Mike McDaniel – December 19, 2022
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Monday, December 19, 2022
Head Coach Mike McDaniel
(Just to get the intricate housekeeping stuff out of the way first, LB Jerome Baker left with an ankle. How is he? Where is OL Liam Eichenberg in his recovery? I don’t even think I should ask you about CB Byron Jones, because you sort of left it as not counting on it for this season, but if you want to add anything. So LB Jerome Baker, OL Liam Eichenberg, CB Byron Jones and anyone else you can think of?) – “Hm, I don’t know. I’m not sure if I feel as inviting about information today. (laughter) We’ll see. You’re just trying to do your job, so I’ll help you. (laughter) No news on the last, so we can stand pat on that one. What was the first one?”
(LB Jerome Baker left with an ankle.) – “Oh yes, he had a lower extremity, but he seemed pretty solid today. Unless anything comes across my plate unforeseen, I think we should feel very comfortable with him. Then the next, I don’t know when it’s going to be, just because you don’t – with Liam, I don’t know when it’s going to be. There’s been no setbacks at all, but I’m not sure if you’ve written about or if anyone noticed he was playing by far his best ball that he’s – I think PFF noticed actually, which is neither here nor there. (laughter) He was playing his best ball when he got hurt which is kind of frustrating. Our grades matched PFF’s, I guess. (laughter) So what I don’t want to do is rush the process with him and not build upon the good ball that he was playing. So as it stands right now, I feel pretty good about him getting a good week of practice in. I’m not sure what that’s going to mean, I don’t want to get ahead of myself, what that’s going to mean for the game. But I know it’s not if but when. So I’m feeling good about how he’s progressing, not taking a step back and I want his confidence to be the same as when he left. Was there another one?”
(I think that’s it unless there’s anyone you can think of that we forgot.) – “You would never. You would never forget. (laughter)”
(We spoke to S Jevon Holland about the neck roll and the stinger he got, and WR Jaylen Waddle seems fine. So you seem to be in pretty good shape. I guess S Eric Rowe and RB Jeff Wilson Jr., obviously, couldn’t go. Too early to tell with them or were they close?) – “Both of them were fairly close. I had to rely on my past experiences with Jeff Wilson to protect him from himself. As you could see, we have some capable depth at that position. I think that was a little bit on display this past game. He’s looking solid, hoping – he’s such a tough guy that I have to be proactive with him so he doesn’t do some negative stuff to himself or the team in that way, because he’s an important part of this team. So we’ll take it day by day, both of those guys, but it was definitely – I wouldn’t have been betting on whether they both would’ve played last game because I would have left myself vulnerable to some losses. I don’t like losing bets, that’s why I don’t bet that much. (laughter)”
(Is it a relief to be coming back to play at home after three-straight road games, including a lot of travel, elements and even a hostile environment last game?) – “I kind of knew what it was. I guess yeah, I love the home stadium. I feel like I’ve lived in Miami my whole life at this point, I don’t know why. Going to the west coast, I was like, ‘What is this dry stuff?’ I hate lotion now. (laughter) I wouldn’t say it’s a relief though. The point of that – we knew exactly what that trip was going to be like. We knew what those three games against good opponents, we knew it was a challenge and we were kind of excited for that challenge. We know exactly what we ended up doing in those three games. That definitely wasn’t the desired outcome, but at the same time, what I’m talking to the team about and what I think is very important that I really, really truly believe deep down to my core, is that if you’re going to lose football games, you should get something out of it. I do think – just moving forward, to make yourself better and to make that purposeful. I was very, very proud of the effort. I was very proud of the lack of excuses that were made by the locker room, the players, the coaches, in general, because now that I can talk about it in the open, yes, that is difficult – for sure. Time zone switches. But everybody has to go through their own stuff. I thought they approached it with a severity enough to get something out of it, because if you go half in or utilize excuses and you lose, it doesn’t really – you can just say, ‘OK, we’ll turn it up,’ and then you don’t really get anything out of it. I don’t see – that’s not to say that I see it as, I don’t know. I said something about asterisks last week about there’s no asterisks in the win-loss column about inclement weather. There’s also no asterisks for moral victories. So I’m not necessarily saying that as much as I’m saying that I think we allowed ourselves to utilize every experience because of our intent and our commitment moving forward, and if we choose to do it and if we execute all the things that we haven’t and utilize those experiences, we’ll look back and say, ‘Those were very beneficial, and that’s the point. Because when you go all in and guys really put forth their best effort under some challenging circumstances, human nature is to kind of, ‘(sighs) Here we go again.’ But I’m very confident in the human beings on the coaching staff, in the human beings in the locker room, that we’ll be happy to play another game. We love our home venue, but it’s not exactly like, ‘Oh, finally. We’re home.’ It’s more that we need another opportunity to play football because it’s a bad taste that you want to try to get rid of. You need some Scope (mouthwash). (laughter)”
(There’s no asterisks for snowballs. However, of the numerous entities that could have done something, I know the PA Announcer said it, but stadium security, police, referees, what could have and should have been done? And moving forward, where you’re possibly in the playoffs, what do you think could happen?) – “Oh, if I would take the bait. (laughter) I do not want to – I appreciate the question and I do not want to insinuate that I do not hold your question in any sort of low regard or anything. I don’t want to dismiss it, I should say. However, it is what it is. Like I said, the only concern I had was with players’ safety, specifically with the ice balls going at people’s heads. I know the NFL is concerned with player safety as well. So however it’s handled, it’s not for me to worry about. I should probably worry about coaching a little bit more.”
(There are different philosophies on what I’m about to ask you. I know earlier in the year, when the team was on a win streak, QB Tua Tagovailoa made a reference, “Hey, we’re not afraid to talk about the Super Bowl. We’re not afraid to use those words around here.” Now that you’re a couple of wins away from getting your foot in the playoff door, is it just Green Bay this week? Or is it Green Bay as a step toward the playoffs? How do you want the players to look at this?) – “I think the players have gotten reps at what I was concerned about that I really knew we need, which was football in playoff atmospheres. There’s a lot of young guys that it’s different when you have – I mean, that crowd in Buffalo was awesome. It was rocking. It felt legitimate. That’s the type of environment that you get when you build upon a season and there’s a lot on the line. I think specifically at the end of the season, you look less big picture, because in terms of the only way that you can really do the things that you want to accomplish, you have to give full intent to the next opponent. So I want them to see one team and one team only – the Green Bay Packers. What I do know is that game matters more than any other game. I think when you’re down the stretch, it’s almost like you do reverse. You can talk big picture and talk about the goals when things are far away. When stuff gets closer, it’s almost like you’re challenging yourself to be more locked into the moment than other teams, players, individuals, because a lot of games are won and lost that way. When you start worrying about things that aren’t right in front of you, which happens. A lot of people can start talking of what type of this game is this and you got to do this to this. No, I think you have to learn how it’s one game at a time or you are severely punished in this league. Down late in the season, you have to learn how to fully attack an opponent, because every single team that you play in these months have things to play for in one way shape or form, whether it’s seating, whether it’s getting into the tournament, or whether it’s taking out aggression on their lack of involvement in the tournament. It’s all – players really are motivated, and you don’t want to have self-inflicted wounds because you’re thinking about some games after the next. I believe there’s two games after Green Bay; they may or may not be in our division. But I don’t know. You guys would have to tell me. All I think of is I’m like a, I don’t know. I’m like one of your children and this time of year, all I think about as Christmas. Except this Christmas, there’s a football game. (laughter)”
(I wanted to ask you about your two rookie receivers. With WR Braylon Sanders, was there anything you’d seen in the opportunities you are able to see him work on the practice squad that intrigued you enough to throw to him Saturday? What was that that made you want to do something that you would have done with WR River Cracraft had he been in that slot? What skillset with WR Braylon Sanders? Also with WR Erik Ezukanma, has it entirely been a result of obviously veterans who are reliable ahead of him or has there been maybe more of a learning curve than you had hoped for? So on those two, WR Braylon Sanders and WR Erik Ezukanma?) – “So with Braylon (Sanders), he was – well, it just so happened that the first time, I believe it was the Detroit game, where he was activated, it was so late in the week and an injury came up, and he had prepared exclusively at the position that was injured. So he was able to get some live bullet experience, and although he did have a point of attack fumble, I look way deeper into the players’ experiences than that, and what I did see was a guy that the game wasn’t too big for him. In this specific – so he kind of got a leg up there. I also think that I’ve really seen Erik (Ezukanma) progress during the course of the season, tremendously. From a starting point perspective, it was interesting. He was probably as physically ready for the professional game as any young receiver we had on the roster. But it was probably the biggest jump in terms of schematically, hearing a huddle called and all that stuff. You learned a lot about guys with how their teammates respond to them, and I’ve noticed a lot of people gravitate towards him. He’s been doing a good job and progressing. So it hasn’t been anything negative in that regard, or we had to do X, Y, or Z. It was more that both of those guys had been really progressing, and then one guy got some game experience. And when he saw the opportunity, he had an injury in the meantime. But we felt comfortable with (Ezukanma. That’s a tough atmosphere, talking about at Buffalo, to have your first varsity experience since playing with some of the guys in August. I guess that would have been against the Philadelphia Eagles in preseason, which feels like a millennia ago. So really, they’ve done a good job. I’m very, very happy with them and what they’ve done with their opportunities, because Erik has practiced very well in his opportunities as well.”
(Kind of a two-parter for you. How do you assess QB Tua Tagovailoa’s performance now that you’ve had a chance to watch the tape? And if you did like it, how did you like his ability? Or what does it say about him to kind of bounce back from a west coast swing that maybe you didn’t have the offensive production you guys are used to? How did you feel he bounced back from those two games?) – “This game was really cool for me, because I had complete faith in where he was going to go. I think it took a couple games; he identified exactly what was kind of holding him back to a degree. Again, it wasn’t by a longshot, him, that was the reason for losing. That’s a collective thing. Or offensive efficiency, that’s a collective thing and all the skill positions know where they played a part in it. But what to me, that I see that is so unique about Tua, what he was able to do is identify something that he could control. And in this particular game, I saw him completely correct the things that I thought were really holding him back in the two previous (games). It’s a very rare thing to do in sports is to have control. Really just the strength, the mental strength, it takes to harbor all the pressure, all of, really, how people just will undress every single play or really hold you incredibly responsible or have a narrative flip in two games after playing however many – it’s a lot. And I think not too many people are built for that. I think we’re seeing a young player that is exhibiting – that game against Buffalo, he was exhibiting some of the things that I think make him so unique and why I feel so fortunate to coach him because he learned from the two previous games and was able, in live speed, to directly attack those. I think, case in point, there was a sack in the, I think it was the first quarter, down by the 12-yard line, that he, in-game, recognized that he hung on, No. 1, a little too long, and then because of that kind of missed two and three; which in the two previous games, it would have really, really affected how he played moving forward. It kind of reminded me of the Baltimore moment, to be honest, where he identified, ‘Oh, I’m forcing something,’ and then immediately has the mental fortitude to go back and persevere. There was another one in the third quarter, I believe the first drive of the third quarter, where he’s dropping back and he’s hanging on (Jaylen) Waddle for a quick route, and they’re not on the same page, which, in the heat of the moment, you could either do one or two things – you can get down on yourself because you didn’t anticipate what he was doing, or you can get down on Waddle, or you can move on to the next play. It was a throw that got batted down directly, like a Dikembe Mutombo swat. The very next play, he threw a 67-yard touchdown.”
Tua Tagovailoa – December 17, 2022 (Postgame)
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Saturday, December 17, 2022
Postgame – Buffalo
QB Tua Tagovailoa
(As you’re watching that last drive, what’s going through your mind after not being able to get into field goal range?) – “First off, we’re playing a really good team in a tough environment, and we understood all of that. They executed well throughout that drive. There were some plays that I know that we wish we could have had back on both sides, defensively and offensively, but they executed better on that last drive, and they did more than we did to come out with the win. It was tough to see that, but that’s just the way the game goes sometimes.”
(What are your feelings of watching that unfold when you want an opportunity to get the ball back?) – “Yeah, offensively we wanted an opportunity, but if you look at how the game went as well, we did have opportunities and we didn’t execute the way we said we wanted to on all our drives. But needless to say, all credit to the Bills defense, to their coaches, to their DC, for the way they came out and game-planned against us. If this is how games are going to be, down to the wire, then then so be it. It really shows you know how much you need to execute offensively, defensively, in the special teams, in all phases of the game to come out with a win against a team like this.”
(How did the run game affect the offense today?) – “I think it opened up things for us offensively like it has in previous games where we’ve found success in the pass game. We were balanced. We did have opportunities where we could run RPOs, and then there were times where it’s, ‘Hey, mano a mano.’ You guys know we’re going to run with the personnel we have in the game, and we just try to out execute the opposing team. So we found success tonight in the passing game also due to how efficient we were running the ball.”
(Did you come into the game, intending to run the way you did? Or did you see that the run game was working and just stuck with it?) – “We came into the game wanting to run the ball, get everyone situated upfront with the linemen, with our receivers kind of hitting a couple blocks before we decided to open up the passing game. But we really wanted to establish ourselves in the run game this game. Really, that was the game plan, and we built off of that throughout the game.”
(Now 0-3, that’s not where you want to be, but as a leader and as a captain, what do you tell the guys to get them bouncing back and get them right?) – “I would say I’m very proud of the way our leaders stepped up in this game. In some of the biggest moments, in crucial moments of the game, our leaders had made big plays in this game. I think our team is taking a step in the right direction, but it’s tough when a lot of the guys on the team have that, ‘it’s my fault’ mentality to not go into a deep hole. I think that’s the learning lesson for everyone, me included, that we have four quarters. We don’t have to press. We don’t have to get down on ourselves. They’re good too. They’re going to make plays, and that’s why you learn to trust. That’s why it’s, in my opinion, the greatest team sport that if our defense gets us the ball, they trust that we have to go and put points on the board. That’s all it is. I’m just really proud of our guys. They came out and the environment was electric. The atmosphere was crazy, a little chilly, but regardless of that, I think we played we played a great game.”
(You’re down to your last three games and the playoffs are on the line. The margin for error gets very small. What’s this team’s mindset going into this last stretch?) – “I think for our team, for us in general, we’re not looking at, ‘Hey, we need to win this game and the next game in the following game. Alright, we’ve came back home with three losses. Why in this game did we come out with a loss? What can we get better from this loss to go into next week to improve our chances to win?’ I would say I’m a very optimistic person; I like to look at all the goods that our team has displayed tonight against a really tough divisional opponent. I’ve said this in many, many interviews and I’ll continue to say this, we’ll look at the film. We’ll hope to get better at the things that we may have made mistakes at and hopefully we can turn the page quick.”
(Do you feel better this game than you did the last couple when you leave the stadium today? Do you feel any different than you did the last couple of weeks?) – “Well a loss is a loss, regardless of how I played or not.”
(Well not you, overall.) – I think because I would say when I come up here, I feel the pressure of how we perform offensively. I think we performed to how we think we can, but regardless of that, it sucks losing. So regardless of how much stats our guys had offensively or defensively, we lost. So none of the guys in there really care. If I threw four interceptions and we came out with a win, I mean, the guys would be excited. I mean, I’d be excited, but also disappointed at my performance. But just the grand scheme of things, we’re in this business to win.”
I was curious, there were a couple situations where you guys were second-and-short and decided to pass. Head Coach Mike McDaniel said he wanted to stay ahead of the Bills defense. What did you see from the guys and the defense with the way they were running to the ball?) – “They had many looks. They had some really good adjustments. At the end of the day, it just comes down to execution – who’s executing what’s called better. So, that’s all it was.”
(How do you feel like you handled the elements today? And how many snowballs did you get hit by?) – “I thought we, as a team, handled the elements pretty well for a team that comes from 80-degree weather. I think for our team, after this performance, we’re able to put that to rest that we can’t play in cold weather, or we can’t compete against cold weather teams. Their fans are electric. Thank God, I wasn’t hit by a snowball, but there were some near misses. There were some near misses on the sideline.”
(There were a couple of opportunities where you settled for three instead of six. What went wrong in those sequences?) – “Just execution for us on our part. You’ve got to give credit to their defense – their defense was really good. They’ve been playing together for some time, so you expect that in crucial situations from those guys. I’d also like to give a shout out to the Bills Mafia, their fans, that when – I remember when I had my concussion, they started a whole ordeal of donating to my foundation. That hasn’t been lost – I just want to throw that out and just say that I really appreciate that.”
Mike McDaniel – December 17, 2022 (Postgame)
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Saturday, December 17, 2022
Postgame – Buffalo
Head Coach Mike McDaniel
(Obviously, that was a tough one. What did you tell your team just now?) – “That it’s a result-oriented business, but there’s good and bad from it. I think guys were so invested, coaches and players alike, and we had a very good performance against a very, very good team. OK? We almost did it because of preparation. I think there’s a little in-game stuff that I really want to improve on, where when someone makes a play, the next play, you’re not down – you’re ready to compete for the next play. I think we let some plays snowball for some of the game. That’s to the credit of the Buffalo Bills, that is a really, really good football team that plays hard and is fundamentally sound. That’s why they’re so hard to beat at home. On the positive side, I think that is night and day from the football we’ve played since the bye. So had we played like that for the whole season, we’d be feeling a lot different because it wouldn’t be the third loss in a row. So I think perspective is important and I think there’s stuff to learn from it. It’s a gut check for sure, but I know the guys aspire to be great. Well, this is one thing that only great people can do is really go all in, really invest, spend a lot of time and do everything the right way and still come up short. That’s football – that’s what happens when you play really good football teams on their home turf.”
Obviously, you want to run the football in this game. It’s been tough sledding last couple of weeks, what were you able to do tonight, to get that running game as effective as it was?) – “I think it started with the running backs. They knew it was their time; they wanted to carry the load. They had the right mindset, and it’s a credit to the offensive line for really going after a team that plays hard, that if you don’t go after they make you look pretty stupid, pretty fast. So I think that – I’m not sure what we ended up with, but anytime you play a team and whatever week it is, the 14th or 15th week of the season, and they’ve given up I think three games around 150 (rushing yards) and everything else below that rushing, they should be proud of it because it was deliberate work that was collected. The wideouts were blocking, the quarterback was doing a good job.”
(Do you feel you got away from the ground game a little bit as the game went on? Do you wish you would have stuck with it a little more?) – “I mean you have to – in a game like that, you have to kind of stay ahead of what the defense is doing. I think when they adjust – we had to give them a reason to play single safety. I think they played four snaps of man the first time we played them. So you have a choice – you can either play scared, or you can try to you know continue doing what your offense is built to do and if they’re blitzing five-man pressures to stop the run, it’s going to get ugly. I was fine with the way the game went and I think all of our players would, if given the opportunity, the offensive line and the running backs believe in our receivers and quarterback, and you have to play to each other and take what the defense is getting giving you.”
(How would you describe what you saw taking place on that final drive? Were there any thoughts to let the Bills score once they got so close to the end zone?) – “Yeah, there was a thought, but I mean, that’s the reason if you guys were watching the game, they didn’t score a touchdown and they went to third-and-1 and then they kneeled it. So yeah, there was thought to it, but they weren’t going to allow us to do that. They get paid too and they’re pretty smart coaches. We were trying to – once they got past the long field goal, that was obviously the thought, but they were going to make sure that the field was the last play the game, so credit to them. They did what they needed to do to win the football game.”
(Leading up to the game, the weather played a huge role and factor. I want to know because once the elements really came down, it seems like that’s when the game kind of got away. So how much impact do you attribute to weather?) – “I don’t at all, no. I mean, it was a football game. Yeah, it did start snowing. I think we moved the ball to the high 40-yard line and we threw a slant that wasn’t complete, so then we had to punt. I know a lot of people would like to make it about the weather; our team never did. It was cool for you guys to talk about, but it was more about football players on the football field, because again, any competitor worth their weight, you’re playing in the same elements.”
(To compete at this level in those wintery conditions, does that give this team confidence going forward would you have to…?) – “I think it’s cool to go through the first time of snow game. It’s really exciting. They had to feel questions about it all week and I don’t think they – we do play football in a warmer weather city, but I think at least we can put that to rest. For the guys that hadn’t played in a snow or cold game, it’s cool to get that under their belt.”
(An opposite weather question would be that once it started snowing in that last sequence, you showed no hesitation in putting it in the air several times and you were able to succeed at doing that. What does that tell you about this offense’s effectiveness, your confidence in QB Tua Tagovailoa and all that?) – “I think they would – they all wanted to do that. They kind of knew they’d be geared up to stop the run, and they looked at it like they had to win the game. I think they expected to, and we thought we had a chance to go put it in our hands. I think offensively, they really wanted that and just came up short. I really had a ton of confidence in Jason (Sanders), so we were really hoping on that last third down to get seven or eight yards to put us in a situation to try to get points, and we were unable to which was unfortunate.”
(From the beginning of season, you won three straight, so you kind of had a cushion as far as win loss record. You have three games left and it’s hyping up that these three games are going to be very important moving forward. Are you confident with your team bouncing back from this one and being able to close the deal?) – “I feel the same way that I (felt) the last three week. The one thing that I will say about our team is they were not feeling like they had a cushion – they’ve gone after it. I don’t think that has changed; it just makes it real tough which makes it more worth it if you’re able to do it. It makes it more difficult, for sure, because you keep getting the wind knocked out of you. The players have given me no reason thus far to expect anything other than the high resolve and determination to finish the season off right. I mean, shoot, you’ve got a home game coming up. Here’s the thing with football – there’s no such thing as a season without adversity, because you either experience it, work through it and then are able to continue winning games, or you don’t have it and then you lose at the end of the season. So it’s adverse either way. My main goal is coaches and players to see what I expect from them, which is tough-minded people with resolve and determination and aren’t going to let the idea that (it) being hard be the reason that they can’t progress. I mean that that should be the – to me, the second something gets difficult, you know you have a chance to do something that others can’t. That’s kind of a – from a competitor’s perspective, it should be a heck of an opportunity that I expect and I’m pretty confident that we’ll see from our team.”
(What was going on with S Jevon Holland and WR Jaylen Waddle, two guys that ended up coming back in the game?) – “There were some dings that I don’t totally know the story of. One was pretty – (Jaylen) Waddle, I really don’t even know what the diagnosis was, something with his hand. Jevon (Holland), he’s such a competitor. I’ve never seen him go out, so he ended up finishing the game. We’ll have more news on that, I don’t know when my press conference is but in the future.”
(What did you notice about your team’s performance in the red zone today? What went wrong in the red zone today?) – “It’s a good defense – the Buffalo Bills tried to not let us score, unfortunately. There’s some execution issues. There was one contested ball that you hope somebody can make a great one. There was one that one of our – we’re not in the situation to compete for this game if we don’t have Trent Sherfield, and the ball bounces some ways sometimes. Other than that, I believe we had a rushing touchdown. It’s just in games like that, guys will look back on that, you can kind of count points that way, but it’s also the game evolves and is a circumstance of situations. You’re not going to make every play. I thought guys did a good job. There were just a couple times that the Buffalo Bills were better than the Miami Dolphins. So they win, we lose.”
(How critical was that sequence where LB Jaelan Phillips and DT Christian Wilkins combined on the strip sack fumble, and you only got three out of it?) – I mean, technically every time we got three and not seven, you could say that lost the game – they’re all critical. That’s what the accountable people – as an accountable coach, that’s the way you approach it and you hope the players match that accountability, which they have all season. So I think every single time that we kicked the field goal, from our standpoint, we would say, ‘Hey, that lost the game.’ And then you’d expect the defense to say, ‘Hey, no. That shouldn’t have mattered, and that’s enough points.’ So I think that mutual accountability is the only way that you can really do what everybody with the Miami Dolphins fanbase and the organization really want to do. We’ve got a game next week, and that’s really all you can control. Right now, I think it would be weak minded of any player or coach on the Miami Dolphins to have less confidence from this game going into next week – that would just mean that they’re sick of being vulnerable. And if I have any say in that, that will not be the case. But they need to learn from this, they need to learn that the game in 60 minutes and that’s where I see real opportunity for growth more than anything. It’s not a turnover that we got, or it’s not a field goal instead of touchdown. To me, I saw hands down, frustration that I don’t want to see. People are going to make plays, especially good teams. So you’ve got to get used to really wanting to win and dealing with the consequences, even in drive, because they have to score. They have to be in the end zone. So that’s where I can see coaches and players need to improve from this game, because I think if that didn’t occur, ironically, before watching it, I think we would have won the game – that was the biggest failure.”
(Were the snowballs distracting?) – “The officials did a great job. I was just more concerned with the safety when there’s ice balls flying at people’s heads, and I think that’s what they were concerned with as well. There were several people that got hit – it’s whatever.”
