Michael Hoecht said my favorite quote about Aaron Donald so far this year

Despite being a relatively young player who barely has 500 career snaps under his belt, L.A. Rams linebacker Michael Hoecht finds himself in a situation where he’s now being looked at as a veteran on a defense lacking experience. There are few others on the Rams defense who are expected to have a bigger role this season than Hoecht, now moving to the edge for the first time in his career, but as always everyone is looking up to Aaron Donald to lead by example.

Even when that means “swinging helmets” and “ruining practices”.

The 25-year-old Hoecht was being interviewed about training camp and was asked about having Donald for this portion of the year and what that means.

“Same as every year. He’s gonna be a killer. He’s gonna ruin offensive periods. He’s gonna be tackling guys in the backfield swinging helmets and ruining practice...

If you listen to the audio you’ll hear a bit of laughter, and whether he was intending to be funny or not, Hoecht lands a nice joke. He also, and maybe not intentionally is bringing up this moment from last year’s offseason.

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Donald didn’t have much to say when he addressed the issue of his helmet-swinging in joint practices in 2022 training camp and ultimately no discipline happened. I am not here to say that anything more should’ve come from the situation in question. I am here to say that I found Hoecht’s response to be funny, and so far it’s my favorite press conference moment of the year. The young player also says more about LA’s famous #99:

But you know that’s awesome that’s why he is who he is. Because when he shows up he turns it on and it never turns off until the end of the season...”

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Donald is ready to leave it turned on all year and not see his season shortened like last year. It sounds like Hoecth thinks Aaron is ready to get back to his wrecking ways and it sounds like any time the season comes around you know what to expect from #99. If he is even more motivated this year (is that possible?), great.

In closing Michael Hoecht reflects that: “excited to rush with him (Donald)...hopefully put together a good pass rush.” If the Rams can put together a good pass rush this year, and if the Rams can win games, then AD can swing all the helmets he wants, just don’t hurt anyone.