New Orleans Saints Defensive Tackle David Onyemata
Conference Call with New Orleans Media
Friday, January 1, 2021

Malcom Brown's been back at practice this week fully practicing, how big will it be for you to get him back?
"It will be really huge just having everyone out there, him especially, just having his presence out there would be really huge for the defense."

Malcolm Roach, how have you seen him develop this season?
"Just taking coaching from Ryan (Nielsen) and BY (Bryan Young). And they both do a great job coaching and he's been, just based off watching him at practice, he's been taking that really good. The growth, it just keeps going week in and week out."

How much do you care about personal accolades? And do you feel like people in the league know who you are? Or do you even care about that type of stuff?
"No."

With Trey (Hendrickson), obviously, he missed last week, but now that there's only one more game in the regular season, how beneficial has his breakout season been for your group just knowing how reliable he's been on the edge?
"It takes everyone. It doesn't just take one person to win a game. So I see it this way, you might see something up front, but the guys back here like the DBs, they help with the coverage. That little second, maybe the second read from the quarterback might get the sack or things like that. So I see like, it's a group thing. That's how I see it."

I wanted to follow up on your one word answer to Rod (Walker) about not caring if people know who you are. A lot of people would say that I think to be humble, but I mean, is it something where it's just not something you focus on, or you really, more than even most people, it's a part of your personality, not to really care about accolades and attention?
"I'm not really an attention person. I try to be under the radar with certain things. I like to be able to go to the grocery store and kind of slide in there and slide out. So I think it's just like a personality thing."

Kind of follow up on that again, how would you evaluate the season you've had this season?
"It's been pretty good, like, it's not perfect. There's still, there's always going to be room for improvement."

What are some areas you think you need to improve on?
"It might be something you might have gotten right two weeks ago, and all of a sudden, going through the season, it's a pretty long season. So it's just about staying in it through every week. And sometimes it could be maybe your first step, or something like that. So it's always, it's something I'm always working in on all phases."

Cam (Jordan) always says that they really know you're going when you're kind of talking on the field. Do you initiate that? Or do you just respond when people are saying something to you? What's that chatter about?
"It depends. Like, if someone says something, I definitely have to finish the conversation."