How he fits into the 3-4 Panthers defense: I believe if you can play football, you can play football. I’m a defensive lineman and being a defensive lineman requires you to be like a Swiss Army Knife. You’ve got to play nose, you’ve got to play three-[tech], you’ve got to play five-[tech], you’ve got to be able to play everything and I think Coach Washington has a great plan in place and we have all the pieces necessary to be wherever. Move guys around and just find the best matchups – when you’ve got a guy like Luke Kuechly and another guy like Shaq Thompson, they’ll make you right. I’m excited about that. I’m going to just be me. I’ve been doing this a long time and I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve that now I can help another group with.
On whether he was upset that he was being released by Tampa Bay: Business is business. In 2012, arguably the greatest quarterback to every play this game was released by the Indianapolis Colts in Peyton Manning. My perspective on this league changed then; I told people right then – ‘Yeah, I know what this league is about now. If you can let a person like Peyton Manning go, anybody can get released,’ so it didn’t hurt me – it’s business. It’s a game we love to play, but business is business.
His relationship with Trai Turner: We played against each other in 2014, it was his first game and after the game I told him ‘Listen, the path you’re on…if you keep playing like this and you don’t change what you’re doing and keep improving, you’re going to be a Pro Bowl offensive lineman.’
One of the biggest things that drew him to Carolina: Belief in me. You want to go somewhere where you’re wanted and they actually want you in the building. The fact that players were welcoming to me – one thing I heard is that the guys were pushing [Marty Hurney] like ‘hey, go get this guy,’ that’s what you want to hear. You know that when you get there that guys want you on the team and the respect they have for you and I have that same respect for them.
On his family: I’m a family man – it’ll be different to not be around my family, but I’m excited about what the future holds. I’m a family man, but there’s a lot that goes into that; my wife is a superhero, she makes it looks so easy but it’s extremely tough. A lot of people don’t see what goes into the offseason….my wife makes it so much easier on me; a lot of that, people don’t see – they just see my wife and I, our five children and [say], ‘Man, y’all just have the happiest family.’ We do have a happy family, but it’s a lot that goes into it. Like how you see the finished product on Sunday, [but] people don’t see the meeting rooms, the locker rooms, the treatments and everything that goes into the product that the Carolina Panthers put out there.
On 2019: I just have so much respect for those guys and I know the type of players they are – the type of mindset they have on gameday. I know when you have a bunch of like-minded men for one common goal with a leader like Coach Rivera, it’s going to be hard to stop it. So I think the culture that’s set here is set in stone, so getting to the playoffs and winning a ring, I don’t think you even really need to talk about that. Because you know who you’re around and that’s why I said it was instant chemistry – because you look in their eyes and they look in mine and they know what time it is.
Nice job, Josh. This is going to be a fun ride.