Adam Gase – October 6, 2017
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Friday, October 6, 2017
Head Coach Adam Gase
(Obviously you guys have been doing well against the run so far this season, but when you face a physical challenge like this in terms of the offensive line and the two physical backs that Tennessee has, does it give you a good gauge of where you are as a team?) – “Absolutely. This is where we’ll find out really where we’re at because there is no hiding from those two guys. Whether, with the quarterback, if (Marcus Mariota is) in there, that adds an extra dimension. It makes it really tough because of the gap responsibilities. It’s just going to be one of those games where we just have to be very sound. We have to play team defense. We have to do a good job of tackling. If it is one-on-one, we’ve got to get the guy down and give ourselves another chance. This will be probably our toughest test so far.”
(Titans QB Marcus Mariota was listed as a game-time decision. You spoke a little earlier about the challenge of preparing for two quarterbacks but how did you go about that during the week?) – “You have to prepare for both. You have to talk about both of them and that’s what makes it tough. You have to put the time in. Normally you spend the entire week worrying about one guy, and especially when you have two guys that are extremes, you’ve got to put the time in. There’s no other way to put it. You’ve got to use your practice reps wisely and do extra film study and just make sure that you’re prepared for both.”
(Do you create two game plans defensively?) – “There’s things that you can do on certain calls to put yourself in position of if it’s one quarterback, here’s how you’re going to play it. If it’s the other guy, this is how you’re going to play it. You don’t necessarily create two game plans but you have some options for one guy over the other.”
(Would you feel comfortable putting a quarterback out there without mobility? Because I know some don’t have mobility to begin with but…) – “A mobile guy that’s hurt, you’re saying?”
(Yes.) – “I’ve done it before. You’re worried about it because you’re … And then you try to call the game appropriately. When Jay (Cutler) pulled his hamstring in 2015, and he was moving around a lot that year and we had a lot of success there, I was trying to be careful of what I called to not force him outside the pocket and things like that, because you just didn’t want to make it worse.”
(What is your sweet spot for RB Kenyan Drake? What would be the ideal role for him?) – “I think the ideal role for him is, and this is what we’re always going to be striving for with him, is we want him to stay where he’s at on special teams and get better, which he’s done a really good job there. There are a lot of plays that you don’t realize he’s being impactful, because he might not necessarily make the tackle or he might not block the punt – all of those little things – or get a return; but he’s been positive in all of those areas on special teams. On offense, you’d love him to be a backup first- and second-down back. He has really good running skills and he has the ability to run routes and catch the ball out of the backfield. He has the ability in empty (sets) to flex him out and run multiple routes. What happens is sometimes when you’re a younger player and you’re not playing and you’re not in the game, it’s hard to learn as the season goes on. You can run as many scout team reps as you can, but that’s not the same as getting reps in practice. Our Thursdays or Wednesdays with him have been ways for him to get better because when Jay (Ajayi) doesn’t practice, he’s taking the majority of the reps. That’s good for him because it’s just one more thing he’s putting in his brain of he’s done it before. When we have all of those backs going and Jay (Ajayi) wants to get those reps in training camp, (Drake) kind of gets put to the backburner there where, as a young player, you really don’t want to do that because you want him to get those reps. The last two weeks have been really good for him because Jay (Ajayi) has missed a practice and he’s had to take the majority of the work.”
(You’re obviously coming off two very difficult games and now that you’ve had a full week of practice to see how the team is responding, what have you seen this week in practice?) – “I’ve seen a lot of guys put their head down and work. Really, at the end of the day, that’s the only way offensively that you can get yourself out of, for whatever reason, the funk that we were in the last two games. The only way that you can pull yourself out of it is that you know what do, are able to play fast and then on game day, you have to execute under pressure.”
(How personal do you think the offense line is taking their struggles so far considering they were kind of the catalyst last year that got this thing going?) – “I think you look at the guy that leads the room. It’s going to start with him and he takes everything personal. He wants us to be a top rushing team. (Mike) Pouncey I’m talking about. He wants us to be one of the best rushing teams in football. He’s not satisfied with any kind of leakage in protection. I think the standard starts with him. The best thing about him is he’s probably playing his best ball right now and he’s graded out the last three games off the charts. If there’s one guy I can say that’s played good in every game, it’s been him. I think it starts with him and then it has to trickle down to the rest of those guys and really at the end of the day it has to be about, we just need to play fast, don’t think, react, and really it starts with the weekly preparation and knowing your job and being able to do that.”
(It looks like CB Xavien Howard practiced for the second straight day. How do you feel about his chances?) – “We’ve got a good chance but it’s just … We’re still a little ways from the game. You just never if tomorrow, what if he’s not feeling right, or the next day. So we’ll see how it goes. I’ll know more by probably tonight and then tomorrow. Tomorrow morning I’ll probably have a better idea.”
(Now LB Rey Maualuga, he’s probably been the most optimistic person ever in Dolphins history; but he knows for sure he’s playing. He’s working with this first team. Is he closer to getting there?) – “I think he’s in good shape. I think today was good for him because Wednesday wasn’t as hot, because it rained. We had cloud cover today. It was a little more like it’s going to be (during a game) and I think it was good for him to go through that, and it seems like he feels good and we’ll just keep taking it day by day. I’m excited. If we get the chance that he’s out there and we can get him playing, this is probably a really good week for him to be playing.”
(What do you see from the Titans defense from the struggles against Houston to how they’ll try to bounce back this week?) – “You just have to look at the game by … Every game has a different story and that’s why us scoring 0 points, you never know what’s going to happen in the next week. It’s the same thing with them. I’m sure they’re not real satisfied with how it went last week and they’ll be ready to go. They’ll probably feel confident coming in here after what they did to us last year and that front is a tough front to block and they know it. We’re a different challenge for them than what the last team they played. When you have a Hall of Fame coach as your defensive coordinator (Dick LeBeau) and you have a lot of talented players, they’ll be ready go.”
(But someone hung 57 on the Titans. Doesn’t that say something about them?) – “It happens. It happens sometimes. Sometimes you get shutout. Not often, but it happens.”
(With LB Rey Maualuga’s style, is it because of his style that this is a good matchup for him?) – “I mean you’ve got two physical backs and he’s a physical player. I’ve played against him enough to know that people know where he’s at. He’s a guy that can … He tackles well and when he hits you, you know it.”
Cameron Wake – October 6, 2017
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Friday, October 6, 2017
DE Cameron Wake
(Head Coach Adam Gase was saying yesterday what a great job you’ve done setting the edge, not only doing it on your own in the run game, but showing others how to do it as well. Is this as well, do you think, as you’ve played the run? You’ve played the run well in the past, but is this, do you think, as well as you’ve done it?) – “What do you mean? I’m a pass rusher. I don’t play the run. (laughter)”
(Well, it’s something that’s asked of you as a starter for years. Is this as well as you’ve done it?) – “I’ve played a lot of snaps so it’s going to be hard to try to merge all of those years together, especially in this old brain. Literally, I take it play by play. Whatever is asked of me, I do my best to do that thing, whatever it is. If it’s setting the edge, setting the edge; getting to the quarterback, do that; drop into coverage, I’ve done that as well. I just literally take it one play at a time and if I do my job on that play, I consider it a win for me and move on to the next.”
(How much of a pride factor though is stopping the run for you, knowing that people think of you foremost as a pass rusher?) – “I just have a lot of pride about me in all aspects of the game, whether it’s stopping the run, dropping into coverage, getting to the quarterback. I have pride in getting my job done. I’ve long, long ago stopped caring about what people thought of me or labeled me as – many, many moons ago. Like I said, it’s play by play and it’s between me and the guys that I play with and the coaching staff as far as what that role is going to be, how I attack it and whether it’s a success or not.”
(How would you describe the mood at practice this week?) – “Urgent, I guess. Is that a good word? I think everybody realizes that we only get so many swings at the bat. You can’t just let any of these slip through your fingers. Obviously hindsight is 20/20 – could have, should have, would have – but in this game, you don’t have 80 games or whatever it is. You get 16 chances, hopefully more. Every one of them is important. You never want to be – we’ve been there before – where you’re looking back 10 weeks from now saying ‘If we would have this, then hopefully we could have … We should have beat this team, but we didn’t.’ You’ve got to treat each game like that’s the most important game and this next game coming up is the most important. I feel like we have a good matchup and things should play in our favor but it won’t unless we go out there and do our job.”
(Obviously you never want to rule out a situation where Titans QB Marcus Mariota is questionable. You don’t know if he’s going to play. How do you prepare for two quarterbacks? Do you have to go into it with two different game plans or two different approaches?) – “I don’t think so. I feel like if you can fit into a medium, you can fit into a large. I’ll say it that way. You prepare, and if you have to scale back, you have to scale back. You wouldn’t want to do it the other way. You don’t want to say, ‘I’m going to be a large and now I’m trying to fit into a medium.’ It wouldn’t work that way, so you set your game plan as such that most eventualities are taken care of, and if you have to cut off a few, better safe than sorry. Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it.”
(For lack of a better word, is it annoying to not know which quarterback you’re facing?) – “Not at all. (For) me, personally, there is a blank spot in the backfield. I will get there no matter who’s standing in the spot, that’s just the way I look at it. Now of course, when somebody has the ball or there are certain plays and things like that, you have to adjust the game plan a little bit; but at the end of the day, it’s nameless, faceless entities that you try to destroy every chance you get.”
(A lot of times rookies, there are just these little epiphanies when something finally clicks for them. Have you seen any little breakthroughs like that for DE Charles Harris recently?) – “That’d probably be a better question to ask him; but I’ve been around him, obviously, for many months now and I feel like he’s tremendously gifted. I feel like he has – and I kind of look back – I don’t want to age myself but I look back (to) when I came in and had so many veterans to look for and ask questions. I think he’s kind of in that same situation where he has many, many years; many, many snaps, Pro Bowls, a coaching staff (around him). We’ve got basically a whole host of wisdom around him that he can always find an answer to any question he has. He’s been a guy to take advantage of that and I think it’s also showing up on the field, as well. I think last game was probably a game that most people say was his best game yet, and I’m obviously looking forward to more in the future.”
(So far, this defense has been far better at stopping the run compared to last year. The main reason for that is what?) – “I’m in there stopping the run, what do you mean? (Laughter) I don’t think it is one thing. Defense and offense are always talked about and how different they are; but on defense you have to play … If there’s 90 snaps in a game, you have to play, especially to stop the run, 90 snaps, everybody in the right place, you have this gap, gap, gap, gap. That’s the only way you stop the run – consistent, cohesive, together football. On defense, if you have two plays out of all 90 that you don’t do the right thing, a 60-yard run, your run defense is completely out the window. Offense is the complete opposite. You could have two bad quarters and come and have two great quarters and at the end of the day, you look like you won the day. It all comes down to consistency, playing together, and it has to be play in and play out. One play can ruin the day for you and change field position, and put points on the board, all of those things. To say one thing, it would be very hard; but I think it’s each guy knowing that, ‘This is my job to do,’ just trust the guy, he’s going to be in his job. (If) you do that over and over again, you build a resume over the course of a few games and you look back and can be proud of yourself.”
(What do you know about LB Rey Maualuga and what do you think he could potentially add to this defense?) – “We probably shared the field a couple of times. Physical force is probably the best couple of adjectives I could use to describe him. He’s obviously a veteran in the game, has a lot of wisdom, tough, hard-nose player, and I’m truly glad he’s on our side. I think this probably would be a great week to have a coming out party. I won’t be able to watch, but I’m looking forward to playing beside him”
(Looking at the run game for the Titans and the offensive line and the production that they’ve had, what do you see in them and how do you go about combatting some of the things that they’re able to do?) – “It’s kind of like what I just spoke about. They play well together. The running backs, obviously, know where they need to be, hit the holes, find the open spots, find that guy who’s not doing what he’s supposed to be doing. They’ll run hard and they’ll make guys miss and, again, you have to play together as a whole. That one guy. All 10 of us doing something right and one guy is not, they find that guy and they pop it through for a big gain. Again, that’s one of those unstoppable force, immovable object situations, and I like our matchup and I’m looking forward to going out there and getting the job done.”
(Only one team has allowed quarterbacks to have a higher passer rating against you guys. You guys are allowing 70-something percent of passes to be completed. Obviously a lot of that pressure is going to the secondary, but do you guys on the front line take responsibility for what’s going on there?) – “I wholeheartedly agree that any stat that you put you together – whether the passing stat is bad or good – is shared by both the d-line and the secondary. It’s probably inverse as far as most people think about it. I think when there’s a 70-yard pass and it’s a big bomb, that’s probably more the d-line’s issue than the secondary. This is the NFL, these are the best receivers in the world, no one can cover these receivers – I don’t care who it is – for 5 seconds. It’s just impossible. The inverse of that is if the pass is going out in 2 seconds, that’s probably more of a DB issue. I would like to think we share. They’re covering guys, making sure that we can get (to the quarterback) and we’re trying to get there to interrupt the plays. Maybe they’re throwing it too soon, it’s out of place, on the ground, whatever. So it’s shared responsibility, like I said, bad and good. It’s not always going to be on them. It’s not always going to be on us. I think we both play a role.”
Andre Branch – October 5, 2017
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Thursday, October 5, 2017
DE Andre Branch
(We don’t know if Titans QB Marcus Mariota is going to play, but if he can, the kind of dual threat he can be, what kind of havoc can that guy create?) – “(He’s) a run and pass threat. He can definitely throw the ball as an NFL quarterback, but he runs the same 40 (yard dash) as NFL receivers, so he’s dangerous and we’re preparing for it.”
(How hard is it to prepare for possibly two quarterbacks, because with QB Marcus Mariota’s hamstring injury, it’s unclear if he’s going to play or QB Matt Cassel?) – “It’s tough; but at the same time, we’re preparing like (Mariota’s) going to play.”
(With this run game, obviously they have two physical backs. How much of a challenge is it to set the edge, especially against this offensive line?) – “It’s important because we went against the same offense last year and they ran it down our throat. So for us, it’s just do your job and just know that it’s going to be a physical, physical game. We’re getting ready for it.”
(When you’ve got a running back like RB DeMarco Murray, is there a key to getting him down on the ground?) – “Tackle. The most important thing for us is just do our job and everything else will handle itself.”
(How well are you guys doing your job so far this season as a defense?) – “I would say we’re doing a pretty good job, but there’s always room for improvement. That’s why we go out each and every day, to get better each and every day. For us, it’s just everybody hone into their job and everybody do their job and be accountable.”
(What are the little things that you think can be improved upon?) – “No one plays a perfect game. My key for everything is just everybody do their job and the rest will handle itself.”
(Why is the rush defense so much better this year? I know it’s only three games, but you’re only allowing 3.1 yards per carry. That’s near the top of the league and last year it was 30th.) – “This is a whole new team at the end of the day; but it’s important for us to just do our job. We have new pieces in place and they’re playing outstanding.”
Adam Gase – October 5, 2017
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Thursday, October 5, 2017
Head Coach Adam Gase
(Offensive Coordinator Clyde Christensen basically just said he’s not doing a good enough job helping you out in terms of helping the offense and giving you ideas, and insinuated that the offense might be tightening up, feeling the pressure of what’s been going on. Your response to that is what?) – “Clyde is just probably being a little hard on himself. I think what everybody is trying to do right now is do more – find ways to help the offense, find ways to see if we can get some consistency going, finishing drives, converting third downs. As far as guys tightening up, this is the NFL, so we’ve got to toughen up a little bit.”
(Offensive Coordinator Clyde Christensen indicated that things haven’t only not been manageable on the field, but also off the field – all the travel, everything that’s included – there’s no continuity, really. Can you kind of comment to that?) – “The schedule is what it is. We’re going to line up somewhere Sunday. You roll with the punches and you get prepared for the game and just be ready to go.”
(Was CB Xavien Howard even close to being able to work yesterday?) – “We were going to hold him out regardless. He’s just still day-to-day.”
(How long does it take for a guy to get in shape? LB Rey Maualgua has been around for a while. Is he still not in shape?) – “He looks alright to me. We’ll see what we do Sunday.”
(Do you want LB Rey Maualuga to play if he’s healthy and in shape?) – “Of course I do. That’s why we brought him here.”
(Do you ever talk to your guys about outside noise or do you leave them on their own to manage it?) – “I just tell them don’t listen to anything. Why? If anyone was held accountable for what they said, there’d be a lot of people out of jobs.”
(Offensive Coordinator Clyde Christensen was in here a little bit ago and he talked about doing what you do, but continuing to do it and just do it better. Is that your philosophy as well as far as the run game is concerned, just do what you’ve been doing?) – “With what we’ve been doing we absolutely … That’s really the No. 1 key for us is just do your job. If we do that consistently, we’ll be fine.”
(With third downs, it has been an issue for the past two seasons, carrying over to this year. Is there any rhyme or reason to why the team continues to struggle on that down?) – “I looked at that after the season, trying to pinpoint one or two things. Some of it came from … It stemmed from first and second down to where negative plays … Last year, it was more we were having minus 5- to 8-yard plays sometimes in the run game. That hurt us. We’d drop a ball here or we’d have a misread or a missed cut – things like that. That kind of will throw you off. If you have a negative play on first or second down, it makes it tough on third down. When you start heading in that third-and-8 plus, third-and-7 plus area, it’s tough to convert in this league, because they know what you’re going to do. They know you’re throwing it and there’s a lot of good pass rushers in this league, and it makes it very difficult to protect the quarterback.”
(We saw WR Jakeem Grant early at receiver in the first series for I think a couple of plays. Was that something that you had planned to do early and not do a lot of later, because obviously you have three, veteran, talented receivers?) – “If we keep the game fairly manageable or get a lead one of these days, I’d like to keep rolling all of those guys in there. We’ve got a talented bunch of guys between the backs and tight ends and wide receivers. (I want to) try to play guys, keep them fresh, get some different guys the ball, see if somebody can pop one out and make a big play. When it kind of gets in a position to where I feel like those three guys need to stay on the field, because they have a greater grasp of the variety of routes that we can run and moving them around. With Jakeem, I don’t want to throw him outside the box we kind of have him in right now, because he’s really starting to make a lot of progress. If we ever got to the situation where he had to play more, we’re going to have to do that; but we’re trying to keep bringing him along. This is his first year playing that spot. I like the direction he’s heading. I want him to keep improving.”
(How tough has it been a decision for you in your first year and a half of being a head coach of how often to ream your team, how often to be really angry with them as opposed to being calm when things are not going well?) – “I just go by feel. I feel like you need to say the right things at the right time. Every week is different.”
(Offensive Coordinator Clyde Christensen said that C/G Ted Larsen is getting closer. How close is he right now?) – “I don’t know. He knows more than I do, I guess.”
(That’s not anytime soon?) – “I don’t know. I’m worried about this game. He’s not playing this week.”
(Mike Gundy … This is totally random, so I apologize, if this is stupid: I was talking to Gundy about play calling once – Oklahoma State Head Coach Mike Gundy – and he told me that if things weren’t going right, sometimes he would literally randomly call a play off his sheet. Have you ever done anything like that?) – “I joke about … It’s like playing Battleship. You really have no clue what the other guy is doing anyways. You try to organize it the best you can and go off of tendencies. All it takes is one game and all of a sudden the defensive coordinator flips all his tendencies. That’s done a lot. You try to give the quarterback and the players as many answers as possible. Teams usually lean on certain coverages, and they’ll throw some curveballs in there every once in a while. But for the most part, you have an idea of what it could be. When you give them a play and there’s just nothing, no answers whatsoever, that’s really where you get yourself in trouble.”
Clyde Christensen – October 5, 2017
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Thursday, October 5, 2017
Offensive Coordinator Clyde Christensen
(A couple of things. One, from a run blocking standpoint, who has been your best offensive lineman this year? The other thing is how different are you seeing defensive fronts in terms of number of people in the box in the first three games compared to last December – Jets, Patriots, Steelers in the playoff game, Bills?) – “To answer your first question, (Mike) Pouncey is the one guy on offense who I think has graded out (well) all three of the weeks. He continues to play at an extremely high level. He has played extremely well for three weeks, especially on a (modified) practice schedule where we’re kind of having to rest him a little bit. Defensively, it’s really the same thing (we saw last year). We just haven’t handled it as well. We’re getting the extra man in the box and everyone starts with the same thing, ‘Let’s stop the run. Let’s not let them get going.’ The difference is that we haven’t gotten going much this year; but I think they’re playing us the same. I really think that they’ve played us very similar and probably the only advantage that they do have now is a whole year of film on us and it gives them a little more to start preparing for us. But it’s the same thing. Every week, week after week, it’s the same thing. It’s that extra guy in the box, let’s stop the run first, which we knew. You go into every game knowing there’s an extra man in the box and last year we ran the ball solidly on the extra man, and this year we haven’t consistently done that. This last game, it’s a hard thing to say; but when we were on schedule, we played pretty well. You called runs on first-and-10 and second-and-1-to-6 and when you’re on schedule … The bad news was we just weren’t on schedule probably two-thirds of the game, whether it was a penalty, whether it was a minus-yard play or whether it was something else, we just stayed off schedule. Then it’s hard. It’s hard-sledding and we didn’t handle it very well. If there was a silver lining – which there wasn’t much of one, but if there was one – it was when we were on schedule, it was okay. The first drive, we drive down there and did some good things and ran, threw (the ball) and kind of had a little rhythm going there and then we had the pick at the 5-yard line on first-and-goal from the 5 (yard line). But when we were on schedule, it was okay. It was okay football.”
(Is it fair to say that the run blocking is not anywhere close to where it was at the end of last year?) – “I don’t know if that’s fair. It’s a good question. We haven’t run it as successfully. There were moments and there were times last year where we had trouble running, that the extra guy is (causing trouble); but I think it’s certainly fair to say we aren’t running it as well. It’s a combination of an awful lot of things. Is it the line’s fault if we jump offsides, if we jump offsides and end up first-and-15? I’d be careful. I would not put it all on the (offensive) line or the run blocking, if you will. It’s been kind of everybody. Sometimes it’s the quarterback, sometimes it’s a tight end jumping offsides, sometimes it’s us not getting lined up right or something. There have been multiple … Getting a ‘Mike’ (linebacker) point, getting it ID’d correctly. All of those things. It would be widespread to blame (everyone), including me.”
(What does this offense need to do more than anything? I know score points, but specifically what do you need to do?) – “I think we’ve just got to get guys … I said last week, we’ve got to have more guys play winning football. That would be the first thing. And then I think third down continues to haunt us because everyone gets claustrophobic and frustrated that you don’t have enough snaps. It’s another game where there is 50-whatever there was – (47) snaps in the game. I watched Houston against these guys last week this morning and I think they had (78) snaps. Don’t hold me to the number. I think if you said two things, we have to play better football and everyone just has to do their job; and then two is we have to stay on schedule and sustain some drives and get enough snaps to where playmakers can make their plays and (Head) Coach (Adam) Gase can get into his full play call sheet, runners can get enough carries to get into a rhythm, we can wear down some pass rushers to where it’s a little easier to protect and block people – all of those kinds of things. Those two things I’d say would be of utmost importance.”
(With Head Coach Adam Gase calling the plays and having final say on the offense, how exactly do you two work together when you’re in a situation like this trying to fix some things? What is your role as far as that dynamic?) – “My role, which I don’t think I’ve done very well is just keep giving him some ideas and kind of manage the things underneath him, talk through some things like how do we get this thing back on track, so he can focus on calling the game. It’s the same as it’s always been, just to be a complement to him. It’s his show and I’m just dancing in it; but I’ve got to do a better job of giving him what he needs to dial it up. The same as everybody, there’s a frustration level I think (he has). When there are so few snaps, it’s hard to get a rhythm. It’s hard to get to the things in your game plan that you want to. You start pressing. I do think that probably one of my responsibilities would be just to be a soothing voice, if you will, that you can’t get frustrated. All of us have tendencies – players and coaches – to say ‘I’ve got to make it happen. I’ve got to make this thing successful. I’ve got to call the perfect play. I’ve got to dial up the one that turns the whole thing around.’ At the end of the day, that’s a recipe for things getting worse. You’ve got to stay with it and we’ve just got to work our way through this thing. The great news – I was walking over here trying to think of some positives and I couldn’t think of many, but one is we get to play this weekend; and two is that we have to find some way to end the first quarter 2-2. We’ve been around the globe with circumstances and geographics, and we can come out of this quarter 2-2 and regroup with a long way to go. That’s a positive, to play as dismally as we’ve played offensively and I think there’s just one undefeated team (Kansas City). If you come out of the first quarter 2-2 … We’ve got a chance to do that with a home game (this week) and we have to do that.”
(How do you improve the production in the run game? Is that a matter of continuing doing what you have been doing but doing it better?) – “I think it is. I think generally, the recipe out there in the stands and on the TV and everywhere else is we’ve got to change people, we’ve got to change things, we’ve got to change schemes, we’ve got to change everything, we have to change what we had for pregame meal. I think that’s kind of … ‘Replace this and replace that.’ Usually, in my humble history, you try to just do what you’re doing better. It’s not the system. It’s a proven system. It’s not the players. They’ve won games. Just keep doing what you’re doing, do it better, tighten it up and you hope for something to just kind of ignite it. A big play, we need someone to make a big run, a big catch, a big throw, a big block, something to just get us going. We all know who have watched this thing from last year that we’ve kind of been that kind of team. Once something gets it going, it kind of catches fire and then we go. I do think it’s not (about changing things). You have to resist a little (because) changing everything, that’s not the case. We’ll experiment a little bit but the answer to the question is stay the course, do it better and it’s about us. It’s not about the opponent. We’ve got to play better football; we’ve got to have guys play winning football. If we don’t play winning football, it doesn’t matter what offense, what stadium, what continent we play on. None of that matters. If we don’t play well, we’re not going to win; and that’s kind of the theme. If we play well, it doesn’t matter who the opponent is. It’s the same thing. If we play well, we’re going to have a chance to win the game. We’ve just got to play well. We haven’t.”
(You’ve had this issue going back to last season. Three different quarterbacks. What is at the route of what’s going on in terms of how, you said, this team starts to feel the pressure?) – “Good question. I don’t know the answer. If I knew the answer, we’d have solved it already. It’s a lot of things. It is three quarterbacks. It’s getting off schedule. This week, it was completely unmanageable third down distances. It was probably the longest I remember in a long time where you had three third-and-20s and a third-and-17. The first thing we can do is to keep that thing manageable and to give ourselves a chance. That would be the one thing that jumped out that we all know, that’s obvious. You guys know, I know, everyone knows that; but we haven’t been able to do it. We haven’t been able to stay on schedule. We haven’t been able to get third down going. I would say that of every nine third downs, you could just divide it up and one is a receiver, one is a quarterback, one is protection, one is the defense does a good job. That’s been the question. We’ve studied it, we’ve worked at it, we’ve emphasized it, we’ve done all of those things and so far we haven’t been able to solve it.”
(You mentioned the big plays before. It seems obviously that you’re not getting enough. Is there a metric for that? Do you expect a certain number of big plays and why haven’t you?) – “Yes, I think we do. We feel like we’ve got people up in the box, we’ve got to throw the ball downfield and we’ve got a couple of guys that we think are big-play guys. I think there is empirical data that it’s hard to drive the ball if you don’t knock out a big play somewhere in the thing – a big run, a throw. They’re not always perfect. That’s the amazing thing. When you watch red zone, or you watch third down, a lot of them are off schedule and its Aaron Rodgers getting out of the pocket and making a play or someone making a one-handed catch. The fact is that you have to have them. It’s impossible to just drive the ball. It’s not like certain games in college where you can go 4 yards over and over. You need a big play and we haven’t had them. This week, we really didn’t get a chance to get balls up. The same thing, those number of snaps. That’s important, where you can take your shots. You do get puckered up a little bit where you’re going ‘Gosh, I don’t want to be second-and-10 or I don’t want to throw two incompletes in a row.’ That’s probably what I’m talking about that it’s a challenge to manage as a coach, just that you start pressing and that you want everything to be perfect. I talked about staying on schedule so you’re kind of afraid to take a shot and take a little deeper drop because you don’t want to be second-and-17 if it doesn’t happen, or some of those things. I think all of the above is not very fun, but we’ve just got to get out of it. We’ve got to get out of it and we’ve got to find a way to get out of it and get that ball flowing a little bit. That will be big plays. They have to happen for us to have any success. That’s everybody.”
(How far away is G Isaac Asiata from getting consideration? With C/G Ted Larsen not available, I’m trying to think of possible guard solutions.) – “I think (Asiata) is a ways away. I think in an ideal world, it’d be his redshirt year. That would be the ideal world. We may have to call him up and he may have to go this weekend; but I do think Larsen and a couple of guys are getting closer and that will give us a little extra depth in the thing. We’ve got plenty of good players. We’ve got to play better. I don’t think it’s pulling someone from another team. It’s not someone out on the street that we’re going to go find. It’s our guys playing better.”
(Do you guys have a definition for big play? 11 yards? 16?) – “Yes, we talk about a pass being 20 yards and a run being 12 yards. Different people measure it different ways. The league measures it a different way, but that’s kind of what we would talk about.”
Matt Burke – October 5, 2017
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Thursday, October 5, 2017
Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke
(There was a report this morning the CB Byron Maxwell ‘failed to play defenses called by the coaching staff.’ How often was that occurring?) – “I can’t address any reports that I don’t know about, but ‘Max’ plays what we ask him to play. All of our guys do. We just made decisions on what we thought were the best matchups for the week. I can’t address stuff that I don’t know about.”
(What were some of the factors that went into the decision to make a change at corner?) – “I liked the way ‘Tank’ (Cordrea Tankersley) had been practicing. You guys know that I wanted tighter coverage and wanted some of the things that I just didn’t feel like I was seeing, so we just felt that that was a better opportunity for us to try to move forward last week.”
(How has CB Byron Maxwell responded? He’s been through this before.) – “He has. He’s been good. No one likes to be benched or replaced or to lose playing time, however you want to look at it. I wouldn’t expect him to be happy about it. He was upset and we had some good conversations, him and I and (Defensive Backs Coach) Lou (Anarumo) talked to him a bunch, about what we were doing, and he’s responded well, honestly, as well as you can expect. He’s getting some scout team reps now. We’re moving guys around and he’s been working hard and he says, ‘Alright, I’m just going to keep trying to show you that I’m ready to play and contribute to the team.’ So as long as he keeps on that track, again, it happened last year, it happened a couple of times, and he’s earned his way back in to where we thought we were ready to play him some more. If ‘Max’ continues on that track, then he’ll have an opportunity to get some more time.”
(If CB Xavien Howard can’t go, is CB Alterraun Verner the next man up for this week?) – “There’s still a lot of issues going on there – factors. I know ‘X’ is kind of day-to-day, so we’re seeing where he is. Honestly, we’re just getting all of those guys ready. Special teams will be a factor in terms of who’s active and who’s not, also. It’s just going to be how it fits for the team and what (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) decides to play in terms of who they’re keeping up and who’s going. We’re getting multiple guys ready to play and we’ll make that decision based on health and those factors.”
(Would you say that this is still a man-press defense?) – “I would say those are our base principles, sure.”
(Do you play it a lot, because people are asking why not more?) – “(Laughter) Schematically, I don’t want to say we’re a man-press team; but all of our techniques, even when we play what we consider our zone defenses, they all have man principles in them, and techniques, especially on the outside part of the field, those corners, they should be pressed. Again, depending on certain route concepts and what’s coming at them, they should be in man-oriented coverage.”
(Do the corners get to decide how far off the line of scrimmage they work?) – “No.”
(So they should be closer?) – “In certain calls. Again, the calls and formations dictate technique. So when we make a call, they should have an understanding of, ‘Okay, depending on splits or formation, this is the technique I have to use.’ Sometimes it’s dictated that you should be pressed, sometimes we can’t press in certain splits or certain formations that they have to play off or have to do some different things. The call dictates one thing, but then what the offense gives us dictates something else. There are certain times where they should be pressed, absolutely; and there’s sometimes they can’t be depending on what the offense is showing us.”
(I know it’s a small sample size, just three games thus far; but your rush defense is allowing just 3.1 yards per carry. Why is it so much better this year than last year? What’s different?) – “I don’t know. It’s a new year. We’ve got good players. We made an emphasis on it. I don’t know. I can’t tell you what’s different. I just think the guys are taking pride in it. It’s a point of emphasis from the top down, from me, from everyone else. We’ve been fortunate enough to have some success so far, but it is only three games.”
(How much of a factor is S Reshad Jones being healthy in improving that running defense?) – “Obviously he’s a great player for us. He’s a great tackler, probably our best tackler in the back end; so when you lose a guy like that (it hurts the defense). I thought one of our issues last year, again, was a run breaks out and Reshad gets it down for eight yards or 10 yards and it doesn’t look as bad and we can regroup and fix whatever happened, whereas if we miss a tackle back there and it goes for 40, all of the sudden it’s like, ‘Man, we can’t stop the run.’ Also, he’s been a good blitzer for us in run pressures, and (we’ve been) utilizing him around the line of scrimmage and stuff, too, and giving some different fronts, so he’s a huge factor in what we’re doing in the run game for sure.”
(Going back to what you said based on what you said about splits of the wide receivers. If they’re in close proximity to one another and you have one off the ball and one on the ball, your cornerbacks have to be at different levels to avoid being picked, so that takes away your ability to get hands on receivers.) – “Correct. Any team that is known as a press coverage team or wants to work out of press, that’s what offenses are going to try to do. It’s hard to press stacks and bunches and those types of splits and those things, so teams are going to try to work to get us off press. They don’t want hands on their receivers either, so we worked on it all spring. That’s what (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) tries to do to us every day in practice. That is one of the ways that teams try to get us off press.”
(How would you assess CB Cordrea Tankersley’s first game?) – “I thought he did a good job. He competed. As expected, he was challenged, which that wasn’t a surprise to any of us. There were some rookie mistakes and some things that he’s got to clean up; but I thought that his approach to it, his confidence, and the way challenged guys – he wasn’t backing off from anybody – trying to do what we asked. He was really into it and when he did have a couple of grey area things and we cleaned them up on the sideline, he was very responsive. He was good. It definitely wasn’t too big for him and he went the other way with it.”
(Everyone’s saying that in the last three games, the defense has played good enough to win a game. Would you disagree with that?) – “I would disagree. We haven’t won. I told the guys this, this past game for example. To me, we had five opportunities that I thought we let go by. We had two fumbles on the ground that we didn’t get on – one of them which was in our hands, literally. We had two interceptions that we had our hands on that we dropped; and honestly, for me, the biggest thing I felt was that last drive that we gave up, the last touchdown drive. We had them backed up on the minus-13, we’re only down 13-0 and we’re two scores (away). Literally, I was stalking the sidelines saying, ‘Man, this is just like the Rams game last year.’ If we get a stop here, we get them on a short field, the offense just takes one drive, then they get going, and now it’s 13-7. That’s how I was preaching it and we gave up an 87-yard touchdown drive, aided by some penalties and stuff. For me, that wasn’t a winning effort by our football team on defense. We had multiple opportunities to shorten the field for the offense, to flip things, get a turnover, whatever it may be, and I didn’t think we took advantage of those opportunities. We have one takeaway in three games and that’s something that we emphasize, so there’s plenty of work to be done. We’re not playing that game in my room. I can tell you that.”
(Part of that seems like you want more big plays, fumble recoveries and interceptions.) – “Yes, and it’s a fine line. What I think a good response to what’s been going on was is that our guys weren’t pressing to make plays, because that’s when we start getting in trouble. There’s certain guys that we have to caution against (that think), ‘Oh man, I need to take a play here,’ and getting out of his lane and not doing his responsibility, and then we’re giving up a bigger play. I don’t want the players pressing, feeling like, ‘Man, we have to make plays,’ but there’s always going to be opportunities within the game, and we have to take advantage. The urgency … We’ve had a lot of balls on the ground that we haven’t gotten on top of all season, so far, and like I said, we’ve dropped, off the top of my head, at least five interceptions this year. I mean dropped, had our hands on, had a chance to make plays. When those opportunities present themselves, we have to make those plays. We have to, if we want to be the defense that we are talking about that we want to be. I feel like we haven’t taken advantage of those opportunities yet.”
(Coaches might not look at it this way, but a fumble recovery. If you have your hands on the ball and it escapes, I can understand your point of view, but isn’t there a randomness to fumble recoveries?) – “Yes, there is. I’m sure there are some stats behind that; but some of the things we preach about always getting to the ball. We had that one, I think it was last week – I can’t even keep the days straight right now – where (Ndamukong) Suh had the sack and the ball squirted out and we have guys not … Kiko (Alonso) is the only one chasing after that ball that’s on the ground that they recovered last week in New York. In terms of us never giving up on the play and always running to the ball, good things happen when you have players around the ball. We had that one last week that’s squirting out and Kiko almost falls on it, it pops out and Cam (Wake) is (close). Do you know what I mean? If we have eight guys running to the ball, maybe one of them is there to clean that thing up or pick somebody else off the pile before they get on it, and that sort of thing. Sure, it’s obviously random how a ball bounces and who it goes to closer, but the more guys that we have getting in the area, the more guys around the ball, the more times we’re attacking the ball, whether it’s a ball carrier or in the air, the more opportunity we’re going to have to make those plays.”
(How eager are you to see LB Rey Maualuga in a game at linebacker and how can he help you?) – “I’m always eager to see all of the guys play. Rey, I’ve known for a very long time. He’s been working hard to get back and he’s getting closer. When that time comes … He’s a big man. He’s a physical player, in the run game, particularly. He’s probably one of the best I’ve been around at taking on offensive linemen because he’s such a big, powerful guy. I mean, he knocks offensive linemen back. In fact, I don’t know if I want to put this out here, he might get mad at me; but ask (Mike) Pouncey about it because when we first signed him, (Pouncey) told me we played them last year and he probably hit me as hard as anybody I’ve ever been hit by. He brings that element obviously with some extra beef in there in the middle.”
(Where is LB Rey Maualuga from a conditioning standpoint, in terms of being able to play let’s say 40 snaps a game?) – “Yes, that’s been part of the focus. Like I said, I think he’s close. I think it’s going to be a game-time decision by (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) and by what we’re doing, but basically all he’s been doing for most of the time here has been working, as part of the rehab and getting back healthy; but then also getting into shape. So it’s been an emphasis for him and I think he’s pretty close.”
(They have a couple of good offensive tackles there in Tennessee. How do they use that to their benefit in the run and the pass?) – “They do. Obviously, they feel good about being able to match those guys up. For an offensive line to have confidence in singling those guys up and not having to … We see so many chips and max protections and slides and stuff, so it’s a little different for an o-line to feel confident in terms of protections, where they don’t have to necessarily protect those guys against some of our rush players. They can get a few more players out in the pass game and those sorts of things because they’re not worried about having to protect (Taylor) Lewan or (Jack) Conklin or those guys. It’s a little different type of protection scheme then maybe we’ll see throughout the year. Then in the run game, it’s just their lifeblood of what they do. It’s their element. Obviously we know Lewan’s a tempo-setter for them and (has) attitude, and that’s part of their run game and part of their style and approach to what they’re doing. They’re two good players that we have to get after a little bit this week.”
(What are some of the specifics that you’ve been doing with S T.J. McDonald over the last few weeks? What are some of the things that you’re doing on a routine basis?) – “Again, he’s limited in some of the things he can do and he’s got some other things he has to resolve as he’s going through this process. He’s around in meetings. He’s allowed to do that, so when he’s in meetings, we’ve tried to just involve him in terms of being an extra set of eyes for us like, ‘Hey look at this cut-up or look at this play and maybe help some of the other safeties out with your evaluation,’ which keeps him involved in what we’re doing and the game plan stuff week-to-week. It gives him a way to contribute. When he’s available, he’s been around in meetings and just trying to help as another set of eyes and another veteran player that’s seen it, seen a lot of football and done it. He can help some of those other safeties and guys.”
(Is there any sort of simulation in terms of you showing S T.J. McDonald clips from the game and having him decide what he would do?) – “No, nothing like that.”
Darren Rizzi – October 5, 2017
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Thursday, October 5, 2017
Associate Head Coach/Special Teams Coordinator Darren Rizzi
(The thinking last week in WR Jarvis Landry returning punts instead of WR Jakeem Grant and is Jarvis now your primary punter returner moving forward?) – “Is he our primary punt returner moving forward? No. We have two punt returners. Kind of like I said all along, there’s really no story there. It’s just a thing that we’re going to do every game based on an individual basis. Last week there was one of the reps that Jakeem was going to get, but he was getting re-spatted – his ankle was getting re-spatted at the time, re-taped. He was up on one and it just happened to be one of the ones they punted. One was a game plan thing. We knew Jarvis was going to play on that particular call during the week, all week; and then one was just a coaching decision. It’s still going to be an individual basis. There’s really nothing that doesn’t … We don’t go into, I don’t go into a game, saying ‘Hey, if they have six punts, Jarvis is going to get four and Jakeem’s going to get two; or Jakeem’s going to get four or Jarvis is going to get two; or one guy is going to get six.’ It just worked out in that particular game that Jarvis got three and Jakeem got zero, but there’s not, again, it’s going to be a little bit more of a … It’s really as the flow of the game is going on and the call that we have, game plan, all of those different things factor in. It just happened to be coincidentally that Jarvis got three last week and Jakeem got zero. There’s no indicator of my confidence of anybody, lack of confidence of anybody. There’s really no story there. It’s just going to continue to be a committee deal. We are fortunate to have two guys that can do it and I have confidence in both of them.”
(Some might have watched that and thought well maybe it was because WR Jakeem Grant fumbled the punt late in the game against the Jets. Was that any bearing at all in incorporating WR Jarvis Landry more into the punt return game?) – “He did fumble one, but that wasn’t part of the decision. Honestly, Jakeem was going to take the very first one and was getting re-spatted, and the trainers had come to me and said ‘Hey, right now he’s temporarily down,’ and it just coincidentally happened to be that they were punting the ball, so Jarvis went on that first one. Then like I said, the second one was a game plan and one was just my decision. That was it.”
(If I’m not mistaken, K Cody Parkey has had three plays in the last two games. A kickoff, extra point and a second half kickoff.) – “That’s an accurate statement.”
(Is there such a thing as kicker rust and do you worry about that?) – “Those guys obviously get a fair amount of work in the pregame, which is great, and then obviously they have their work days during the week. They’re a lot like – I kind of liken them to pitchers. They have a five-day rotation, you kind of have your work day, your game day, your work day and your off day. So what we’ll do in that situation is make sure he’s getting a little more work on the days where – like a practice day like yesterday for example – was his work day on Wednesday. So if he’s not getting those reps in the game, we’re going to try to simulate as many as we can. So he maybe got a little bit more field goal yesterday than he had been getting. Obviously we hope we get many more attempts with him and hopefully he’s playing more in these next coming games; but that’s a legitimate question. We just have to adjust his week as his week goes. It would be like a starting pitcher getting – in baseball – getting 40 pitches instead of 90. We’re going to get him more during the week. So that’s basically how we (do it).”
(Did anything or anybody stand out on special teams against the Saints?) – “I though Walt (Aikens) had his best game of the year. Walt Aikens I thought really played well. He obviously missed that preseason time and so, not that he played poorly in the first two games, but I saw the Walt in this game that’s kind of the Walt from the second half of last year. I thought he really had a dominant second half of the year last year and I saw that guy again on Sunday. I thought he really played well. Bobby McCain plays a limited role for us, but he’s really played well through three games. Whether it’s the field goal block or once in a while he’s a gunner or a jammer, or kickoff – he made a big open-field tackle on a kickoff. It was a really nice play. I thought he really played well. Terrence Fede I thought had a good game. Those are the three guys come to mind.”
(I believe your 28th in the NFL in net punting. What needs to improve?) – “After a three-game body of work, I really take very, very little credence in the stats right now. With where the league is, other teams have had one more game than us as well, and so the rankings right now, whether we’re really good at something or really bad at something, I don’t really put a lot of stock into the stats right now. The one thing we need to do a better job of, I will tell you this, is there’s been times where I thought we should have gotten the returner on the ground quicker. Like last week, I thought Teddy Ginn had a few more yards than he should have gotten on the one return in particular. Again, I think there’s a combination of things. It’s not putting your finger on one thing. I thought Matt Haack, for the most part, has punted the ball fairly well. There’s probably one or two punts he’d like to have back; but he’s had really good hang time on the ball and enabled our coverage to get down the field. We’ve got to do a better job of open-field tackling. As I tell our guys all the time, on special teams and your coverage, they can’t get a hat on everybody. In this league, the free players have to get the guy on the ground. If you’re not blocked in this league, it’s the same thing with defense, the unblocked player has to make tackles. Period. If your unblocked players don’t make tackles on coverage and defense, it’s going to be a long, long day. That’s one thing we harp on. We had a couple of instances so far where the unblocked guy didn’t get the player on the ground. That’s what we’ve got to do a better job of.”
(Both LB Stephone Anthony and CB/S Jordan Lucas will be active on special teams this week?) – “It remains to be seen. We’re going to kind of see how the practice week goes here. They’re both working. Again, it’s my job, as you guys all know, to get everybody ready. Both of those guys are actively taking reps in everything that we’re doing and rotating in. We have some decisions to make here at the end of the week on who the actives are; but both guys could potentially be in there for sure.”
(In your role as associate head coach – I asked you this last year when you were 1-4 – now that you know Head Coach Adam Gase even better, what’s the best way to help him do his job the best way?) – “I think the best thing for me to do is making sure I have an overall sense of the entire game and what’s going on. Obviously as the play caller, the one thing I can do for him is help him out with decisions during the game whether it’s penalty enforcement or time outs or time management – whatever it is – so he can really concentrate on that role as a play caller. I try to take that off his plate as much as I can. We’re constantly communicating through the game. Obviously whether it’s all of those things that could come up, different challenges or replays or like I said penalty enforcement or the time outs, I’m just trying to always stay one step ahead in those instances – the game management stuff – so that he doesn’t have to. So he can be thinking about the next set of calls or the next down or talking to Jay Cutler or the quarterbacks or whatever it might me. I think that’s the biggest thing I can help him with.”
(As far as the saturation that’s hit the field this week, with the punting and kicking, do you use longer cleats or anything like that to try to make up for it?) – “Yes, I’d love to tell you I know what our stadium looks like but we haven’t been there in a couple of months. (laughter) Yes, it’s no different than this past week. When we played in London, a lot of the guys ended up going with seven-stud cleats when you have a wet, soggy field. A lot of guys, what they’ll do is they’ll go out, they’ll have two or three pairs of cleats in their locker on game day, and you see a lot of guys running around early on in the game. A lot of times, that’s what most of them are doing is testing out their cleats. I know a lot of our guys did the same thing in London because that field is known to be a slick field with not great footing and hopefully we get some dry weather here in the next few days and it dries ours out. I would like to think it should be in really good condition. We haven’t been on it, and the University of Miami hasn’t been on it much either. Hopefully it will be in really good shape.”
(Are you taking K Cody Parkey to Hard Rock Stadium in the next couple of days?) – “We were going to take him today, so that’s not going to work out too well. (laughter) We’re going to probably get him down there early, whether it’s tomorrow or get him down there early obviously on game day. We’ll kind of see how the weather goes. We had planned on this being the day that we got into the stadium but I think it’s going to be a little bit of a wash out here. We did get some good work in the rain yesterday though. I know that seems maybe like a small thing but specialists obviously, you see a lot of times in these rain games or wet games where the special teams things really swing games, and so our operation between the snapper, holder, punter and all that stuff, we really got some good work out here. We stayed outside yesterday in the rain and got some really good wet ball drills and didn’t have to simulate it. A lot of times we simulate it. We bring out a bucket of water. We didn’t have to simulate. We had the natural rain, so we got some good quality natural work.”
(What kind of latitude do you give your returners as far as returning balls out of the end zone? Because obviously WR Jakeem Grant returned a kick and it kind of cost you about 15 yards there. So what do you exactly tell your returners when the balls are in the end zone?) – “It’s a really good question because I think it really depends on the … There’s a bunch of factors because I think it depends on the situation of the game, the time of the game, where you are. I’m very confident in our two guys. My problem last week was not with them taking it out of the end zone. When I watched the game with them, I made that perfectly clear. My problem was not that we took the ball out of the end zone, I had about three or four other problems with that play. Our communication was poor. We had a couple of missed blocks and all that, and if you go back and watch the play on film, we actually had a play there. So do I want a guy taking a ball out from 9 (yards) deep in the end zone with a high hang-time kick? No; but that ball was a line drive right at us and I thought that’s a ball that we should have returned. I had no problem with it. It was more of the breakdown of the play and the way we blocked it and the communication. That’s where we weren’t good, on that aspect. I probably, to answer your question specifically, I probably am a little bit one of those guys that’s probably down the middle somewhere. I’m not really strict that you’ve got to say in and I’m not that I want every ball to come out either. I’m probably somewhere in the middle in terms of special teams coaches; but those are opportunities for us to make plays. We had two guys back there that have proven they can make plays with the ball in their hands. We have a bunch of guys that can block and so I have no problem in the right situation, the right time, bringing the ball out of the end zone.”
Mike Pouncey – October 4, 2017
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Wednesday, October 4, 2017
C Mike Pouncey
(Where do you think the offensive line is playing now as far as where it is compared to where it’s maximum potential could be?) – “We’ll see. Obviously as a unit, we’re not playing the way we need to be playing. We’ve got to rush the ball, we’ve got to run for more yards in the first half to give (Head) Coach (Adam Gase) confidence in us. I think we’ve got a ways to go, but it’s still early in the football season. We went out today, had a really good practice and (we’ll) just keep building off that.”
(How good is it to have a ‘normal week’ and be back and be home?) – “It feels good. I can’t wait to go out there and play in front of our home crowd. Obviously we can never use that as an excuse. We got dealt this schedule and we’ve just had to deal with it; but it feels good to finally be able to play in a home game.”
(That smile came out as soon as I said you finally have a normal week.) – “(Laughter) It’s just good, man. It’s good to be at home. Everything’s a little bit easier. You get to go on cadence. You don’t have to really worry about the crowd. We’re just excited to go play in front of our home crowd. We’ve been all over the world these past couple of weeks and it’s been a fun experience, but it’s definitely not the record we want to be at right now. We kind of put ourselves in a hole and we’ll dig our way out just like we always find a way to, and get better week by week.”
(Talking about digging yourself out of a hole, does last year’s slow start give you confidence that you can get out of this hole?) – “Just any season, it’s a long football season. We’ve only played three football games so far. Obviously we lost to two teams that we thought we should have beat. Those games right there add up at the end of the year when you’re trying to make the playoffs. That’s why I said we’ve got to dig ourselves out of this hole. When you’ve got teams that you’re expecting to beat, you’ve got to go beat those teams. Right now, we didn’t do that these last two weeks. We’ll work on that. We’ll get better as a football team. We’re excited to go against this Tennessee football team. They’re really good on defense. They get after the quarterback with their two edge rushers and they play the run really well. It’ll be a good task for our offensive line and we’re ready for it.”
(Is it attention to detail, just little details that you guys are screwing up?) – “Yes, I mean it is one thing on this play, another on another play. We’ve just got to start playing as a whole unit and once we do that, we’ve seen what that turns into, and that turns into our offense looking really good. We’ll get back on track this week and look forward to running the ball a lot more.”
(What do you have to do to try to get the running game going?) – “We’ve just got to stay on schedule with it and whenever we get there, whenever we get the calls, we’ve got to make sure we do really good at it to keep (Head) Coach (Adam Gase’s) confidence high in us running the football. Obviously if we’re losing three or four yards when we run the football, then he’s not going to go back to it. So it’s something we’ve got to do as an offensive line and pay attention to. Especially early in the football game, we have to run the ball really well.”
(What would you say the atmosphere has been like this week? Has there a lot of anger about the way things have started out?) – “Yes, obviously guys are mad. Any time you lose a football game, if you’re not mad, something’s wrong. I think that shows that you have a really good football team, guys that really care when they come in and they’re pissed off about a loss. That’s pretty much been the attitude this week. Guys are just very disappointed in how we played last week, especially on the offensive side of the ball. The defense has been playing really well these past couple of weeks. We’ve got to do a better job of keeping them off the field, stop going three-and-out and keeping those guys fresh, so that in the fourth quarter they can win some football games.”
(Did you sense that in practice today too?) – “Well you can’t ever get that sense. We’re running maybe 25 plays in practice. In a game, we’re running 60-70. I think today, we did a good job running the football during our run team periods. We’ll look at it on film, but we’ll have a lot of confidence going into this football game.”
(The attitude more, though, like the mood and the approach in practice today.) – “Like were guys wanting to be out there in practice today?”
(Well like you were saying, you guys were angry from last Sunday.) – “Yes, guys are pissed. There were fights today at practice. If that’s what you’re asking, yes. Guys are mad that we didn’t play well this past weekend, so we’ll do a better job of that.”
(What do you remember most from the Tennessee game last year when you faced those guys?) – “That we were down three starting offensive linemen before the game. This year we’ll have all of our guys. Last year we had a few starters out and we had some other guys in. We’ll see how we do against these guys with our starting group.”
(On running plays that have been bottled up at the line or behind the line, do you think it’s been mostly the individual linemen being beat physically by their guy? Has it been a little bit of communication stuff?) – “You can point out anything. At the end of the day, it’s just not getting the job done. What I think we’ve got to do is do a better job in the first half of football games to run the ball well. That gives (Head) Coach (Adam Gase) a lot of confidence. It opens up our offense a lot more. We can do play action and stuff like that. We’ll get it rolling this week.”
