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Liam Coen recalls when he thought Jacksonville Jaguars were special
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- Liam Coen recalls when he thought Jacksonville Jaguars were special
Jacksonville Jaguars head coach Liam Coen did take Sean Payton's "smaller-market" comments personally.
Or, at least it seemed that way to linebacker Foye Oluokun .
"Liam had a problem with that for sure, and I like the energy that he comes with," Oluokun told reporters during a Monday zoom call. "What'd he say? Something about small market. He didn't like that little brother feel maybe, maybe they had some beef going from before that but obviously that's the mindset he came out with through week."
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After the Jaguars defeated the Denver Broncos 34-20 on Sunday, Coen's first comments in the postgame press conference referenced the comments made by Payton earlier in the week.
But Coen didn't address the comments any further on Monday's zoom call with reporters. Instead, he focused on the Jaguars and the win they just pulled off.
"They understand that we really only truly care about what's going on in our building and each other," Coen said. "It is a group, I mentioned this the other night, that cares about each other. They get along, the players, the staff, the coaches, we all get along pretty well.
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"And yeah, we've gone through some stuff together, but the resilience, the ability to respond each week has been impressive."
Liam Coen on when he felt the Jaguars had something special:
JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA - DECEMBER 07: Head coach Liam Coen of the Jacksonville Jaguars looks on during warmups before the game against the Indianapolis Colts at EverBank Stadium on December 07, 2025 in Jacksonville, Florida. (Photo by Rich Storry/Getty Images)
"We had some pretty physical practices throughout training camp where we got after each other pretty good in a few, because we only had the one joint. So, we did have some more physical practices against each other. It was probably one of the more physical training camps I've been a part of in terms of being in the NFL. And that was something that I looked at. At the time, nobody was complaining, 'why are we hitting, why are we doing this? Why are we doing that?' The guys just kept coming to work every day and practicing their tails off."
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Liam Coen on the team's identity and where it stems from:
"There's a lot of players that, whether they came in via free agency, the draft, whether they're here already, whatever that case is, I think it's a group of guys that are proving something. Whether it's for a contract, whether it's for wins, whatever it is, all those reasons make up our edge. And that's something that we've talked about a lot from the moment we got together is having an edge as a team and yeah, not really caring too much about the outside noise."
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Liam Coen on Parker Washington 's big day against the Broncos :
"We figured that it was a great opportunity from some of the matchups that we felt like that was beneficial for us and that he was really feeling better coming off the injury a couple weeks back or whatever it was that he was getting back to full strength and feeling a lot better. He had a great week of practice, and it showed out yesterday, a lot."
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Liam Coen improvement of defensive play over the last several games:
"These guys have played in meaningful snaps and meaningful games. And when everybody's in, it's just like, 'Hey, trust the next man up,' and somebody else is going to make a play. And I think that's huge for depth, for development and for confidence going into December and January football."
Liam Coen on the play of Jaguars DE Travon Walker recently:
"This is such a matchup league and you're constantly trying to find different ways of putting your players in positions to be successful. And I thought Travon played very well. He played with his hair on fire. He was relentless, made some critical stops for us, both from the end and from inside."
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Liam Coen on the closeness of the Jaguars:
"The coaches and players and each other are close. But I do believe that this building appreciates one another. And ultimately when you have everybody going towards the same thing, everybody's got the same goal and vision and understands what the standards are, I think that's when you usually get success."
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Jacksonville Jaguars Liam Coen: Defense depth helps boost confidence
