Chargers’ Ladd McConkey: Justin Herbert’s will to win is so evident | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

Chargers’ Ladd McConkey: Justin Herbert’s will to win is so evident | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

Joining us now, a man who was a second round pick of the Los Angeles Chargers in 2024 and set an all-time NFL rookie receiving record for yards in a playoff game with 197 also separately 1149 in his rookie regular season. He is Lad McConi. Lad, welcome. How are you? I’m good. I’m good. Thanks for having me on. Oh, it’s great to talk to you. It’s great to see you. the Chargers and usually this is a bi-week thing and I looked it’s like they’re not on a by-week so you know this is something you got to squeeze into your regular routine. How disruptive is this? Especially when you know there are technical issues that maybe delay the start by about 10 minutes. No, it’s all good. Uh I know football comes first. I get all my work done block in. Um that’s that’s always the first in everything. So I do that. Uh but I know I’m glad that we got some time and we’re able to talk. And we thank our friends at Dr. Pepper for making you available. We’ll get into the reason why later because I got some special requests for you when we talk about that. For now, I want to ask you this because we see receivers make it to the NFL highly drafted and sometimes it works out quickly and sometimes it takes some time. Why was it so easy for you or why did you make it look so easy right away? I was about to say it was uh it was far far from easy. There was a lot of hard days. You made it look easy. Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, but no, I just kind of try to take the take the approach like I’m trying to prove myself every single day. Um, you and I both know that the NFL is a what can you do for me right now league. Um, so whether you’re you know, you can have one good week and then have a bad week the next and it’s like, oh, okay, what’s this what’s this guy doing? So, I just try to go out every single day and try to prove myself and prove my worth. I’m glad you called it that because people always say it’s what have you done for me lately? And no, it’s what are you doing for me right now? Yep. And what are you going to do for me tomorrow? That’s all that matters in the NFL. You got to prove yourself every single day for you when and we always hear with each higher level of football the first impression is holy crap it’s fast. Yeah. When did the NFL slow down for you? H I would say it really started to slow down maybe midway, you know, midway through the season last year. You know, I thought I was gonna be I was like I’ve played in the SEC. I’ve played, you know, I’ve seen fast. Um, then I got in the first game against the Raiders last year and my head was just was just spinning. My my mind was going a lot faster than my body was. But, uh, yeah, once I just settled down and, you know, understood understood what I needed to do and how to do it, I feel like it opened up a whole new game for me. Who gave you the first hit where you realized this is different? Shoot. Uh, geez, I don’t know. I don’t know who I guess I my very first catch it was a you know it was a it was a hard hit didn’t like you know hurt or anything but it was like I caught it expecting to have a little bit more room and I caught it as soon as I turned he the linebacker was right there so I guess my first one it was like okay they’re they’re closing a little bit faster than I’m used to. We always hear talk about quarterbacks having to make the adjustment because the windows get tighter at the NFL level. But from the perspective of a receiver, the tighter window makes it harder. There’s more contested catches. There’s fewer opportunities to be wide open. Is that part of the adjustment that you experience? Oh yeah, 100%. It’s a it’s a contested catch league. Like you’re not just going to go out there and kill people by 10 yards every single route. as much as I’d love to, uh, you’re going to have to make the tough catches and people are going to be draping on your back and grabbing your arm and seeing what all they can get away with. So, uh, contested catches is important part of this game for sure. We hear all the things that guys do to improve their hands and the hand eye coordination and the jugs machine and all that. Is there a way you can train to better catch a contested pass without actually being out on the field being defended and trying to catch him that way? Uh, I mean, you kind of hit it. You can I’m I’m a big believer in the jugs. I’m I’m on the jugs pretty much every day after practice. Just getting catches in um and just getting reps after reps after reps. But like when you talk about on the field, practice is really when you when you got to lock in and do it. Whether it’s a walk through, whether it’s a full speed rep, whatever it is, it’s like, okay, catch, go eyes at the tug, just spend an extra second on the catch point. And it might not be like that in the game, but if you can train yourself in practice, then you’re you’re going to, you know, be that much better when it comes down to it. We see guys from time to time drop passes because they’re running before they have the catch. And you seem to be very good at securing the ball while you’re taking off. You had a long catch and run the other night and you had to kind of juggle and hold the ball and you were gone. H how much of that is natural ability? How much of it is a learned skill where you can start down the field with the yak yardage before you actually have the ball fully secured? Yeah, there’s uh there’s no such thing as yards after drop. So, you gotta you got to make sure you catch it first. And that’s something, you know, I try to be more persistent on is like spending some time on the catch point and understanding when you have those when you have the time to, you know, get those extra yards. And when it’s like, okay, it’s third down. Let me move let me make the catch. Let me move the sticks. Um and then whatever you can get after that, it’s a big play. So, I always um you know, try to approach it with a mindset like if I got the ball in my hands, I’m going to try to go score, but also learning and understanding when, okay, let me just secure this catch. Let me move the sticks. Let me keep this uh drive going for the offense. What do you take more pride in, your hands or your speed? Oh, I mean, I it have to be my hands. If I if I if I can’t uh if I’m not making the catches, then then there’s nothing uh I’m playing the wrong position. Yeah, there’s plenty of fast guys where you see the ball bounce off, right? Yes, sir. 4-39. And I do have to I do have to mention this because the 58 yard play the other night was impressive. It was a great throw by Justin Herbert and you had a guy draped on you and you made the catch. You secured the ball and you took off. I should have scored before you I’m sure you thought you were going to beat Jaylen Ramsay. I’m sure you thought you were going to get to the end zone. I mean I Yeah, I went back and watched the clip. I think I should have just trusted my speed. I should just put my head down and run. I got caught up looking back at him and But no, great. You made a great move. You made a great move. I thought you were going to pop all the way across the field. Yeah, I should have just trusted. I should have just kept running straight. Uh, great play by him. I mean, not giving up and and putting the effort in. And he can still run. People People can get still give him some credit, too. But, well, and he had an angle, too, right? He had an angle. We’ll make all the excuses for sure. When when you’re pop free like that, because it looked like you were maybe looking back. Is there different guys do different things? Do you look up at a video board? Do you look back? How do you trust and figure out where the guy is who’s chasing you? Well, in Sofi, it’s like our jumbotron is like wrapped around in the middle. So, there’s there’s no looking looking up at that one. I don’t have any help. But, no, I think uh I think more than doing that, I just got to put my head down and run and like, okay, don’t worry about where he’s at. I have green grass in front of me. Just hit it and trust that, you know, I do run a 43 and I I have some top end speed. When you finished your rookie season, I assume you did a postmortem on what went well, where you want to improve. What was the one thing you wanted to work on for your second season? Just being more consistent. Um I feel like, you know, rookie year, like you said, beginning of the season, things are super fast. Like I left some things out there. Um so just being more consistent and I think that’s still the goal this year. Feel like I’ve left some things out there, but I’ve, you know, I’ve played good ball at times. So two, so um just want to, you know, be a great player day in and day out. What have you done to develop the relationship with Justin Herbert? So you guys basically are sharing a brain when you’re running a route and he knows where you’re going to be and and and you know the ball is coming like what what kind of extra work is put in to get to that point. Yeah. Just tons of reps um reps in practice, reps and routes on air, reps on throwing on the side. Um and then also just talking about it like if I if I run a route and uh I might not under, you know, I might not know if that was a route decision, if that’s what he wanted me to do, whatever. So just going up to him and talking, having the open line of communication, I feel like that’s uh that’s super key. So you arrived when Jim Harbaugh did as head coach, so you don’t have a frame of reference to what Justin Herbert was like before Jim Harbaugh got there, but I’ve got the impression that since Harbaugh arrived, he’s had a concerted effort to bring out the badass in Justin Herbert. Have you noticed an evolution of him since you got there at this constant proddding of Jim Harbaugh to turn him into basically this guy who just kind of takes over any and every game? Shoot. I mean, I don’t know because you see you see games from Justin’s rookie year, second year, third year, whatever it is, and you’re like, “Okay, this guy’s been taking over games for a long time now.” So, I guess it’s just, you know, more evident like his will to win, like whatever he’s got to do to help our team win. Justin’s gonna do that. I saw you recently making the case for Justin Herbert to be the MVP. And I will tell you this, as as hard as it may be to believe I have one of the 50 votes, so make your case right here, right now to sway me, and I’m not allowed to finalize my opinion until after all the games are played, I’ll get in trouble with the Associated Press. But make your case for Justin. So just turn the film on and watch him uh watch his passion, watch his uh his grit to go out there and just win. I mean, he’s leading the NFL and what is it? Passing yards, completions, whatever it may be. Stats are great, but when you turn it on, it’s like, okay, how is this guy affecting his team? I feel like he does that at a higher level than anybody else. So, you play at Georgia, you win a couple national championships. And part of the fun and the pageantry of college football is you go to a game and it’s all your fans with this tiny little corner in one end where the other team’s fans are there. What kind of an adjustment? And look, there are very important reasons for it. No team’s in the LA market for 20 years. A generation of kids grow up picking any team they want. So when the visiting team comes in, hey, let’s go see this team that’s our favorite team that comes to town, you know, once every two, three years. What’s that adjustment like for you when you’re used to that that feeling of an overwhelming home field advantage in college and you come to the NFL level and it’s like, damn, where all these Steelers fans come from? Yeah, it’s a it’s a little different. like you said when I was at Georgia that’s however n they hold 96,000 like 95,000 were Georgia fans. Um but no I mean I’m seeing our fan grace fan base grow. I’m seeing people come out more. I’m seeing people you know getting more involved. So I’m excited to see what’ll happen with it in the future. You got a game if we keep winning that I think that’ll that that’s the key. Win games that helps for sure. That’s right. you win and you win and both teams doing well this year and you know I was thinking today that there may be a conflict for the AFC and NFC Championship because they’re played the same day and may have two games in the same stadium. I don’t know what they’re going to do about that. Um this weekend you’re in Jacksonville. It’s I believe the fourth one o’clock Eastern game for you guys. You got a couple more coming up. What’s the hardest part of of playing at what is essentially 10:00 a.m. your body clock time? Yeah, it’s just I mean there’s there’s obviously an aspect of it of like okay, you know, you’re used to being on different time zone, waking up at 10:00, but then there’s also the other side. It’s like, okay, let’s get up and just go play. You don’t have time to think about anything. You don’t have time to get anxious or or worry. It’s like, all right, wake up, go play football. So, I feel like our we, you know, we always travel on Friday, try to get a day ahead, try to get adjusted a little bit. So, just got to go out there and start fast. Yeah. Somebody who told me that recently, I think it was Cooper Deene, that that’s the worst thing about a prime time game. You’re sitting around all day waiting and what do I do with myself? Let’s go play football. And you you had to do that this past Sunday. Yeah. Yeah. No doubt. You just sitting there. You’re watching the other games. You’re just, you know, having a meeting and a walk through and you’re like, “All right, let’s just let’s just go play.” Like you said, who’s your biggest rival with the Chargers? What team do you guys look at and say that’s that’s our number one arch rival? Is it the Broncos or is it the Chiefs or is it the Raiders? You know, I think everybody in the division um you can definitely feel the tension when you play those games. Um but I mean I don’t know if you I don’t know if rivals the right right word. I don’t know what it is, but the Chiefs have been at top of our division for a long time. Um so you know, you know, if we want to do what we want to do, you got to you got to beat those beat the Chiefs, beat the Raiders, beat the Broncos. Um and then obviously other AFC opponents. All right, here’s the point where I give you the floor to tell me what you have going on with Dr. Pepper as a fairly big college game comes up this weekend. Yep. No, I mean, I’m just partnering with Dr. Pepper. Super excited about it. Um, I love Dr. Pepper and what they’re doing and really just how they kind of bring like college fans together. They’re having like the Pepper portal where there’s one in Athens, one in Texas, and you can kind of have some friendly banner. Dogs fans can like show, okay, yeah, this is our fan base. We’re in the SEC. uh and then show Texas fans, you know, what Dog Nation’s all about. So, super excited about it, um and what they’re doing. Well, my partner Chris Sims is a Texas guy, as you may know. Here’s your chance. Talk your best to Chris Sims about the upcoming game between Georgia and Texas. Hey, I’ll let those boys do the talking. Um I don’t want to don’t want to put any bad bad juju on them, but I believe in believe in the dogs and I’m excited to watch it. No horns down. You can’t horns down for sure. Oh, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Horns down for sure. Yes. Awesome. Um, and thanks, Dr. Pepper. And one of my all-time favorite movie lines is related to Dr. Pepper. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the film Hell or High Water. Okay. And one brother asks the other to bring him a Dr. Pepper and he doesn’t. He brings him a different similar knockoff and he says, “Only drink Mr. Pip.” And his brother says, “Then drink up.” So, I keep waiting for that to show up in the Dr. Pepper commercial. Thanks for some of your time. All the best. And uh we’ll be watching and we will be admiring both the hands and the speed as you go forward. Thank you. I appreciate you. Hi, it’s Mike Florio. Thanks for watching PFT on YouTube. Hit subscribe for the latest news and analysis from Pro Football

Mike Florio is joined by Ladd McConkey to discuss his adjustment to tighter windows in the NFL, why consistency has been a point of emphasis this year, what stands out the most about Justin Herbert and more. #NBCSports #NFL #ProFootballTalk
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Chargers’ Ladd McConkey: Justin Herbert’s will to win is so evident | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC
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