The 41-year-old Klayton Adams, the Arizona Cardinals’ offensive line coach, played in college at American River College and Boise State before beginning his coaching career as a grad assistant Boise State in 2005.
He coached 13 years in college before landing with the Indianapolis Colts as assistant offensive line coach in 2019. In 2021 and 2022, he coached the Colts tight ends before joining head coach Jonathan Gannon’s staff last season. Gannon was an assistant with the Colts from 2018-2020.
This year, he has handled the move of Paris Johnson Jr. to left tackle and now the loss of right tackle Jonah Williams to a knee injury.
In this Q&A, Adams discussed those issues and more as the Cardinals prepared for Sunday’s game against the Los Angeles Rams.
Q: Obviously, Jonah (Williams) had to go on IR this week. You guys spent the entire offseason and training camp planning to have these guys together. I know injuries happen, but that’s got to be a little disappointing that you had such a short look-see at what you wanted to have.
A: Absolutely. And above anything right now, I feel for Jonah just that it’s kind of uncertain as to how long he’s going to be out. But the mentality that you have to take as a football team and as an offensive line and as a coach is … it sounds like coach-speak, is just next man’s up. And there’s a reason that the guys that are here are here and they’re all going to have to play at some point. And that’s why you got to try to develop the entire room. And you’ve got to try to put guys in positions where they can develop and be successful. And it’s a little bit different for a guy like Beach (Kelvin Beachum) because he’s not early in his career where he’s trying to develop. What you’re trying to do with him is maintain and lean on his experience.
Q: It’s wasn’t the first time he’s ever had to step in, but how much different is it stepping into a game cold versus having an entire week to prepare?
A: I think it’s different for sure. Knowing that you’re going to play the entire game before the game starts is definitely a different mentality. Having said that, he’s the pro’s pro and he’s the guy that you know is going to be able to go in there cold and do some good things and he was definitely able to do that last week and I know he’s going to be able to do that this week as well.
Q: Are you guys in a tough spot with (tackle) Christian (Jones) already out. Now that you lost another tackle, do you feel comfortable with what you have? You’re going deeper and deeper into the bodies that you have at tackle specifically.
A: Yeah. And I certainly trust the guys that we’re putting in that position. You hate to have guys out, but you guys said it earlier: It’s the NFL and that’s going to happen. And so there’s a reason the people that you have when you’re 53 are there. And there’s a reason that the players that you have on the P(ractice) squad as well. And it’s not just because they practice, it’s because at some point they may have to play. So you have to be able to trust those guys and know that they know what to do and how to do it.
Q: Do you also call Beach grandpa? (laughter)
A: No, too much respect for him to call him grandpa. I’m older than he is.
Q: What does he need to focus on this week? Or what does he need to do better than he did when he came into that game last week?
A: I just think be himself and play confidently and do the things that he’s been doing great for 13 years.
Q: Twice you had to do it last year, prepare for Aaron Donald. You don’t have to do it this year. What do you see from this Rams defensive line?
A: They’re still really good. There are a lot of good young players in that group and good veteran players as well. There’s no such thing as losing a great player and it being the same. But having said that, one of the things that made them tough last year is the guys that were around him were also very good and those guys are still there and they’re all a year better.
Q: When you look at last week with how good everything was in the first half and then the second half, not so much. Have you been able to pinpoint any of what happened? I know it’s a team thing, but were you able to hone in on anything in the second half?
A: Probably just staying locked in, staying focused, being consistent. Not really ever being affected by the outcome of a play I think is something that we talk about a bunch on the offensive line. And whether that’s positive or it’s negative is the next play is going to be our best play and it doesn’t matter what the one before it looked like.
Q: Is that one of the things that can happen sometimes where a guy can play a really good game but also there’s one or two plays and everyone says, ‘Oh my gosh’ because it wasn’t a good result?
A: I don’t know that I saw that from our guys. I think that’s probably the nature of human beings is to carry whatever happened the play before with you. And so people call that positive momentum or they call it negative momentum. And what you’re trying to develop in a football team, is you’re trying to develop like blinders of this is what needs to be executed, regardless of what happened the play before. You’re probably fighting against human nature a little bit that way, but that’s what we’re preaching.
Q: Can you take us through the process a little bit of the decision to switch Paris to left tackle.
A: I just think it was kind of a natural move throughout the offseason and something that that he was comfortable with and also bringing in Jonah, he was comfortable in the position that we were going to have him in, so it was just something that felt natural. I don’t know in the NFL you look at the guy who plays left tackle as being a lot different than the guy who plays right tackle because in this day and age, if their best rusher is on our left and he doesn’t want to go against your left tackle, all he’s got to do is walk over to the other side. So what we used to call the left tackle in the older days in the NFL, I think what you’re saying now is really, you want two of those guys. You want two guys that are good at pass protection. Two guys that can protect a quarterback. If the quarterback is throwing the football to the left, he’s not gonna be able to see what’s happening to his right.
Q: Drew (offensive coordinator Drew Petzing) mentioned that the Bills started using some run blitzes. What’s the challenge for an O-line when a defense starts doing that?
A: It depends on the type of pressure that you’re seeing. Generally speaking, if you’re in what we would call sub-offense or 11-personnel offense and you’re accounting for the box and there’s a player who’s entering the box from the third level, you’ve got to have answers for that. And so there are ways to block him with scheme or block him with a receiver or push your ID to him. And so there’s a little bit that goes into it. But we’ve got answers to handle those type of things. We’ve just got to do a better job of executing them.
Q: Trey McBride was talking a lot about trying to be a complete tight end and working on his blocking and there’s Tip Reiman. I know it’s only a one-game sample, but what have you noticed about bringing the tight ends into the overall blocking?
A: I think that those guys have done a really good job over the course of training camp and over the course of the offseason. I know the guys in that room and also (tight ends coach) Ben Steele coaches them and does a tremendous job of taking a lot of pride. And I think one of the things that’s unique about our situation is Ben’s been with the offensive line. He’s been with the tight ends. I’ve coached the tight ends, I’ve coached the offensive line. (Assistant line coach) Chris Cook’s been with the tight ends. He’s been with the offensive line and so where sometimes there’s some natural friction between those groups to point fingers at each other or not communicate properly, I think our guys know that this needs to be a special relationship where the entire offense needs to be a special relationship in order to run the ball effectively. That needs to be really good with the communication and being able to solve problems.
Q: What do think Evan Brown has brought to this line and hopefully brought some stability at that left guard spot?
A: One of the things that Evan does as good as anybody is, he’s played a lot of center. And so he sees the entire thing. He’s not just completely locked in on exactly what his little square is. He sees it from more of a 30,000-foot perspective. And so the communication; if Hjalte (Froholdt) has his head between his legs in a silent-count situation, there’s another set of eyes there who’s really good at solving problems and getting us into the right call.
A: Hjalte did mention that in training camp about how Evan is helpful there. How has Hjalte been as he’s come through this development and being that center, the aspect of it of recognizing things and communicating them.
A: It’s been fun to watch and it’s been fun to kind of go on that journey with him because I know that, probably early in his career, there was some frustrations and things. As the number continues to grow of total starts for him, you just see much more confidence and the experience of having been in a situation and solved a problem before lowers your anxiety going into a game because it’s just, ‘OK, I’ve seen this. This happens, I’ve seen this.’ And so he’s been a good leader for us that way. And like I said before, it’s been fun for me to watch.
Q: With Paris, what have you seen as the biggest leaps for him from Year 1 to Year 2 in terms of everything?
A: It’s an interesting question because he came in as such a confident and mature guy as a starting point. Sometimes with rookies, you say in Year 2, all these guys will be much more confident, this guy’s much more mature. Paris was very mature and very confident last year. What’s been exciting and fun to watch with him has just been there has been a transition for him moving from right to left and there’s been some bumps along the way and just his resilience being able to deal with those things and not getting down on himself. I’ll get a text message after a practice maybe where he didn’t think that he performed very well and he’s like, ‘Here’s what I want to focus on tomorrow.’ The guy’s constantly solving problems.
Q: Even with Christian on injured reserve, what have you seen from him and Isaiah Adams, the two rookies, in terms of getting it and making as much progress as they can as quickly as possible?
A: They’ve both done a really good job with really kind of the same type of thing that I said with Paris, is just being resilient. There’s going to be problems. One of my coaches used to tell me this before games and it made me feel good: ‘I don’t know how it’s all going to go, but it’s not all going to be good.’ And so we’re going to have to solve some problems at some point. And then that’s always the rookie’s journey. Like they show up in the building and it’s like, ‘Oh, this is awesome. I got drafted.’ Hey, listen, this is going to be hard and we’re going to have to solve problems and you’re not going to feel good about yourself sometimes. But those guys have embraced that and it’s been fun to watch.
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