WATCH: Raiders' Coach Reveals Insight Into Key Unit

The Las Vegas Raiders defense is reliant on excellent trench warfare. Defensive line coach Rob Leonard gave valuable insight on Tuesday.

Las Vegas Raiders DL Coach Rob Leonard from Mandatory Mini-Cam / Noah Scott Fahey, Sports Illustrated

LAS VEGAS, Nev. -- Perhaps the most important facet of the Las Vegas Raiders defense is the defensive line.

Despite being riddled with injuries, the defensive line has been a consistent factor for the Silver and Black defense, in great part due to the steady leadership of defensive line coach Rob Leonard. Leonard talked to the media on Tuesday, and we have the full video right here:

Here is a partial transcript of Antonio Pierce's Monday presser:

Q: A lot of the passing was game script and you just kind of fell behind in the second half. If you just take the first half, is that what you kind of want the offense to look like in terms of a bunch of different guys touching the ball?

Coach Pierce: "I thought we kept them off balance. I mean, you saw jet sweeps, you saw different guys touching the football, running backs in there. I thought Scott [Turner] did a really good job of just spreading the ball around. I thought Gardner [Minshew] did a good job as well of managing the game and the operation. Jackson Powers-Johnson declaring the center, all that stuff was really good in the first half. Competitive game. Obviously, we had two opportunities down in the red zone. Instead of kicking field goals, we want to score touchdowns. But getting the ball in the second half, I thought that would be another good opportunity for us to go down there and hopefully take a lead or tie the game up. But it didn't happen that way."

Q: Gardner Minshew was pretty complimentary of the job Jackson Powers-Johnson has done since moving overt over to center. A few game sample size, how would you evaluate how Jackson has performed?

Coach Pierce: "I think it's pretty interesting to see a rookie go to a position he never played much in college at left guard. Then one week fills in for somebody that's injured, and then the next couple weeks now have to make all the calls. And he's done a really good job. His energy, his presence, his physicality, you see throughout the game. High effort, very smart football player. And when he's controlling the line of scrimmage as being the center making the calls, you see his personality come out more and more. And that's where you see that leadership from a young player start to stand out. I think that's really good for our team. The more guys we can have talking up and taking that leadership role, regardless of the age or experience or money or draft, the better for us."

Q: What was it that you were able to identify that Miami was doing to keep you guys off balance defensively, where you just couldn't get off the field when you had that opportunity?

Coach Pierce: "Well, really, we had three third down penalties. So, it was really the Raiders beating the Raiders on that one, right? So, third-and-20, we get a holding call, uncalled for. Believe we had an offsides penalty, then we had a holding penalty late in the game. So, technique, fundamentals, things that we're coaching up we can't do in critical moments like that. Situational football. That's a four-point swing there because they scored a touchdown instead of a field goal. So, those are things. I thought early on they were mixing up different route concepts, looking for man, zone beaters, things of that nature. And it was that chess matchup, and obviously their quarterback did a good job getting the ball out of his hand very quickly."

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