FOXBORO \u2014 The Patriots have talked about Chargers safety Derwin James as much or more as they\u2019ve mentioned starting quarterback Justin Herbert in the lead-up to Sunday night\u2019s wild-card round matchup.<\/p>\n
Offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels called James \u201cas good of a unique defensive piece that we\u2019ve played all year.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s not just one thing,\u201d McDaniels continued. \u201cSo, he plays safety, linebacker, nickel, he blitzes, he\u2019s down there in the front and line up in the A gaps. He\u2019s a special player.\u201d<\/p>\n
James, 29, is a five-time Pro Bowl selection and four-time All-Pro. He finished this season, another Pro Bowl campaign, with three interceptions, seven pass breakups, one forced fumble, two sacks, 94 tackles, six tackles for loss and eight QB hits.<\/p>\n
James had two sacks the last time these two teams played last December.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s relentless. He\u2019s a great football player,\u201d QB Drake Maye said. \u201cI played him last year and got to know him a little bit at the Pro Bowl. He\u2019s a great dude. He flies around. He\u2019s got good instincts. He\u2019s punching at the ball. He\u2019s good in the run game. He\u2019s good in the pass game. He plays some man coverage on third down. He\u2019s always around the football. He\u2019s got a knack for the football, and he\u2019s had that probably since he started playing. He\u2019s a great player. A lot of respect for him, and we\u2019ve got to find out on every play where he\u2019s at.\u201d<\/p>\n
Head coach Mike Vrabel noticed James\u2019 love for football when he coached him at the Pro Bowl in 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember his mom was getting married, and he communicated, he reached out like, \u2018Hey, I\u2019m going to miss a day.\u2019 I was like, \u2018Buddy, I don\u2019t think there\u2019s any rules to the Pro Bowl.\u2019 So, just remembering that about him, I always have a lot of respect for him,\u201d Vrabel said. \u201cObviously, the player he is, but the person.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a player, Vrabel praised James\u2019 tackling, coverage, versatility and instincts as a blitzer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FOXBORO \u2014 The Patriots have talked about Chargers safety Derwin James as much or more as they\u2019ve mentioned…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664699,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2050],"tags":[80,833,839,7,838,1167,249,2326,2094,6,15,835,61050,208,836,19972,834,61051,61052,724,837],"class_list":{"0":"post-664698","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-england-patriots","8":"tag-2025-nfl-draft","9":"tag-drake-maye","10":"tag-eliot-wolf","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-mike-vrabel","13":"tag-new-england","14":"tag-new-england-patriots","15":"tag-newengland","16":"tag-newenglandpatriots","17":"tag-nfl","18":"tag-nfl-draft","19":"tag-nfl-news","20":"tag-nfl-patriots","21":"tag-patriots","22":"tag-patriots-2025","23":"tag-patriots-game","24":"tag-patriots-news","25":"tag-patriots-schedule","26":"tag-patriots-stats","27":"tag-pats","28":"tag-robert-kraft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115861499683647352","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664698\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}