sure. And I think, again, I think everybody has their own perspective, right, and own vantage point. I think that's the uniqueness of sports and I think that's the great thing about having fans and then you guys covering the game, right, you have your own vantage point. And so, however you see it, you see it, I just think from my perspective, obviously it's the world I live in, right, and I know where the play is supposed to design and go and things of that nature. I just think sometimes, right, as coaches too, we have to understand there's 21 other elements besides the quarterback that can affect, right, those other variables that can affect the play. And, you know, again, I know we all go back to the quarterback because it's an easy see the ball, see it thrown, stat lines, everything is easy to see in terms of how a quarterback's playing. And I'm not a quarterback defender or martyr, but I'm also saying, like, there are other things that factor in a really good quarterback play at times. And sometimes a quarterback just makes a great play. And I would always argue sometimes a great play, right, D-let is getting out of a sack and then throwing it away or getting out of a sack and getting a one-yard game. I know that's not like a gaudy stat line. But, again, if he's getting you out of bad plays, right, and you watch that on film, it might match just your quarterback, even watching somebody else on film, like, there is a true value in the ability of quarterbacks to negate negative plays as an offense because negative plays are going to happen. It's the quarterback's ability to keep your offense out of those. And then, again, will that show up on a stat line? No. But as a coach, you have an utmost appreciation for that player's ability to help you, right, keep the ball moving forward or not taking negative plays. Boy, I'm long-winded today, aren't I? My goodness. We were talking to Marcus yesterday and he was talking about how something hasn't developed most in his career is his ability to communicate with Arthur, specifically, is who we were referring to. But just in terms of the feedback kind of going both ways, in terms of not just trying to please the coach, but trying to have kind of more of like a conversation about what he's seeing to help the offense. How have you seen that? I don't want to speak for Marcus. That wouldn't be fair for me. But I think, like, just through the maturity and the maturation and the time of the quarter of X spends in this league, right, I think when you get in this league, you know, there's obviously a lot thrown at you as a rookie or a first or second-year player, right? There's things on the field, there's things off the field. But I think as you grow, and if you're able to stay in this league at the position and you get to see more, you get to experience more, you get sometimes you're the guy and sometimes you're not, and you get to learn from other coaches and players of what you like and what you don't. Because there was an old adage in football, you don't take it with you when you leave, right? And it's the same thing that goes with quarterbacks, right? You start to gain your voice as you get older in this league. It's sometimes harder to do when you're younger because there's just so many different experiences being thrown at you. Again, I'm not singling out Marcus, but the quarterbacks I've had who have been later in their careers in this league, yeah, they tend to see it a certain way just because they've been through a lot. The quarterbacks I've had who are younger, yeah, less likely to probably say something just because they can't always see around the corner what's going to happen next. So maybe that's what Marcus is referring to. But just in general, I think the longer in this league, the more you see, the more you're able to speak. Is Fred Warner the best linebacker in the national football world? We don't get in player comparisons or rankings here, D-led. He's a very, very good player. Like I said, and it's just not him. I have a ton of respect for everybody who plays on that defense. I mean, you've turned the film on, man. It is fast. It's quick. It's violent. It's downhill. And they force you into what? Into bad downs. They're able to get off the field. I mean, it's unbelievable what Coach Ryan's has been able to do with Kyle setting the tone there. The position coaches have done a phenomenal job of, you know, you really think about what they've been through with Kyle since he's been there, right? There's been a different D.C. You know, Roberts moved down to New York and then obviously Demico comes in. But what they're able to do though, man, they're able to sit there and understand what they want to have it look like. And then they're able to execute it. And that's why I give so much respect because it's easier said than done. And this will be a phenomenal challenge for us offensively. When you see an entire position group essentially questionable, like they're starting defensive line that appears like they might be, how do you prep for that versus... I don't look at it that way. Because it's a national football league. I get there's some really good players and some players that maybe haven't gotten the opportunity to show how great they are. Everybody's really good in this league. And so we go out about the mindset of preparing for a number of different scenarios or situations. But the reality is we're preparing as if we're going to see their best roster, which is whoever they suit up on Sunday. And so we're getting our players ready to go. We know San Francisco, the defense will be ready to go. We have no doubt about that. Just to piggyback off the Marcus question on how he improves his communication, how do you see that both in the weekend and in games? Yeah, that's a good question. I think when it comes to Marcus in general, it's just every day we're together as an offensive staff and players around him. And especially for me, right, my first year with him, you grow with the relationship just like you do with other players. And the more conversations you have with somebody, obviously the more you're able to see it the same way or at least communicate and be open about it. And I think that's what's transpiring. So about Fred Warner. I just realized you didn't answer my question. What do you mean? Absolutely. I have a ton of respect for him and everybody else there. I just don't... To me, I think it's unfair to rank players just because of... You guys have great, like, articles about that and stuff. What are some of the attributes of the 49ers offense that jump out at your coach with Sam, I guess, is the one layer that I talked about in the running back. We'll see. Well, they're a physical team. They do a lot on offense. They give you a lot of emotions. They give you a lot of looks. They're a very, very talented team. They've been up there every year playing for a championship or Super Bowl or winning their division. So it's really a great offense. Kyle does a great job with them. They've had a lot of continuity. There's a lot of... They've got a lot of talented players and they play physical and they know their system. They've got smart players too because to do all the things that they do, they ask a lot of a lot of guys like Juice and 44 and Debo 19. I mean, they ask a lot of those guys. I don't see them screwing too many things up. So they're smart. They're tough and they have continuity. That's a good offense. Do you think that you've seen at least right now in the league? They're all different. They all have a different style. I mean, it's whatever the style. The offensive coordinator or the head coach deems that he wants. It doesn't mean that it's any better or any worse than anybody else. It's just their scheme. I don't know if it's any more versatile. To me, like when we played Cleveland, they were versatile but in a whole different way with the team runs and stuff. That's very versatile too. It's just different styles. So to me, they're all versatile. Every week is a different challenge because it's a different style. When you're facing, because you have a player well, he's on IR now but in Cordero, that's at least similar and somewhat similar in skill set to Debo, does that help your defense at all because they faced him at least all training camp? I would say that there's things because our offense does a lot of things with a lot of different personnel groups that is beneficial just for the whole year. I think it's really good for us for the whole year having to deal with the motions and all the stuff that we had to deal with in OTAs and training camp. I just think that's good for our defense because it makes you have to communicate and you see so many different things. So I don't think it has anything to do with CP particularly or Debo particularly. I think it's just the scheme of our offense gives us a lot of looks that as defensive coaches you've got to sit down and say okay, how are we going to play this? It's the same thing when you face Baltimore and Lamar, that's going to be a whole different system and it's a very good system too. So it's just it didn't hurt, let's put it that way. You guys have had success so far this year again in limiting yards after the catch. What's that function? Well, it's always tackling. I don't know though I just still feel like we've got to get a lot better at tackling and open space. Spacely on these check downs we're taking away some of the deeper routes and stuff like that and making the guy check it down then you've got to come up and you've got to tackle. And we've missed a few of those that have led to some plays that aren't necessarily big plays but they're bigger than what they ought to be. They're first downs, they're moving the chains and that's the thing and that's also what's hurting us in total yardage that situation is we talked a little bit about last week. Again, this last week we had four third down and ones. We had four third down and ones the week before and it's hard. It's just hard to stop somebody for a yard whether it's a sneak or whatever it is it's just hard. And just look around the league and percentages go up the third down the longer that it gets. So we just and that's coming from second down and usually not always but a lot of times it's either a missed tackle or just not getting there as fast as we need to in zone coverage. On tackling, does it help at all having gone in the last couple weeks against Nick Chubb, Leonard Fornett like two of the toughest running backs in the league to bring down physically? Does that help you at all in the short term? Yeah, but if you really look at it I don't think most of our missed tackles have come from like guys running over you and guys running inside. They're running over open space which Chubb is I'm not saying all those guys are very good open field runners but that's really not their forte their forte is one cut downhill hit it a hundred mile an hour run over you they make move but ours that really come from more space and that's where we got to get a lot better as he's cutting down the space. We had a situation last week where we could have been off the field but we had to get down but then as we go to tackle the guy about three yards away we stop because we're worried about missing the tackle and then the guy and we make the tackle but the guy gets four yards we hit him and he falls forward he gets a first down it's still a first down you know that's the stuff we just got to keep closing the cushion and tackle the guy before he gets there not be like okay I want to make sure I make this tackle I just got to make it there not here you know and so that's like sometimes I've seen stats on linebackers oh this guy's got 20 tackles yeah all of them are six yards down field that's terrible you know but everybody's like this guy is our great tackler this guy's leading the league in tackles he's tackling the ball after it's a first down I mean it's like it's just stuff like that that can kind of be and we got to get better at that I think how good is Grady Jarrett playing great great if you open the dictionary and it said pro it'd be Grady Jarrett his name would be right behind it guy comes to work every day practices is but all places but all I told him in the offseason I wanted to do some different things with him moving him around different places like that here's a vet you know some guys might say you know I'm comfortable wherever you want and that's what we've done and it's shown up and we've tried to do some things with him and tried to get him in positions to make more plays because he plays hard he's a great leader he is a great captain I can't say a lot of things about him I mean he's just a love the guy do you think moving him around is why we've seen his production stats go up it's a little bit of that but it's just he's playing hard how many times too business a long time and sometimes guys get new contracts and all of a sudden they don't look quite as good as they did when they were trying to get the new contract he's playing better after he got a new contract which is exactly what you want a guy to be he gets rewarded and he's rewarding us so to me that's why he's great player and a great person you've got anything publicly you'd like to say about his about the Ruffin pastoralism last week does my look tell you enough I just wanted to give you the opportunity no my wife told me do not say anything no I'm not hey we're moving on San Francisco or you know San Francisco week moving on did your wife actually tell you that hmm yeah Coach how's Jimmy Garoppolo playing through a little bit of adversity and then he's back in the saddle I think he's playing really good I've never ever thought he didn't play good you know he's had moments what quarterback hasn't I mean it's like it's funny how guys get things said about him and every position that and then all of a sudden somebody says something about a guy and then that's what he has to live with for the rest of his career or something I think the guy plays great I've always thought he played great I he ate us alive last year so why would I not think he doesn't play great and they're winning what do you want the quarterback to do that's what he does they're winning how's your rookie linebacker coming along with Troy Edmson I thought he played pretty well what I really like about him is he's an aggressive guy he's got to make some rookie mistakes at times but you know what he's got to make them aggressive rookie mistakes and that's hey I'm fine with that the guy's going hard and practicing hard and learning like I said very pleased with him I know you said you don't want to talk about the great he roughed from the poundster club but what do you have to say to him after that because I mean that was I think maybe one of the more emotional moments I've seen in the last couple years nope