“Just being able to come in, obviously understanding the game, and being able to develop and not have to worry about all the things that come with being a rookie,” he said. “Shoot, just being able to focus on football, and fully focus on football, I think is a huge thing, compared to this time last year.”
He feels the key to the versatility he’s showing is as tied to what defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus is asking of him as much as it is the preparation it’s taken to have such abilities.
“Just being able to move around — the more you can do, the better you’re going to be,” Kneeland explained. “I think, obviously, just working on this year, this offseason, I’ve been a lot of getting my knee back from last year, and just being able to be healthy, be able to come off the ball, utilize my hands.
[When] my leg was down, I was doing a lot of handfighting, a lot of hand stuff, to try to make up for that. Now [I’m] coming back and gonna be better.”
It’s that mentality to level up that combines with Eberflus’ plan and also a points-based system of competitiveness created by the defensive ends’ room that has Kneeland finding a sweet spot going into Year 2. And for all of the joyful trash talking that’s been going on between Dante Fowler and rookie Donovan Ezeiruaku concerning it, as it turns out, it’s Kneeland who says he’s leading in points.
And that’s because he’s getting sacks, sure, but also everything else as well.
“Me,” he said with a huge grin when asked who tops the board currently. ” We have teams right now, so my team just got ahead of theirs. … [This level of competition] pushes you a lot. You know the saying: iron sharpens iron. If we go out there and you look at Sam [Williams] coming off the edge, ‘Ooh, he’s burning the edge, burning the edge, making plays.’ It’s like, ‘Shoot, let me go out here and do a little more.’
“You look over at Dono [Ezeiruaku] and he’s out there spicing it up, and you got [Dante] out here doing what he do and it’s like, ‘OK,, we’ve got all these guys that’s just out here making plays — now let me go get some. It’s all great.”
Kneeland is not only a part of one of the deepest and talented pass rush rooms in the NFL, but if he continues on his current trajectory, he could end up being one of the best in one of the best rooms.