Read the full transcript from DC Sean Duggan's media availability on September 10, 2026.

I don't think another team has a younger secondary as far as guys who are going to play. Do you and Hafley just excuse youthful errors to an extent or do you make clear to your secondary players that it's not going to be tolerated, the fact that you're young, you still got to do things the right way?

Sean Duggan: Yeah, I think when it comes to youth, you want guys to constantly get better. Are there going to be growing pains, sure. That's the reason we practice too, right? There's growing pains for everybody, it's why you practice. We're never going to make an excuse and use youth as an excuse for guys making a mistake, that's our job as coaches to get them ready and it's their job to be prepared and execute the game plan. But there are going to be growing pains. It is yYear 1. So we're just got to continually get better every single day and every week.

There are older defensive backs, obviously, who have miscommunications in the secondar. It's a common thing around the league. But to guard against that with young players in particular, how much have you and Ryan Downard and the defensive backfield coaches emphasized your communication must be down?

Sean Duggan: The communication is everything. The safeties run the show back there as far as our coverages and getting checks, getting in and out of the right calls. It's everything. The biggest thing we stress to them too is the volume of their communication because that does reflect confidence in the call, confidence in knowing what you're doing. And that trickles down to the linebackers and it trickles down to the d-line if they're involved in it. But communication is critical in the back end.

Along those same lines, what should we look for just from an evaluation standpoint from the this young secondary?

Sean Duggan: Yeah, I think the first thing at least, we're always going to judge ourselves on, is how hard we play, how hard we play, how together we play. Is it 11 hats running the ball? Our play style is always going to be the most important thing to us. Then I don't want to tell you how to judge it. (laughter).

We try to overcommunicate in the press box. Ryan Fitzpatrick told us that we need to overcommunicate.

Sean Duggan: That's good, you guys are taking the field lessons to the press box. I like it.

How well prepared do you think Jacob Rodriguez is for this green dot assignment?

Sean Duggan: I think he's done a really nice job. It's something he's done since he's gotten here. You know, he's gotten better at it. I think the communication with him and Haf during the play call, getting kind of the rhythm of how he calls things has gotten better and better. Something I've appreciated about him is he's been open about hey, I kind of like it more like said like this, and Haf's it's like, well, I like to say it like this. So it's kind of, it's fun to see a rookie take that ownership of the call and that ownership of having the green dot on him. But he's done a nice job, he really has. He's gotten better and more comfortable with the playbook and with the calls and how to word it to the rest of the defense.

When you guys hear that Brock Bowers is not playing, is there like a small fist pump and then you get back to work? How do you handle that? Do you celebrate a little or what?

Sean Duggan: I don't think we ever celebrate. Definitely wouldn't use that word when it comes to a player being injured. But to us it's just OK, this is the news, OK, then what's the next step as far as game planning, right? What adjustments do we need to make? How can we fine tune our game plan for our players and put them in the best spot. During the week it's always kind of, OK, what's the next thing? How do we adjust? What do we need to do to put ourselves and put our players in the best position possible? You know and that's matchups. Who's on the field is obviously important. Okay, if this guy's not, where else can we put our attention? If there were certain calls that were predicated to a certain player or so forth, what's the next step of the game plan?

How much would you quantify that a game plan could show change when a player like Bowers - not to ask you to reveal how it specifically will change - but when a player like Bowers is bound to be out, how much does it change?

Sean Duggan: I think anytime in general there's a premium player, a really good player on the offensive side of the ball, you have to account for them. It's almost negligent not to, just be like, 'oh, we're just going to kind of – we can just do what we do.' Yes, there's an extent to that, but also you need to understand what they're going to do. And this isn't just the Raiders, this is every team. If you're playing a team with a premium receiver, well you got to account for the guy. And again, if something changes in the week and they're not playing, well then you just adjust your game plan accordingly. But I think you always need to respect really good players in this league.

I guess Ashton Jeanty said an hour or so ago that he's good to go, that he plans to play. What makes him unique or challenging?

Sean Duggan: I think what makes him a really good back, obviously he's got speed. His stop/start's really good. He can accelerate and hit his top speed very fast, which makes him a home run threat. And then I think the thing that people notice about him is his contact balance. He's a back that does not go down easily. He can take hits, he keeps running, he fights for extra yards, runs behind his pads. He's a good pass catcher out of the backfield. I know he showed that a lot in college. I just have a lot of respect for the way he runs the football. You know he very rarely just goes down on the first hit and goes backwards. So that's good – it's going to be a really good challenge for us.

Speaking of their backfield, what did Mike Washington Jr. show you this preseason that impressed you?

Sean Duggan: I think he's another really good back. A bigger back, I think he's listed around 6-2. He runs hard. And again, his straight line speed and his ability to get to his top end speed was impressive. I think he's got good vision. I think you see that he's a patient runner, then he can accelerate. Which is always hard because it forces defenders to play their primary gap and you can't shed and get out of a gap too soon and then he could be gone.

Hafley was talking this week about the difference between being on the field versus in the booth and referred to you being his eyes in the booth. And you said you guys see the game in a very similar way. I was curious how that comes to be. Is it something that you recognize early in the coach? Do you guys have a kind of a mind meld? Is it years together? How do you get to that point where you guys have so much trust in each other?

Sean Duggan: I think it's a little bit of both. You know it started, I guess it was what, 2019 at Ohio State. I think just our communication, we were sitting next to each other in the booth, so our communication was really good and we just kind of saw things happening the same way. Kind of having the answer to any problem we saw in the field was very similar. And then just being together for so long, you just build up that trust and you kind of start to see and say things similarly. So I think the answer is both.

With a defensive minded head coach, how much easier does that make your job or more complicated? What are your thoughts on it?

Sean Duggan: I've only had two head coaches in the NFL, they've both been great. I think you learn different things from each side of the ball. I know I learned a lot from Coach LaFleur in Green Bay. He was incredible to work for and I've learned a lot from Haf. I think obviously they're different, but they're the same. At the end of the day, they're running the team. Their personality, their culture is going to rub off and it's our job as assistant coaches and coordinators to push their message and kind of build the culture that they want to establish.

Hafley told us that all your three top safeties are all going to play on Sunday. They're all going to get significant snaps. Would you mind going over each one of those as far as their strengths with Dante, Zayne, who you've obviously been around for two years, and Michael?

Sean Duggan: I'll start with Dante, I think he does a really good job. Again, all three are really good communicators, which we talked about the importance of that in the back end, so I think it starts there. I think his body control, he's very poised, you never really see him in panic in coverage. And whether that's in zone, dropping into the right place, having a good spatial awareness. And then his poise when he is asked to play man. He's got a good ability to be physical with tight ends or if he's matched up on a slot, he does have enough athleticism to do that. Zayne, really good communicator. I think his ability in the deep part of the field is pretty good, covers some ground, got really good ball skills. And then Taaffe, last time I spoke with you guys, talked about him, I think he's a really smart player. Puts himself in really good spots, he's very rarely out of position. And then he does a really good job just continuing to learn from mistakes. You asked about youth and yes, there's growing pains, but you learn from those mistakes and you don't make them twice. So I think all three of those guys are doing a really good job and I'm excited to see them on Sunday.

You've got two bigger physical cornerbacks in JuJu and Jason. Going back to your experience in Green Bay, you guys like to play a lot of zone. Does that kind of force you to adapt what you do and styles that you play when you know they have this varied skill set?

Sean Duggan: That was one of the first things I think we talked about – we're always going to adapt to our personnel. We're going to figure out what our guys do best and try to put them in the best positions for them. I think when it comes to corner – bigger corners, they do have traits. It helps you to be physical, use your length, but it helps in zone because you can cover more ground, but then in man it helps. If you're in press man, you can keep a wide receiver at the line, you can get the cut off, you can use your length to control that route. So the answer, I guess, is yes. We do want to adapt and use what those guys do best, but I don't think it's just zone. I think we're going to consistently learn about our guys as the season goes on and we're going to evolve. In Green Bay, we started out really the first couple of games we played a lot of man in 2024. Then we evolved as season went and we adapted to the personnel. And last year was different. We got personnel that showed up the week before the game. They were d-lineman, but it changes the way you play defense. I think you're constantly evolving, just always trying to think about, how do I put this guy in the best position so he can use the traits he has.

Going back to what Haf said about coaching from the booth, he described it as almost like serene. Said it's quiet, peaceful –

Sean Duggan: Air conditioning, too (laughter).

He said it's almost like playing a video game. I'm curious what your experience is like coaching from the booth, what's your take on it?

Sean Duggan: I've been on both the field and been in the booth, I kind of do agree. The booth to me is just – it's calming, it's quiet. You're always, 'what's the problem, how do we fix it?' You're always kind of trying to think a step ahead. You have room to lay out notebooks and call sheets and take notes. When you're on the field, it's loud, there's emotion. Not to say you're not thinking about answers to problems or trying to get ahead. It's just there's a little more chaos going around you. So I think the booth is great. And like we said, air conditioning here. Very nice, huge.

Willie Gay Jr. is a veteran on a young team. What have you seen from him? What do you want to see from him this season?

Sean Duggan: I think the first thing I always think about when I think of Willie is just his play style. He plays the game of football the right way. He plays the way we believe in. Plays to the whistle, plays 100 miles an hour. Even if he makes a mistake, he does it full speed, which I think you can really appreciate as a coach. You see guys when they make mistakes, sometimes they're slowing down or they're playing like 'oh man, I messed that up.' He just goes. So that's always the first thing I think about. He's always vocal, always in a good mood when he's out there. He brings people up, right? Like when you're around Willie at practice, your day gets better because you can feed off his energy. What I want to see from him is really what I want to see from all of our players. Play the game the right way, play fundamentally sound, play as hard as you can. If you make a mistake, don't worry about it, fix it. You know, fix it after. We'll correct it on the sidelines and try to learn from it.

The addition of Tyler Linderbaum – how does it kind of bolster their offense?

Sean Duggan: I think Tyler is a really good player. We were able to play him last year in Green Bay when Baltimore came to town and you got to see him live. I think he's a really good player. He's really smart. He's a hard guy to fool as far as him either making protection calls, run points, stuff like that. He does a really good job with that. Obviously, he's very quick off the line. He can run, he can get to the second level. And then he's big enough to anchor. He's got some size to him where you can't just think go power or I'm just going to physically try to manhandle this guy every play, or when it comes to pass rush, you have to work an edge. I think he's a really good center.