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Nnamdi Asomugha talks about learning 49ers defense

49ers cornerback Nnamdi Asomugha is one of the few players learning the 49ers defense from relative scratch. He had a chance to discuss that transition with 49ers.com.

By David Fucillo
Alex Trautwig

The 49ers are into their second week of OTAs, and it has been mostly positive about free agent addition Nnamdi Asomugha. He has reportedly shown his age at times on longer players, but it sounds like things are generally going well for the cornerback.

Nnamdi had a chance to discuss his transition with the 49ers, and 49ers.com had a few quotations:

On learning the new defense:

"This is a really solid defense all the way around. Since everybody knows the defense, it's really easy to communicate ... Anything I don't get I can ask anybody on the defense and they pretty much have it down ... It's different when everyone has the defense down and one guy needs the answers and everyone can help him out. It's not like everyone is trying to learn something new."

On the 49ers defensive philosophy:

"There's a really good mix of zones and man," he said. "It's more diverse than you think. You can switch back and forth."

He mentioned how the defensive players can't be quite as aggressive as they might like. The rules of OTAs do not allow for physicality, and in fact, a team can be fined and have practice sessions docked if they break those rules.

The lack of physicality led to this tweet from a Philadelphia sports blogger:

Eagles fans were burned badly by Nnamdi, so it should surprise nobody to see this kind of response. That's really why we have to wait and see with Nnamdi. It is always nice to hear good news from OTAs, but getting in pads and getting physical in practice and in preseason games is what most of us probably want to see. It'd be great if he got his swagger back, so for now we wait.

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