Cal football spring practice no. 3: Peter Sirmon addresses the state of the defense

The Cal defense needs a bounceback season and its defensive coordinator addressed questions on Friday regarding where they were at.

Credit: Cal Football

Previous spring practice press conferences (Monday with Justin Wilcox and the QBs and Sterlin Gilbert; Wednesday with Mike Bloesch and TJ Session).

The unit under the most scrutiny to improve this season is the Cal defense. Defensive coordinator Peter Sirmon spoke with the media on Friday addressing last year and where the team is currently at this spring.

On last year’s disappointing defensive performance

I think it was a culmination of a lot of things. We weren't as disruptive as we need to be in the front seven with tackles for loss and negative yardage plays. We had, I thought some sack opportunities that we just didn't finish.

And then when the ball went on the perimeter vertically, sometimes we didn't play the ball as well as I think we can, or definitely didn't play as well as we should.

I's the separation, the difference between knowing and doing. And I really feel like 98% of the time, I think the kids can tell you what the techniques are, what is what we're trying to get accomplished.

How much of last year’s struggles were on the pass rush vs. the seconday

I think four of the top five defenses in pass defense were from all from the same conference. So there's some context to who you're competing against. Fortunately, unfortunately, we played some extremely talented quarterbacks last season. That's that's not an excuse. We played some good teams and we have to we have to play better.

What are you seeing from the new defensive backs?

Isaiah Crosby has been playing with the ones and the twos. Marcus Harris has played a lot of ball. He's a very productive player at Idaho. And Ja’ir Smith … is in the mix playing some.

All those guys have really good traits. The three of them are extremely athletic. I think Marcus and Isaiah might be the two fastest players we have on the football team. Guys that have some exceptional straight line speed, some recovery speed and the ability of trying to get the ball if the ball does fit, trying to get the ball on the ground and then just play another snap.

All three of those guys seem to come in with a little bit of swag to them, kind of like know that last year.

Anybody in particular jumping out so far?

I think David Reese, Xavier Carlton, I think those are two players that have really established themselves with some leadership qualities. They're coming out here, they're behaving like leaders, they're talking like leaders and they're playing like leaders. So I think that's fantastic for those guys to step into that role. You're looking for that every year on a new team.

On newcomers

You know, the we have some new new faces here. So Luke Ferrelli from Carlsbad is is a very talented player. He played some edge in high school. 18 years old, always got a smile on his face. You know, he's a guy that's getting some opportunities.

And then Aaron Hampton, who was a player that joined us up from Anchorage, and he's he's getting a lot of opportunities as well. So we have those three true freshmen mid-year.

So they're getting a great opportunity. And, you know, we'll continue to add some people, you know, in the roster and make sure that's a that's a unit that has a blend of experience and youth and talent.

On the ACC move changing recruiting strategy

Yeah, I think the the east and the southeast and even the northeast region with … some of the Syracuse and the North Carolina region with all the schools. I think it's a a great footprint for us.

I think we're still pretty primarily a West Coast operation. You feel like we're really starting to dig deep into Texas. They do a good job of producing football players.

We're going to really, really, really get limited on how much off campus contact we're having that it's going to have to be a lot more people coming to see us.

And it's going to be interesting to see if the high school recruiting turns a little more regional just because if we don't, we're not going to have … 156 days on the road. The windows in December for some of the off campus contacts are going to be minimized. So we're having a harder time actually getting to see those kids in person for evals.

On Cade Uluave

He'll be joining us. Right now he is unavailable. He's got a little to deal with something in the in the training room. But I anticipate Cade to be with us very, very soon. Nothing long-term going on.