SANTA CLARA – Adam Snyder had to take a phone call, so he was unavailable for comment this afternoon.
Frank Gore walked into the locker room at 12:50, a group of reporters crowded around him at his locker, the P.R. director said, “Frank, show them how you break through the line!” and Gore walked through the reporters to leave the room and go to meetings.
Vernon Davis walked out five minutes later. “Meetings!” The P.R. director reminded him, and Davis promptly left.
The typical offensive leaders have been no shows in the locker room so far this week. But maybe there’s a new spokesman for the offense.
Delanie Walker was upbeat and talkative this afternoon. He spoke to a large group of reporters and answered questions about zone blitzes, red zone offense, and more. He was beyond generous.
Here’s what he said.
Q: One of the red zone theories has been that you guys have so many weapons on offense this year, you haven’t been able to concentrate on getting just a couple of them going in the red zone. Do you think there’s any truth to that idea?
WALKER: You know man, I really can’t tell you. We practice hard every week for the red zone. We just get in the game and for some reason it just don’t fall through. Either the defense has a good scheme for us or we don’t execute the play right. Sometimes we shoot ourselves in the foot, so this we’ve got to make sure that we do everything possible to get our assignments right and get the ball in the end zone. We’ve got the playmakers to do that.
Q: Does it help that you’re coming off playing a defense that’s very similar to the one you’re playing on Monday?
WALKER: Most definitely. They’ve basically got the same defense and almost similar guys, so we’ve got to everything we can. We’ve already seen it last week, so we might be a little bit prepared for that.
Q: You’ve been doing this for a while – is zone pressure a big deal as opposed to man-to-man pressure? Is that something that can really throw off an offense?
WALKER: Not at all. One thing that throws us off is the blitzes. You’ve got to pick the blitzes up. You’ve got to give Alex enough time to throw the ball and make the right decisions. So this week we’re going to hurry up to the line of scrimmage and get set. We’ve been a little slow in the last past weeks of getting in the huddle and getting the play and getting to the line of scrimmage. We’ve got to give Alex a chance to see the defense so he can make the calls and get a better opportunity to see what’s going on before we snap the ball. I think that’s the biggest key.
Q: Giving him a chance to audible if he needs to?
WALKER: Yeah, and that’s one thing on the players part. Coaches have been getting the plays in, but as players we’ve been getting to the line of scrimmage slow, so we’re going to pick that up and make sure we get to the line of scrimmage faster so Alex can have a chance to read the defenses and make the audibles.
Q: Are you guys getting out of the huddle late because Alex is calling two plays in the huddle?
WALKER: No, it’s not that. We have a lot of personnel so it’s just switching in and out. We’ve just got to really hustle getting back into the huddle.
Q: Do you think you guys would be better off if you didn’t shuffle personnel as much?
WALKER: No, I think that’s our game. Our personnel scheme is our game. We’ve just got to do a better job of getting back to the huddle and making sure that we hustle back so we can get the play and get to the line of scrimmage.
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