Read the full transcript from HC Jeff Hafley's media availability on June 2, 2026.
We noticed that Aaron Brewer wasn't here last week at the OTA session. Is he here now and what was the reason for last week's absence?
Jeff Hafley: Yeah, family obligation that we knew about. He's here and he'll be back out there today.
Is anyone missing?
Jeff Hafley: From today? No, nobody's missing. We've got them all here.
What have you been told, if anything, about if there are any positive indicators regarding the Brewer contract talks?
Jeff Hafley: Sully and I have had talks, but I think those are between Sully and I, as you would imagine I'd answer. I love Brewer. I love the way he's practiced. I love the way he's gone about his business and hopefully that gets ironed out.
For Brewer, he's going to have potentially a rookie on his left and a second-year guy on his right. Is this a time period where he builds trust in those guys so that when you get into training camp and the season, it's not he feels the need to overcompensate for maybe young guys making young mistakes?
Jeff Hafley: I think it's the whole o-line. I mean, I think those guys in general all have to work together, probably more so than any other unit on the field, whether it's in the run game and combination blocks, whether it's in pass protection, when we're sending overloads and twists and stunts; they've got to feel each other. They got to communicate, but they all have to be on the same page, so I don't just think it's one guy. I think it's all the guys who have to learn how to play together and help each other out. And any time you have young guys on an offensive line, the older guys all have got to step up and help them out. So yeah, I think it will be Brewer, I think it will be Jonah (Savaiinaea), I think it'll be Austin (Jackson). I think it'll be all of them.
We know that Malik Willis is the presumptive starter. What do you want to see from Quinn Ewers this this minicamp and in training camp?
Jeff Hafley: Yeah, I want Quinn to continue to get better and battle and compete and do everything he can to show us that he's the best quarterback on the field. I want everybody at every position to do that. Quinn's done a nice job. He's got familiarity with some of the scheme, and I think he's gotten better. He's made some really good throws. He's learning the offense and I'm really pleased with where he's at right now.
What have you seen from him specifically in the OTAs that impressed you or that he needs to work on?
Jeff Hafley: Yeah, he's smart. Just standing back there from a defensive perspective, he knows where to go with the football. He gets rid of it on time. He sees the defenses really well. There are some times when he'll hide his eyes really well. A lot of quarterbacks like to start down the middle of the field early in the down. Usually when they hit their back foot, they've got to kind of get into their progression, which you guys if you watch, you'll see; but he'll hide it for a long time. I mean, he'll even throw some no-look passes where all go up to him and be like, 'if there's a rush, buddy, that ain't happening.' You know what I mean? Like, he'll be looking over here and give one of these. And so I've had to tell him a couple times not to get too bored because the rush will be coming after him soon, and I'll make sure if a quarterback's going to give us no looks, that he'll get hit from the other side fairly quickly. But I really have been pleased with him. He's really grasped everything well. He sees it well, he processes really quickly. I think he's improved, and I like being around him.
Have you talked about Malik Willis in that for a guy who wins outside of structure as frequently as he does, how can you have him work in this stage when there's not a lot of quarterback runs that you can design?
Jeff Hafley: Well, he's got to play quarterback right now. There's not a lot of team in any practice setting, right? I mean, any time we practice whether it's team run, team pass, just move the ball periods, two-minute; in practice I want to see him go through his progression, get rid of the ball on time and at the same time, if it's not, then I want him to play the game like he would in a game. Don't just stand there in the pocket, take five hitches and let guys run by you, because any quarterback who does that is going to get sacked in a game and I think you create really bad habits. Those guys who can't do what he can do, they better step up and throw the ball or they're going to take a lot of sacks. Now Malik's got the ability to sit in the pocket, go through his reads, and if things break down and he should work outside the pocket because he's going to put stress on the ends, he's going to make sure our pass rush lanes are good because if you don't have good pass rush lanes against him and you have a huge B-gap or A-gap, he's going to step up and he's going to be gone. So he puts stress on the defense and he needs to practice like that. I think there's a fine line when you don't want to do too much of that but I want him to play the game within the game a little bit – 7-on-7, not a huge fan of 7-on-7 because I don't think it's real football. I think from a defensive standpoint, when you're playing some vision and break coverages and you're just kind of setting as a linebacker and you're anticipating a throw, a lot of times you can feel the rush and break. So I don't think it's real for defense, and I don't think it's real for the timing and the pressure of the offense. But 7-on-7 is a really good time for him. We're staying in the pocket and get rid of the ball on time and there is no rush, so it's kind of like part to whole. I thought Malik had a really good practice Friday. He looked really confident. He stepped into his throws. The ball came out on time. He hit some big throws in the red zone. I thought it was one of his best days. I think what you're going to see – and I know I'm being long with you right here – but I think what you're going to see is we've been really heavy on the installs and we're starting to come back to like install one and two now. So it's the second time through so you can see the confidence almost the way he's stepping up and throwing because he's seeing it better. We've installed a lot just to try to get it in and have film of it as we get into training camp and the season. But I think you can see the confidence building now that we're kind of going back through it again.
That's kind of an interesting segue that I wanted to ask what changes between OTA and minicamp? Is there a material difference or is it like a natural progression of everything you've been learning throughout the offseason?
Jeff Hafley: If I'm just going to be completely honest with you guys, the only thing different in minicamp is we're going to meet with them in the afternoon and watch tape. Now, what I've said to both sides of the ball, we've had a lot of install, so for these three days, I kind of want to go back and pull from the early installs and not continue to add at this point. So I had that conversation with the defense and the offense. Let's not add at this point. Let's just repeat some stuff so these guys can do it again. That's probably the biggest difference. There's really not much. We'll do some more team combined a little bit more maybe, but you guys shouldn't notice a huge difference.
Kind of connecting with that as well, you've said the past couple practices, the voluntary workouts and everything that's been going on that you've been observing. What do you expect or hope to get out of the next three days from this group as we kind of start evolving quickly and getting closer to training camp?
Jeff Hafley: Higher level of execution. If I'm going to ask the guys to repeat installs for the second time and it won't be the first time they're doing it, I want to see who can retain and who can execute at a high level. You want to see the chemistry on both sides of the football, the communication and just a higher level of execution. We've got them to the point right now where I told them today, I love the way they're practicing, the way they're running to the ball, the way they're competing, the energy that they're practicing with, just the way they're running from drill to drill. And I kind of feel good about the structure of that. I don't think because it's minicamp, I think because it's a further week in and next week I hope it's even better. I want to see the execution get better. I want to see who can take what we've done over the past however many weeks and improve. I think that's going to be really important.
Are Tyrel Dodson and Jacob Rodriguez essentially competing for the same green dot position?
Jeff Hafley: I think they're just competing to play linebacker, and we'll put the best linebackers on the field, whether we have two in the game at a time, three in the game at a time or some different packages. I think there's competition amongst all those guys, but I wouldn't call it like a battle for the green dot. We've mixed around who's wore the green dot in practice. When I was in Green Bay, in practice, truthfully, I had the safeties in the green dot, I've had all the linebackers in green dot because I want them to hear how the call comes in so they can start training for that. I think the misnomer is, oh, he won't be able to handle the green dot, this guy can't handle the green dot. I don't believe in that. I believe you can teach guys and over time train them all so if they have to call it, they have to call it. So when we get into training camp, we'll figure all that out. T Dot (Tyrel Dodson) has done a great job with the green dot in the past. He's a great communicator, and he's been doing a good job calling it here. Jacob is learning. Now in college, you actually have the helmet-to-helmet communication, which is nice because it's not the first time that they're doing it, but it will be good eventually to hear my voice and how I call it in. There's kind of a rhythmic cadence to that, right, because some of the calls can get lengthy even on defense, so it'll be good for all those guys to hear it. We don't have the safeties in the helmets now, but that's a good reminder. I should make a note of that.
Along those same lines, I know in the past Jordyn Brooks hasn't been necessarily a fan of having the green dot. Just with what you just said, has he even tried the green dot?
Jeff Hafley: Oh, he's worn it and he's called it, and I think he did a really good job with it. Whether or not that's how we'll go during the season, that's not what's important to me right now. It's sometimes it's nice to force guys to be uncomfortable, get them out of their comfort zone and then they start to realize that they can do it and they can get comfortable. It's just reps and it's just time and it's just straining to do it. We'll figure that out in training camp, but for right now, we're rotating who's doing it, when they're doing it. And that's very important to me because you never know when he's going to have to do it in a game and he's definitely capable of doing it.
Last week we saw you guys were doing a lot of passing plays. We saw Jaylen Wright in there and not a lot of Ollie Gordon II. I guess does that tell us the way that you're thinking about using them, that Jaylen would be more of a receiver and Ollie more of a...?
Jeff Hafley: No, I just think that's – like I can honestly tell you that's coincidence. That was not planned. So it's just the plays that you' watched or maybe it was scripted or maybe Ollie got plays in another period; but that's pure coincidence there.
How would you describe the chemistry building process between Malik Willis and his wide receivers?
Jeff Hafley: I think it's a work in progress. We've had six practices with limited reps, so I just think it's going to take time. I think it's improved. It's going to be a work in progress and it's going to take a lot of reps, just like it would with any new quarterback and new wide receiver group, and then you add in we've got a lot of young wideouts that just came in. But whoever's playing quarterback right now – it's Malik, it's Quinn (Ewers), it's Cam (Miller) – it's just going to take time with the rhythm.
Just following up on that with the install with the receivers, the youth there. Is there anything that stood out in that wide receiver room for you? Can you tell at this stage any surprises or guys that you're like, okay, maybe this guy can have a role for us this year?
Jeff Hafley: That's hard to say because I don't know if I came in with any expectation or I hadn't really seen these guys live. I think that's a group that I want to see who can continue to get better, learn the offense, run routes, what their skill set is. Whether it's Malik (Washington) in the slot, I think he's done a really good job with the catch and run. I think he's getting better as a route runner. Then a guy like (Jalen) Tolbert, you can move him around and do a lot of different things with him. From those guys just in general, it's just going to be improvement and we'll tell in training camp. But I didn't really have any expectation when I came in to say, wow, that's a big surprise to me, so we'll see as we get going and we start to play real football.
What are the ways you feel your defense can benefit Chop Robinson?
Jeff Hafley: Hopefully he becomes an every down player. I think the easy answer is his pass rush, his get off, his ability to affect the quarterback; but I'm looking for a lot more from Chop. He's going to play a position where he's going to line up in a 9-technique and play on tight ends and he has to set the edge; and he's going to have to reduce down to a 6-technique and play through tight ends. He might reduce down and play a 5-technique. There's going to be pass rush times when he's going to be coming off the edge. We might slide him around, move him around to put him in good situations, but he needs to become a complete football player going into Year 3, and we have high expectations for him. We need to coach him, we need to develop him, but the guy's got such a good attitude. He's working so hard and I'm excited to see where that goes.
