Adam Gase – November 2, 2018
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Friday, November 2, 2018
Head Coach Adam Gase
(CB Cordrea Tankersley missed practice today; is there an update on his condition?) – “Yeah, he’s going to be out for the year. He tore his ACL yesterday.”
(What do you now to compensate for CB Cordrea Tankersley’s loss?) – “We’ll have a plan. We talked through a lot of different scenarios last night. We’ll have a plan going into Sunday.”
(Do you feel like you need a veteran cornerback?) – “We’ll get through this game with the guys we have and then we’ll talk about what we need to do next.”
(Do you think WR Kenny Stills will be able to go from what you see today?) – “I don’t know. We’ll see. We’ll see how it plays out. I’ve got to see how he feels tomorrow. It’s the second day that you always kind of wait and see.”
(I guess it was a good sign that WR Kenny Stills was able to practice today?) – “It was good to see him practice. (You guys) kind of got me with the, ‘Does he need to practice and still play on Sunday?’ I really wanted to see him practice just so I could see him run and see how he feels the next day. I do not want to take a chance of he’s active, he plays, something happens, we have a huge setback. I just needed him to just shoot me straight and we’ll go from there.”
(Was it contact with CB Cordrea Tankersley?) – “Just running with a guy and then just kind of took a weird step. It was weird because it wasn’t like … It didn’t look like what it normally has when you see that happen. So you weren’t sure if it was just like he just sprained something. It just looked different than what I’d seen before.”
(You talked before the trade deadline with us that you can’t afford any more of these season-ending things and here’s another one.) – “Can’t afford any more. You know what, it’s a shame because he was pushing to come along and we felt like we had him in a good spot and he was competing. He was practicing better. It’s just young player gets hurt, it’s tough for them to handle it. He’ll be back at some point. The way that those ACLs seem to be, guys come back from those. It’ll be good to get him back when we can.”
(I don’t know if we asked you, but we asked Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke: What is the possibility or the likelihood that S Minkah Fitzpatrick could play on the boundary? I know it’s something he hasn’t really done a regular basis.) – “He can do it. He can do all those positions. I mean, he’s done it all. When we evaluated him, we evaluated all the positions he played. It was pretty incredible to see how much he did over his career. He gives us a nice security blanket, to say, if you have injuries you can always move him around. It’s unfortunate for him to where he never can just get comfortable at one spot, which I don’t think he really cares about because I think that he enjoys that part of the game of constantly mentally being challenged.”
(Does it bother you at all that S Minkah Fitzpatrick is not on the field more at this point, or are you okay with what you’re doing with him?) – “The last two games we got caught in some personnel groupings where he wasn’t on the field, but for the most part before that, the first six games, he was on the field quite a bit.”
(How do you think coming back from injury has affected CB Bobby McCain recently?) – “I would say he’s done predominantly most of his stuff, he’s looked normal. It’s probably more just dealing with practice more than anything. Like, he’ll never say anything. He’ll never say he’s hurt or sore or anything like that. He’ll fight through it. To me, I don’t see a difference in him. Any place we put him, he’ll figure out a way to do a good job.”
Cameron Wake – November 2, 2018
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Friday, November 2, 2018
DE Cameron Wake
(What would you identify as the biggest key to turning the defense around back to the way it was playing earlier in the season?) – “Just do your job. Plain and simple. Very simple. Whoever you are, whatever your responsibility is, do it. Now that I’ve gotten a chance to watch a lot of plays that didn’t go our way, it’s people taking turns not doing what they’re supposed to do. Once you get that fixed, I think it’ll make things a lot better.”
(Are guys trying to make something happen instead of just focusing on their assignment?) – “I guess you’d have to ask the guy on that particular play. It’s hard to assume but trust the guy next to you that if I’m here, he’s going to be there, the ball will maybe go there and I might want to go over there but if I go there, then now two of us are doing one job and now good players are going to find the guy who is overcompensating or whatever you were trying to do, trying too hard or whatever it may be. But at the end of the day, I’m going to be here, you’re going to be there and if there’s 11 or 12 other guys doing the same thing, then we’ll be fine.”
(Is there still confidence in this scheme?) – “Sure. Without a doubt.”
(That’s not an issue?) – “Not at all.”
(You’ve had a couple of extra days to prepare for this one because of the way the schedule fell. Did you do anything special to reset personally?) – “No, not really. You just get an extra day of whether it be studying, lifting weights, cardio. You just have to finish doing a little bit after that. But nothing out of the ordinary. You kind of get extra Monday, Tuesday and today to do whatever it is. Everybody is a little different. I’m sure Kiko (Alonso) has extra gel in his hair for this game. (laughter) But whatever each guy has a different thing that that they probably have, hopefully they’ve been able to take time and self scout, know thyself and know what you need to fix and put a little extra energy on that.”
(I know you always say that sacks come in bunches but you guys are off to a fairly slow start – 11 so far this season. What is it going to take to jump start that productivity?) – “I think it starts … You just missed it but they asked me what to (do to) get this defense going back in the right direction and I said doing your job. Doing your job would probably do a lot to help stopping the run and I think if we stop the run, then obviously you get more of a chance to rush the passer. If a team can run the ball downfield and it’s third-and-1 and first down, first down, touchdown, where was the opportunity to get to the quarterback? The first job is to do your job. The second job is to stop the run. Then if you do that, I think that creates pass rush opportunities and then bunches will come.”
(You’ve got two new defensive tackles. I can’t remember the last time where you’ve got an infusion of so much talent so quickly. How is it to gain chemistry with them?) – “Well, they’re new to the Dolphins but they’re definitely not new to playing football. They’ve played a lot of ball. They’ve been successful on different teams. I think at the end of the day, there’s a guy in front of you and you have to dominate your matchup. They’re no strangers to doing that, so I don’t think that’s going to be an issue. Again, having trust in that creates the chemistry because I’m trusting that he’s going to be where he’s supposed to be and attacking each guy the way he’s supposed to be doing. Their resumes reflect that, so that shouldn’t be an issue at all.”
(What’s your take on the Jets run game? It was so good against Denver and then the last few weeks, it hasn’t been very good.) – “Well, I’m sure they’re over there in their football world and we’re over here probably saying the same thing. They probably want to get back on track. I’m sure they have guys who weren’t doing their job and may have created issues. Again, I’m not over there. I have no insight into what they’ve got going on but just being general, that’s usually the case. Passing the ball or running the ball, if you see somebody untouched, something happened. It’s just very basic. I’m sure they’ll get back on each man, get it blocked and run the ball and we’ve got to do the same thing.”
(Do you expect a different Jets QB Sam Darnold or somewhat similar to Week 2?) – “There’s a guy back there with the ball and it doesn’t matter (if it is) Week 2 or Week 15. Get there and get your job done. I’m not concerned with that, really.”
Kenny Stills – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
WR Kenny Stills
(On the field, how would you describe how the first half of the season went for you?) – “That’s a tough question. I feel like I’ve taken advantage of the opportunities that I’ve had. Obviously I have an injury right now, so that’s a little frustrating. I try not to focus too much on the first half now that we’re moving into the second half and just focus on this Jets game.”
(How do you keep this team focused on the fact that you guys are still competing for a playoff spot?) – “That’s easy. We look at all of the records around this league and we see that we’re still in the hunt and that’s enough motivation for us to go out there and play one game at a time. If we can start stacking these games and heading in the right direction, then we have an opportunity to still be in the hunt.”
(Head Coach Adam Gase painted it as you probably think you could play a game tonight if you needed to or wanted to but he’s pretty concerned that if you come back a moment too soon on this, it could be a long-term issue. Where do you stand on that or what do you think?) – “I stand with whatever he says. We’ll see how I feel on Sunday and we’ll make a decision there.”
(Have you ever had this type of injury before?) – “It’s been a while. Most soft tissue injuries are pretty similar in the fact that you don’t want to rush. You don’t want to come back too early because you risk making it worse. We’ve got to be smart about it and we’re taking it slow.”
(I think you’ve been injured all season pretty much it seems like. You hit your shoulder. How is the rest of you other than that?) – “It’s a contact sport. It’s football. All of us are banged up. None of us feel 100 percent. It’s nothing out of the ordinary.”
(Nothing else would keep you out other than that?) – “No.”
(You’ve now had two collisions in the back of the end zone. I know you didn’t want to go there the last time we talked but do you think the fans are too close?) – “No. I really don’t think it’s a problem. I think that there’s potential to have some better awareness on that side. If the people on that side know that we’re in the red zone and there’s potential of a score, just to have a little bit of awareness on the fact that we might be potentially running into them. I felt awful for what happened in the last game and I tried to reach out and find the lady’s name and send flowers. I think she wanted her privacy. It’s frustrating that stuff like that happens but you want to make sure people are okay. I just hope that we can all just have better awareness when it comes to potential scoring plays and security and people that are in the end zone.”
(I was wondering if that shook you up because she didn’t see it coming either but you would have never expected to run into that situation on a football field where you just plow through someone like that.) – “Yeah. Luckily I was able to see her and just kind of put my arm out. Because the other option would have been put my helmet and shoulder pads into her, so it could have been worse. I’m just happy that she’s okay and that I came out of it okay.”
(What made you choose compassion in that situation? When you get a touchdown, you’re probably frustrated you get banged up.) – “Yeah. Honestly all of the credit there goes to Mike Gesicki. I was so flustered and in so much pain at the time that I wasn’t thinking about anything but just what had happened to me. Mike had come over and was like ‘Hey bro, you ran into the lady. You should go over there and give her the ball.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, you’re right.’ I thanked Mike after the game and he’s like ‘That’s something I know you would have done if you would have been cognizant of what happened.’ So I appreciate him and I told him he’s a good dude and thank you for that.”
(How did you get hurt on that play? Was it just your shoulder hitting her?) – “Yeah. My shoulder just kind of felt like something kind of funky happened because I didn’t expect it.”
(From the impact with her?) – “Yeah.”
(Obviously you released a documentary explaining why you kneeled. Why did you feel the need to do that and what kind of statement are you trying to make with the shirt there?) – “So the shirt just says unity is the new cool. It speaks for itself. I’ve always been somebody that’s trying to bring people together through conversation and instead of dividing people, bringing people together. Through the documentary, I just wanted to kind of share with people why I’ve decided to protest or how I got to becoming active or involved with hopes that people could better understand who I am and potentially … not sway people but get them to understand this is who I am, this is why I got involved and this is something that’s important to me. It’s not something that I just decided one day that I’m going to go out here and do and I’m just out here kneeling and there’s no action behind it and no work behind it.”
(How do you deal with just constant negative reactions to how you are protesting?) – “I think the first couple of years were a lot worse when it comes to the negativity. A lot of the social media channels have done a good job of you being able to filter kind of the negative comments and the bad stuff that you’re able to see. This year has been a lot different. There’s been a lot more support; a lot more people reaching out and really supporting and having my back. It’s important to share in the story the negativity and the hate that’s out there so people understand and see it, but this past year has been a lot better for me.”
(Do you have intentions to play on Sunday? Are you going to play on Sunday?) – “We kind of spoke on that and we’ll have to see.”
(As a fellow wide receiver, with all that WR DeVante Parker has been through with the injuries, how happy were you for him with the game he had Thursday?) – “I’m extremely proud of DeVante. I’m so happy for him. I’ve always had his back. I think all of the receivers and most of the guys on this team have always had his back and supported him. We know what he can do as a player and he showed that on Thursday. That’s the spark that we need to see from him and we hope that he continues to perform like that.”
(Can you handle that if it comes to that, where you feel like Sunday you could play and they say we can’t let you do it? Are you going to be alright?) – “Yeah. I mean it’ll be frustrating. I’m not going to act like I won’t be upset but I understand that we’ve got to do what’s best for the team and I know the guys that we have can go out there and perform and get us a victory.”
Darren Rizzi – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
Associate Head Coach/Special Teams Coordinator Darren Rizzi
(What does LB Mike Hull bring with his return?) – “The first thing I’d say about Mike Hull, let’s take the playing aside for a second. The way he attacked his PT (physical therapy) and his rehab was really incredible to watch. (He’s) just an ultimate professional, did an unbelievable job (and is) really a model, a role model for anybody. Not just the young players, anybody that’s ever injured. Watching him go through the rehab and just really attacking it and having a great attitude about it. It’s hard when you get injured to have a really good attitude. Let’s be honest. But watching him come in every day and work, and work with the trainers and work himself back, it’s not a surprise that he’s back in the time he’s supposed to be back. I watched him go through it. What he brings to the table, he brings leadership No. 1. Just a really good guy in terms of the meeting room, the field and practice. He obviously brings playmaking ability. Any time he’s had an opportunity to go on the field in special teams in all different phases, he’s really done well. So we’re really happy to have him back. (He’s) just a guy that was really having a strong preseason, offseason, spring, training camp (and) preseason up until he got hurt. I was really looking forward to watching him play this year. It was obviously a disappointment when he got hurt. Now to have him back and get him back in the fold is great for our core team and really the whole team because he’s just a great guy, great locker room guy, great character guy and great professional. I’m really happy to have him back.”
(What happened on those first few snaps of the game. It seemed like it was penalty happy special teams wise.) – “We had a bonehead play. We lined up … In the new rules, you have to have eight guys setup in the setup zone. So between the 10-yard line and (25) yards back – the 40-yard line. (Cordrea) Tankersley was standing on the line. You can’t even be on the line. It’s kind of like a restraining line, you can’t be over it. The ref was trying to get his attention, I was trying to get his attention and we didn’t get him moved. He kind of started up and then he moved back and lost where he was on the field. He knows the rule, he just lost where he was for a second and unfortunately he was on the line. When that happens, they now have a choice. The other team has a choice now. They either want to take a tack-on penalty, where they can take 5 yards off of wherever we end up, or they can re-kick. I believe we returned the ball to the 23 yard line. A tack on, minus five would’ve been to the 18(-yard line). Or they can move up to the 40 and re-kick. So I guess they thought by moving up to the 40 they could pin us back even further than the 18. I’m assuming that was their philosophy, I guess. Then obviously they kicked it into the end zone so we had a touchback out to the 25, and then they had an illegal formation on their kick team. They didn’t have everybody up on the 34-yard line. It was kind of a weird sequence of events to start the game. We actually gained 12 yards, we benefited on that whole thing. That was their decision to re-kick. They didn’t have to. They could’ve taken the 5-yard tack-on penalty; but that was a really, really weird series of events.”
(A good penalty by CB Cordrea Tankersley?) – “Yeah. (laughter) It worked out. I guess we got plus-12 (yards) out of it.”
(What is your rule on returning? I don’t want to give away any state secrets, but if WR Jakeem Grant gets it and he’s two steps away from the end zone, do you think he should come out? Not just Jakeem but RB Senorise Perry too.) – “It’s really on an individual basis. We treat each play like an individual event so we have rules for that play. A lot of it has to do with game situations. It could be the team we’re playing, in terms of personnel, ‘Hey, we think we have a good chance this week to maybe get a return.’ Obviously a lot of people are talking about the end of the game with the Rams and Packers. The ball was just over the goal line. We’re going to talk through those situations, ‘If this one is in, we’re staying in.’ The other day when Houston kicked off from the 40-yard line. That was one that if that went into the end zone, I didn’t care if it was one inch into the end zone, we were going to take a knee. That’s for an example. To start the game, had it been a yard or two deep maybe a few yards, we were maybe taking it out. That was one of those situations, if they’re kicking off from the 40, 45, 50 after a penalty and the ball is in the end zone, typically you’re going to stay in. On a regular situation form the 35, it’s really all game situation and how early is it, when is it, is it end of the half, is it end of the game, is it a possible 2-minute situation like Packers were in the other day? I feel for that guy because when (Ty) Montgomery fumbled that ball, it’s one of those easier said then done plays. He was told, ‘We’re going to take a touchback here.’ Those kickoffs which we’ve discussed before … The ones that land right near the goal line are very difficult for the returner because if someone is not in his ear communicating exactly where he is on the field, it’s very easy for that player to get lost for a little bit. Typically you’re not going to catch the ball and look down. You have to have an awareness of where you are. In those situations, usually what we do is we line up on the goal line and if you step back at all, you’re going to stay in. I feel for him, obviously. It was a big play in that game. Obviously there was a lot of discussion this week about that. For us, it’s just really an individual basis. When we huddle up on the sideline ‘Hey, on this one, this is our thought process.’ We’re either going to stay in, we’re going to come out. This is kind of our yard marker. Our alignments by the returners, all of those things are going to change play by play.”
(I’ve seen you use, I think it was on Hard Knocks because you’ve been here that long. I’ve seen you use film from other games as teaching moments for your special teams unit. Is that something – the Packers RB Ty Montgomery situation – is that something you’ve used?) – “One-hundred percent, yes. What we do every week, it’s actually a weekly thing. It depends on the week but usually on Saturdays we’ll probably pull about 15 to 30 plays from around the league. We call them plays of the week and we use those as teaching moments for the whole team.”
(15 to 30 special teams plays?) – “Correct, from each week. What we’ll do is we’ll use those. What happens in the special teams world is you may have a situation that comes up and it may be a once a season thing and you can’t get reps at it. I can sit here and talk about it for a really long time. You can go through every phase and there is all different crazy situations that come up in games. I was watching the Jets vs. Bears game the other day and the announcer starts talking about there was almost a fair catch kick. It was at the end of the half and I believe the Jets were punting and there was like 6 seconds left in the half. In that situations, if the Bears or if the return teams gets a fair catch, there’s a very unique rule where you can actually kick and get a free kick from the spot of the fair catch and if it goes through the goalpost, you get three points. You never see it. It never comes up. It’s a very, very odd situation. If a team is deep in their own area with not a lot of time left in the half, there is a thing called a fair-catch kick. So if they kick the ball, wherever they kick it, if you fair catch it, the fair catch rule is this: 99.999 percent of the time, what you see is you either run an offensive play or you get a free kick form the spot. A free kick meaning you can’t bring out a tee, but you can have a holder come out and hold the ball. The kicker can take a full approach, a kick off approach – no blocking. It’s not a field goal formation, it’s a kickoff formation so you have to be 10 yards back in the restraining area. If he kicks the ball through the goal post, you get three points. You never, ever see it. It comes up once every 10 years. For example, I’m going to use that play in our meeting this Saturday and explain to the guys, this was a potential fair-catch kick situation because you rarely see it. We may have one of those come up every four decades. One in every 40 years. But we have to be ready for it. In the special teams world, you have a lot of plays like that. That’s why we pull about 15 to 25 plays per week that come up and we discuss them. We go through them and go through the rules. I remember last week one of the plays we had was in Cincinnati. In the Cincinnati game, there was a kickoff right by the sideline and their returner did a really good job. If the returner puts his foot out of bounds and then touches the ball while his foot is out of bounds, he’s considered to be out of bounds and you get the ball at the 40-yard line. So the ball kind of rolled near the sideline inside the 10 and their returner had great awareness. He went over, got his foot out of bounds and then touched the ball and they got the ball at the 40-yard line. Those are just a couple of small examples. That’s why we do that every week. Ironically enough, this past week, we had just watched on Thursday morning the day of the game, we had just watched on of those plays, the opening kickoff where (you have to be in front of) the 40-yard line, we watched someone else make the mistake that morning. Then we went out that night and did it. It doesn’t always work. The teaching doesn’t always work. I was sitting there saying ‘we just watched that this morning.’ It’s one of those deals where we try to use those teaching moments throughout the league because there’s a lot of unique situations that come up. There’s very unique rules. There’s gunners out of bounds, re-enter and staying in the paint and all of those kind of things that come up all the time that are very unique that we try to teach from other games because we may not get the min ours.”
(There’s a website, I don’t know if it’s any good but it’s Football Outsiders. They have a special teams formula which takes into account everything – coverage, field goals, punts, weather, everything. Right now they have the Dolphins third in the NFL. Do you feel like that’s a fair representation? Would you describe the first half of the season as excellent overall?) – “I’m a really tough grader. I wouldn’t be a very good teacher. My grading scale might be a little different. I’ve seen a lot of those formulas before. There’s like four or five different ones, different websites and different things. People use different things. Sometimes you pull one thing in and put another one in and you go from third to first or first to 12th in one play here or there. I said this to the guys after the weekend, I think special teams wise the first half of the year, we have a lot of highlights. We did a lot of good things. I felt like we were a little bit too inconsistent for my liking. I felt like we’ve got to just play more consistent football. There were a little bit too many peaks and valleys. We did have some great plays and kudos to those plays. I felt like we left some plays on the table. I felt like we could be a little bit more consistent all the way through. I’m probably not a fair guy to ask because I’m probably the hardest on myself first and then the players second, in terms of grading. I don’t know if I would use the word excellent; but I’d say good to slightly below average. That’s just me. I’m fairly tough in terms of the grading scale. I’ve seen a lot of those. There’s all different ones I’ve seen.”
(You’ve been here for so long, you’ve been here for quite a while. When you’re struggling and possibly losing confidence as a team – last year you faced a five-game losing streak in the exact same stretch – how do you inject confidence and self-awareness that ‘Hey, the season is still alive.’) – “I think the first thing, no doubt about this and we’ve talked about this before is really keeping the one-game approach mentality. It’s hard to do. It’s certainly easier said than done and it’s certainly a little cliché-ish. There is no doubt about it. I get all of that. However, I really think keeping the focus on just one game … You guys know how hard it is to win one game in this league. It’s hard to win just one game. I think we have done, as a staff, starting with (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) and throughout the rest of the guys, is keeping the focus on the task at hand, on this game. This week, right now, Jets at home, that has got to be all in. It can’t be looking behind. It can’t be looking ahead. It can’t be any of those things. Then what happens as you all know is that you get one, and then you start going one, then you stack and that’s how you build confidence. On the flip side of the coin, what you’re talking about, on the other side when you lose a couple in a row, it’s easy to lose confidence. I think to re-center yourself and put the blinders on and get the focus on the immediate task from a confidence standpoint, all of the focus has to be on the Jets. I think all of the other things in my opinion, and I know everybody else in the building, is everything else outside is just noise. We have to keep the focus on what we’re doing right now. To get the players confidence back and everybody’s confidence back … I don’t think there is a lack of confidence in the building. I really don’t. I think right now with where we are, we’d certainly like to have a better record; but where we are, we’re right in the middle of things. I think if we just can take care of the job week to week, we’re going to be in the position we want to be in at the end. We can certainly be a little bit better, but we can certainly be a hell of a lot worse. We’re right in the middle of this thing with a lot of games to play. There is no reason … You guys know we pretty well. I certainly don’t lack any confidence and we’re going to go out there and inject that into the players every day and have the same approach every day.”
(When there is a surprise onside kick call, does Head Coach Adam Gase say ‘Hey, I want to run it?’ Or do you come to him and say this might be a good time?) – “We always have a couple up and you’re always looking for the situation to do it in. It’s obviously called a surprise onside for a reason. I’ve heard people say, ‘that wasn’t an onside kick situation.’ No kidding. That’s why they call it a surprise onside kick. You don’t want to do it in the most obvious situations. I can’t really get into depth with this thing because I’m going to come across like I’m criticizing and I don’t want to do that. I don’t know if you were aware but the ball hit the wire for the camera. I don’t know if you guys were aware. It hit the spider wire. Obviously it wasn’t seen. It’s an unfortunate situation because we had the play we wanted. I feel like if it didn’t hit the wire we would’ve been in a much better situation to recover the ball. Then all of a sudden, we have the ball at midfield down by one score and that whole game is different. I thought it was a great time to do it. Again, it’s called a surprise for a reason. Unfortunately with the whole wire thing … I’ve been asked a ton of questions about it. Obviously the officials at that time didn’t see it. By the time we saw the replay, they had already run another play, by the time we got video evidence and it was too late to challenge it. That’s really how that went down.”
(What’s the rule on the wire?) – “The rule on the wire is that if the officials had seen it, there would’ve been a replay, just like the play never happened. Dead ball, replay put the time back on the clock and replay the down like it never happened. Ironically enough, I haven’t seen one in a long time and if you watched the Florida vs. Georgia game, it happened again in their game on a punt. Their officials did see it and they replayed the down like it never happened. It is reviewable however we didn’t get … Again, in the whole video world, you’re not going to waste a challenge if you don’t have video evidence. We didn’t get a replay on the stadium board and we didn’t get a replay in the booth until after they had unfortunately run a play. It didn’t hit it by much but it skimmed it enough to affect the ball and the ball dropped straight down instead of wider where it was supposed to be. That’s how that went down. It was just an unfortunate situation. Call it what you will but it didn’t work out.”
(How often would you say you practice onside kicks?) – “The kickers have a weekly routine that they do. Then we’ll work on it. It’s usually Friday, Saturday type things we work on it. But we work on it every week. We’re always going to have those kind of things up in the game plan. It depends on when you want to use them. That goes with all of our phases. You always have different gadgets and things you’re going to have. It depends on when the right time is to pull them out. Usually the right time to pull them out is when they work. Usually the wrong time to pull them out is when they don’t work. (laughter)”
Matt Burke – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke
(You’ve explained very well why you think what you’re giving S Minkah Fitzpatrick is about right – about 75 percent of snaps. That said, he has the lowest passer rating against in the league of any cornerback. Have you a single time since he was drafted ever discussed playing him on the boundary and have you considered giving him some of S T.J. McDonald’s snaps at safety? Those two things.) – “Yes.”
(Yes on the first?) – “Yes to all of it.”
(And have you all determined that S Minkah Fitzpatrick could be a competent NFL corner on the boundary or is that unclear to you?) – “I think he has the skillset. I think it’s been a while since he’s done that – played on the outside. There’s a level of just going through that process with him and trying to figure out … Again, part of it (is) mental in terms of what we’ve put on his plate. Part of it is it’s another position and you’re trying to spread him a little thin at. The more he shows he’s capable, I think it’s a physical skillset. He has the ability to do that. He has performed well in coverage situations for us. Yeah, all of those things have been discussed and we’re working through some of those things right now.”
(I know obviously you’re not going to say anything from a competitive standpoint with a decision with regard to whether S Minkah Fitzpatrick picks up any of S T.J. McDonald’s safety snaps. Is that something that’s a possibility moving forward if you’re not willing to say it will or won’t happen?) – “I’m probably not willing to say any of that but everything is a possibility. Obviously we’re addressing a lot of things on defense right now so I mean everything is a possibility for us.”
(What was your approach to assessing your defense over the extended break that you had? How do you go about it?) – “Honestly, it was … Funny is probably not the right word to be using right now but (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) and I didn’t really get together. We independently kind of came to the same conclusion. I felt like our biggest issue was all of the explosive plays. We came in on Friday and just did … Everybody was in on Friday and did sort of our normal stuff and went through our grading process and that sort of thing. I met with the defensive staff before we left and kind of laid a couple of things out. So I came in independently on Saturday and just took all of our explosives from the season and went through that to try to pinpoint again whether it was schematic or just player or offensive scheme and sort of where that was becoming an issue. That’s where my starting point was. I felt like even within the bad games we’ve been having, there were good plays and stuff like that within them. So obviously (it was about) where the explosives were happening. Shoot, on Thursday night we gave up three 2-play touchdown drives. That’s just silly. That’s where I started for myself. It was funny (because) then Adam (Gase) circled back on me a little bit later on and he had kind of taken the same approach, so it was kind of interesting for me that we both kind of came to that conclusion independently. That was kind of my approach. I didn’t necessarily think it was just a consistent play after play after play after play (thing). It was these breakdowns are happening and these big plays are being created because of it. So we tried to dig in at where that was happening as a starting point.”
(Did you find common threads or did you find that it’s just everything?) – “It’s that. I mean there’s threads. The frustrating thing for me last week was … For example in the run game, we’ve had 23 explosive runs (this season) – 12-yard-plus runs. That was on our cutup reel. Twelve of them came in the last two games, so over half. We’re averaging one and a half in the first six games and we average six a game in the last two games. If there’s a trend like that or what’s going on and how that’s approaching … Some of that is there were a couple of offensive runs that were kind of similar schematically that we were getting and why we were having trouble fitting some of those runs up. So there’s threads like that. We obviously didn’t play well. We played very poorly. So I don’t think that in terms of … (It wasn’t) this one thing was the cause of all of this. (It wasn’t) if we just stop this one thing, that’s it. When you give up the yards you give up and the points you’ve been giving up, that’s systemic and there’s issues at all levels that have to be addressed. There were threads. There’s obviously commonalities in some stuff and that’s where you start to try to address things but I didn’t think it was like this one thing is what’s going on and we have to stop that.”
(Have you heard from Microsoft about any repairs?) – “(laughter) No.”
(Obviously that was a pretty emotional moment for you. What was going through your head right there?) – “Obviously I was frustrated. I was frustrated. Very frustrated. We were just cutting guys loose. He had five touchdown passes and four of them were to uncovered players. It’s not like they were contested catches or something got schemed up. We were just not even covering guys and dropping guys loose and getting out of things. So as that just kept building, it was a level of frustration. Obviously I didn’t realize I was going to get captured. I slammed one last year too and I don’t think anyone caught it. (laughter) So it was just that. It was built up and kind of an outlet. Unfortunately that was the closest thing I had in my hands and I took it out on an inanimate object.”
(Why were the receivers uncovered?) – “It wasn’t one player or one thing. It was … I wish I could answer that directly in terms of like … It was communication. Guys are miscommunicating things, not playing techniques the way they’re asking them to play techniques. It was different on every play. It wasn’t just one thing of saying every time we’re playing this thing wrong or we’re doing this. There were three different coverages on three of the touchdowns that are different coverages, different calls, different techniques and none of them are being executed the way we need to execute them. But again, the way I look at it, that’s on me. If it’s not getting done on the field then I start with myself. I have to re-examine what we’re asking those guys to do and whether it’s from a mental standpoint, a physical standpoint, a whatever standpoint. Even if in my mind a scheme is sound or a call is sound and it’s not getting executed on the field, we have to address why that’s happening. If it’s sometimes we’re asking them to do something they can’t do or things that maybe people can’t pick up or certain players can’t handle certain things, all of that stuff goes into it. That’s probably the harder part. I wish it would be a lot easier. It would have been a lot easier weekend for me if it was like this one guy can’t play this or it’s one call that’s happening here. If that’s the issue, it’s never going to be a 42-point, 500-yard game or whatever the heck that was. That would be an easier fix. There’s a lot of – at every level of the defense – miscommunication, just between groups and stuff. Really I went back to sort of big picture, how everything fits together and why we’re calling the things that we’re doing and why we’re asking you to do this job because it affects how this guy does this job and it affects how this guy covers this guy. We had to really get back to that and have everybody understand they’re not independent contractors and this thing all fits together. You can’t make a decision to say I’m going to do this to try to make this play when it trickles down and affects eight other guys or 10 other guys or whoever it is. We really got back to that part of things this week a little bit.”
(What did happen and what was supposed to happen on the long WR DeAndre Hopkins touchdown?) – “We were supposed to cover him.”
(Who’s responsibility was WR DeAndre Hopkins?) – “We’re supposed to have a corner take a vertical player out of that. It’s a hard play but obviously we don’t have any defense that’s designed to not cover anybody. That’s stupid. We were supposed to have a corner. They ran a bunch route and released him over the top of it. We’re supposed to squeeze to it. Visually we saw something different from the back end and we didn’t play it the way it was supposed to be played.”
(When we talked to Head Coach Adam Gase about defense – this is an oversimplification – but he said it’s not the scheme, it’s the players. More or less, that the plays are being called, they’re just not being executed. Is that the way you see it?) – “Look, we’re all to blame. For me, it goes back to a little bit of what I just said. Possibly … Yeah, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the scheme. Again, we’re not designing defenses to cut guys loose in the back end. We’re not designing defenses to give up 50-yard runs and not fit things right. Obviously, that’s not what we’re trying to do. We’re not scheming those things up. And I don’t think we’re just getting a hardcore scheme where they’re finding weaknesses in our defense in terms of schematic issues. But if players are having trouble executing what we’re trying to get done, then we have to find the reason behind that. We have to address all of that, whether it’s the stuff we can’t call, whether it sounds great and we call this play it’s going to be a great call for us, but if it can’t get executed, part of that’s on me. We can keep sitting there going ‘they should be able to do that, they should be able to do that, why aren’t they doing that?’ But at the end of the day, if they can’t, that’s something that has to be evaluated. It’s our job as a coaching staff to put our players in the best position to make those plays and to understand what they can and can’t do. Physically, what they can play, mentally, what they can handle and how they can execute that as a whole unit. I’m not going to blame the players. It’s my job, it’s our job to put those guys in the right spots. Again, some of it maybe it’s to that point, but I always start with myself and say ‘what am I asking these guys to do from a mental standpoint, from a physical standpoint?’ If it’s not getting done, then it has to be addressed from a coaching level all the way down to a player level. At some point, they have to learn some (expletive) and play some stuff. Excuse my language.”
(You said you were looking for common threads and just from the naked eye, it looked like some of those busts were happening with players who are veterans. They’re not new to the defense, your calls, the scheme. Is that accurate and is that concerning?) – “Everything is concerning right now, so yes to the second part. That will be the short answer. Again, it was everybody. I think a lot of factors. It’s hard to just give simple answers to this. Obviously, there’s a lot of complexity going on here. Yes, it was veterans making mistakes that shouldn’t have been made. There’s also guys pressing to make plays. The mentality of when things start kind of going off the farm a little bit and off the reservation, it’s not ‘I’m going to go make the play,’ because again, understanding how that unhinges everybody else. To me, you’re adding fuel to fire when this guy is trying to go make a play, so ‘I’m going to stop this by myself, I’m going to turn the tide here by myself.’ Now, you’re getting out of position and you’re leaving somebody else hanging out to dry and that trickles down, and that guy is saying ‘shoot, well I have to do this.’ That’s where the miscommunication or sort of one guy starting it and then all three levels of defense, it’s not meshing together properly. It’s all concerning to me. It’s all concerning that we have veteran guys that are doing things, whether the motivation is to make a play or the motivation is something else. Again, those are things that we’ve been going through and addressing and looking at. That’s all concerning to me and we’re trying to address it this week.”
(On one play, I saw CB Bobby McCain chasing a guy and S Reshad Jones is back there, the guy is going this way and he decides to go that way. And CB Bobby McCain is going … they’ve played…) – “They’ve played football for us and they’ve played together and they should be on the same page and communicating better on that, absolutely.”
(So are guys just freelancing essentially?) – “I wouldn’t call it that. I think it’s the nature … It’s the same as me throwing a tablet. Things start going bad and everyone is feeling that, and everyone wants to turn it. Again, they’re competitive players. No one wants to be doing what we were doing Thursday night. I think sometimes that they press to make plays and they try to kind of go a little bit out of the framework. I wouldn’t say they’re just doing whatever they want out there. They’re just trying to kind of jump a route or do something different. Or in the run game, ‘I’m going to just shed this guy and go make this play, I’m going to go get a TFL and that’s going to kind of spark us and get us going.’ I think the word freelancing kind of has more negative intentions to me. I don’t think they’re just saying ‘Screw this, I’m going to play whatever I want to play.’ I think sometimes, we’re pressing to make plays, especially once that gets rolling a little bit. We have to play the calls. I have to make the right calls and put them in the right spot. They have to execute the calls, the techniques we’re asking them to play and we’ll be fine.”
(Are there consequences for those who do not play the scheme repeatedly?) – “Yep.”
(Would that be a player’s starting job?) – “It could be, absolutely. We’d be remiss if we didn’t come in this weekend and Adam (Gase) and I went through a lot of stuff and study this from a personnel standpoint to a schematic standpoint to execution, all of that stuff. If we didn’t address everything and come in with answers and solutions to say ‘this is what’s going on.’ And it’s at all levels. There’s some scheme stuff that we’re tweaking and trying to do some different things. Part of that is player based, saying ‘maybe this guy can do this better than some of the stuff we’ve been asking him to do.’ But if there’s guys that can’t do what we’re doing, at some point, absolutely. At some point, they take ownership. We’re not asking them to do a lot of crazy stuff here. I think everyone is aware of where we’re at in the season. Having that mini bye week, kind of having that extended weekend – I think I talked to some of you guys. After the Detroit game, I felt like it was a blessing in disguise having a short week. I was like okay man, shoot. Sometimes it’s good to move on from that. Obviously, it wasn’t a one-time thing, so it was hard having that. It would have been great having a Thursday night game and feeling good about it and having a fun weekend and kind of refresh and rejuvenate. It was hard having to chew on that for 10 days essentially. We’re still eating that Thursday night game. It was hard; but again, at some level in terms of silver lining it, it afforded us some time to really sit down and dig into some things. We’re still going through that process.”
(How tempting is it to be like ‘what I’m doing hasn’t worked, I’m just going to call way different stuff?’ Is there danger in that? Like a big-time tendency break or whatever.) – “Yeah, there’s danger in that. We spent eight months or whatever it’s been, from March until now, training in certain techniques and doing things we want to do and trying to get these guys right and put all this work in. It would a little crazy to say ‘screw all that, let’s do all this instead.’ Now, they have to learn all new stuff. Again, I don’t see that as the issue. I really don’t. I don’t see our scheme is broken and we’re screwed up and all this. We have a fairly complex scheme and we have a lot of stuff we can call, so it’s more of maybe this part of it is something that we want to lean on more towards this area. To me, that would be akin to what I just talked about the players – ‘I’m going to make it right, I’m going to call all this crazy stuff and just fix it by doing all this stuff.’ Now, I’m putting all those guys in positions they’re not used to and getting them unhinged. That would be me contributing to the chaos. We have to get better at the stuff we’re asking them to do. Period. We have to play the stuff better. I have to make sure that we’re asking them to do things that they can do. If we have determined that they’re capable of doing that and we’re asking them to do that, and they don’t, then that’s on them. They have to execute those techniques and those schemes and get this done, because we obviously can’t live like this.”
Dowell Loggains – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
Offensive Coordinator Dowell Loggains
(Want to talk about WR Jakeem Grant?) – “Absolutely.”
(When you came in and you watched some of the film on him from last year, did you have some ideas on what you could do with him as an offensive player?) – “The one thing that you could tell right away is the same thing you guys see is he’s an explosive playmaker and you just have to get your hands on him, because he doesn’t have a lot of experience with different routes and they did a good job using his speed and some of those things. But the one thing I give the kid a lot of credit for is he’s starting to become a more consistent route runner as well and the tree is getting bigger. He’s become a better practice player. I think most of that has probably happened because his confidence is growing as a player as well. Those guys in the receiver room, (Wide Receivers Coach) Ben Johnson and (Assistant Head Coach/Offense) Shawn Jefferson, have done a really good job helping him develop and helping him develop confidence that way. You can feel it at practice the energy he brings. He’s excited to be there and he knows that he can still get a lot better.”
(When RB Kenyan Drake is at his best on rushing plays, what are some of the things that he is doing and he is keeping in mind?) – “Kenyan has a unique skillset because he’s got size and speed. So when Kenyan is decisive and he hits it downhill and he can use that speed and size, that’s when he’s at his best. One of the areas that we keep working that he needs to keep improving on it is in the open field and sometimes trusting his speed, because he can outrun angles and those things. He runs through arm tackles. He’s a guy that when the ball is in his hand, he can score for you. He’s got a lot of room to grow as well as a player, but he’s doing a nice job. He’s a good receiver. Obviously, we move him around and trust him and we need to continue to expand that role as well.”
(When you’re talking about expanding roles, there’s been a lot of talk from Head Coach Adam Gase about moving WR DeVante Parker around. Can you explain what that would do for the offense and how do you keep DeVante consistent considering he just produced a career game?) – “I give DeVante a lot of credit because he showed up and did his job when we needed him to. He had a good week. We didn’t get to practice and he had to walkthrough and coming off an injury, but he just dialed in mentally. The more we get him back on the field and doing those things and getting up to speed just keep moving him around. He’s playing X and playing Z and playing on the right and playing on the left. The one thing he has – we talked about it a couple weeks ago – is he has size. He has length. Obviously, we’re not the tallest receiver group and he gives us something different that way. We’re going to keep expanding his role, especially as he gets back going a little bit. He’s had a good week until this point and we’re excited about having him back.”
(When you notice that WR DeVante Parker has a good week, because Head Coach Adam Gase said that, what is the difference? What do you see?) – “Adam obviously has more experience with DeVante than I do, but he’s a really good kid. He’s a quiet kid. So you see through his play like when he practices fast or when his confidence goes up. You start to feel it a little bit. It’s cool to see and it’s exciting to see. It’s a week to week deal and we have to keep getting better. Obviously, hopefully, he can put that game and having a lot of success last week and continue to build off that.”
(There’s a lot of talk about QB Ryan Tannehill in terms of whether or not he has reached his ceiling. What more can Tannehill give you or show that he hasn’t so far?) – “Considering we’re playing the Jets this week with Brock (Osweiler), I’d really prefer to keep all those questions to Brock. I think Ryan did a really good job in his five starts. He’s 3-2. Knowing he played in the first three … We’re judged on wins and losses at quarterback and he got three wins. Obviously no one played well enough or coached well enough against New England and Cincinnati, he had two and a half good quarters. He played two and a half really good quarters and then we didn’t finish. He needs to play better in those last quarter and a half. Just because the week and Brock is the starter this week, I’d really prefer to stick to Brock.”
(How have you guys evolved as an offense to figure out RB Kenyan Drake’s best role? Has that changed from what you all thought it would be?) – “It changes week to week based on the game plan, based on the matchups. Kenyan is a guy that can do a lot of things. Hopefully you go into a game and you have 250 calls on your call sheet. A lot of times you don’t get to all of them, but in the course of a game, when the matchups are advantageous, he’s a guy that obviously has matchup plays and he’s a guy you game plan around. We’re going to keep using him in different ways and different spots. He needs to keep improving. He adds a lot of flexibility to the offense because he can sit in the I, in the dot, and run the ball and he can also line up wide and beat linebackers and safeties one-on-one.”
Adam Gase – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
Head Coach Adam Gase
(Did DE Charles Harris have a setback of any kind?) – “No.”
(How is DE Charles Harris doing?) – “He’s progressing. That’s a tough injury, especially when you’re at a position where you have to explode and come off the ball the way that those guys have to. It takes time.”
(It seems like it’s not looking good for WR Kenny Stills with him still missing practice today. Where are you at with him?) – “We’re just kind of finishing the week out and see if we can get him out there and see what he can do, see how he feels. I don’t think he’s accepting that answer. I know he’s not…”
(Is WR Kenny Stills the type of player where you would put him on the field if he has not practiced the entire week?) – “Yes. But I just want to make sure that we’re not going to have a setback injury-wise. That’s my biggest concern.”
(When you spent the past weekend looking at stuff, what on defense did you come to the idea … I know guys doing their jobs is the number one priority.) – “The biggest thing we talked about was explosive plays. That’s where we’ve really been hurt the last two games where teams have been able to get in the end zone with four or less plays, which puts us in a bad spot. One, it’s just happening multiple times. We’ve really just lived off of turnovers and the longer some of these drives have gone, we’ve been able to take advantage of a mistake and got a negative play somewhere or a turnover to where we can flip the field and now all of a sudden we can do something on the other side of the ball. We really haven’t had that opportunity. We’ve been really hurting ourselves by not being on the same page, not doing our job, not finishing a play to where the other team takes advantage of it.”
(Assuming that C/G Ted Larsen is healthy and was full go yesterday, are you moving forward with him as your starter or are you considering C Wesley Johnson or C Jake Brendel at all in terms of a competition there?) – “We’re good with where we’re at right now. He took a weird shot. It was just a weird angle for him to where it just kind of knocked him out of the game there for a little bit.”
(And with C Jake Brendel, I guess you have a decision to make by next Thursday. Do you know at this point if you’re going to bring him back this year or is that undecided?) – “We’ll just take the whole time and when we feel it’s the right time and he’s feeling right and we’ve got a chance to move him up, we’ll move him up. Any time you can get an o-lineman that’s fresh, that’s beneficial to us.”
(When you talked about how you’re going to take the weekend to assess everything including scheme defensively, how much thought and how much discussion was there about making more than a tweak to the Wide 9 concepts?) – “There wasn’t a ton of discussion about anything. It was more ‘these are the things we need to fix. Here’s what we need to do. This is how we need to do it.’ And then we moved on from there. That was about all of the discussion there was.”
(We haven’t talked to him today yet but last week Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke was pretty angry with how things have gone. What kind of conversations have you had with him about keeping this thing together?) – “All of our conversations have been about what are the solutions. Anybody can walk in and say this is messed up, this is wrong. That’s great (but) I need to go in there and say ‘Hey, here’s where I think we can do something different or better.’ That’s what I’m looking for from him too. ‘Here’s how we’re going to get this fixed. Here’s how we’re going to address this.’ That’s what you want to do. Complaining about any of the problems, that doesn’t do anything. We need solutions.”
(You obviously are on the offensive side but you felt the need to go in and say these are a handful of things that…) – “Yeah, I mean that’s my job. I’ve been around for a minute.”
(What is it about Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke’s approach and his process that you trust him even when you guys hit a rough patch like this?) – “You’re talking about a smart guy that’s been around for a long time that’s been a very good position coach. He’s done a lot of good things as a coordinator. We’ve had some really good games. We’ve had some games where I know he wants some (back) – whether it be calls or execution. We all do, at the end of the day, of going ‘Man, I wish I would have done this.’ That’s part of the learning process. That’s why it’s the guys that keep learning and figuring out a way to get things fixed when it’s not going the right way that are the guys you want to be around. Those are the guys that you trust. That’s what he works to do every week.”
(Do you think of Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke as somebody that adapts rather than somebody that sticks to doing this no matter what?) – “Yeah, he’s not going to do the same thing over and over again and just keep getting drummed. None of us want to do that. We weren’t doing well on offense in a lot of different areas over the last three years and we just kept trying to adjust and tried to figure out what works for us.”
(Regarding TE Mike Gesicki and yards after catch, I know that you’ve talked about him not leaving his feet. He went low and he kind of got dinged. How should he proceed? How does he get yards after catch do you think? What’s the best route for him to take there?) – “Make the right decision on whatever you do. Just don’t be wrong. The one that he hurt his shoulder on, he went really low and of course he came right back at me and said ‘Well, I didn’t leap. If I jumped over the guy, I would have been alright.’ (laughter) It’s just one of those things where he is a tall guy. He’s a long strider. It is kind of strange the way he can defend himself. Does he go low? I just want him to be careful as far as trying to get up in the air too much because you saw what happened in Houston and now all of a sudden he gets dropped on his head. We just have to keep finding ways to get him to get north and try to get glancing blows and run through contact.”
(How can TE Mike Gesicki’s athleticism help him? He’s pretty fast and he’s agile but how can that help him running upfield?) – “Well, he can run by everybody. He’s fast for a guy that size.”
(I know that QB Ryan Tannehill is not playing this week but I have a big-picture Tannehill question. There are some people, whether it’s media, fans or whatever, who have made their case that they’ve seen enough of Ryan Tannehill. I want to know why you maybe don’t feel that way.) – “What qualifications are we talking about with the people saying that? None, so I don’t really care what anybody else thinks.”
(I want to ask you in a different way. Why do you still believe that QB Ryan Tannehill is…) – “Because we’ve made a lot of strides since we started in 2016. He had some good seasons before I got here, I know that. We did some different stuff that year. We leaned on the running game and worked off the play-action stuff. He does a great job with the zone-read stuff. When you have an athletic guy that can move around as much as he can and then his arm strength has been something that I’ve never been around before, where we hit the pass like we hit against Tennessee where he throws it 50-plus yards in the air and the guy never breaks stride. He has some rare qualities that you can’t find in a lot of guys physically. The more that he keeps playing, he keeps learning game to game. That’s something to me that puts him in position to where where’s our ceiling at? I don’t think we’re close to it. I think we just keep getting better (and) keep finding ways to maximize his skillset because it becomes a problem for the defense. It’s hard to defend him when you don’t know what he’s going to do. Is he going to do zone read? Is he going to sprint out? Is he going to run a naked (bootleg)? Is he going to go play action? Is it drop back? Are we running the ball? There’s a lot of things they’ve got to defend.”
(So why wasn’t it better when QB Ryan Tannehill wasn’t hurt?) – “It was. The first three games, we played pretty good.”
(And then the next two.) – “Yeah, that happens. That happens sometimes in the NFL. Quarterbacks … when you play New England, that’s not easy. There’s a reason they win a lot of games every year.”
(I’m not saying you won. I’m saying why wasn’t QB Ryan Tannehill better?) – “The first three games?”
(Than what QB Ryan Tannehill was previously? He wasn’t any … he was the same guy.) – “The first three games he played pretty good. You’re asking me that question and you don’t even know what you’re talking about. It’s hard for me to defend anything when you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t. I’ve watched the film. I sit there. We evaluate the scheme we’re asking him to do and he does a good job on it.”
(I know what results are and I know that…) – “That’s fine. That’s how you look at things. Everything is results to you. We’re going through a process because that’s what it is. That’s what the season is. It’s about trying to get guys to trend upward. We were headed in the right direction. We hit a speed bump with New England. Then (at) Cincinnati, he was playing well and then we lose our left tackle and we make two bad decisions.”
(WR DeVante Parker, how do you keep that momentum going from a career game last week with a quarterback that he doesn’t have experience with to keep trending upwards?) – “I think really it starts in practice, which he’s had two good days. He’s executing all of the things that we’re asking him to do. He’s practicing fast. I feel like his body feels good. Now it’s just going to be when we hit Sunday, trying to make ways where he’s not getting taken away by what the defense is doing, moving him around like we keep trying to do and expand what his route tree is, his position flexibility – whether it be inside, outside or No. 3 in a 3×1. Just things like that. You just want to keep him to where guys can’t get a beat on him where they say he’s going to be there every time.”
(So why wasn’t WR DeVante Parker doing that not just this season but before? Or was it just he was not ready to…) – “Well we were doing that last year. We were starting to move him around more. The flexibility was getting to the point where we felt really confident about it. It’s just we kind of lost … I mean he got hurt. Then we lost track of what we were doing and we were trying to fix a lot of stuff and trying to get our balance back. We just got stagnant in a lot of the stuff that we did with him.”
(Is this looking like the week that TE A.J. Derby will be back barring any setbacks?) – “I think we have a good chance. We really wanted to push him this week. The thing is I don’t think he’s going to be 100 percent. He’s always going to have some kind of pain. We just have to figure out where is he hurting because my biggest concern was in the run game or pass protection, was he going to be able to hold up against defensive ends that are bigger than him? That really was my biggest concern. It seems like things have gone well this week. I’ll have a better idea probably tomorrow and Saturday as far as how he feels after these last two practices because these are the more physical ones. Once we kind of get word from him on how he feels, then we can make a decision.”
(Does TE A.J. Derby benefit you more in the run game or the pass game?) – “I think he’s able to do both. He was actually doing well in the run game. He got better over that span that he was playing. We had a little bit of a drop off when he went out. Then once we brought Nick (O’Leary in), then we had another spike to where we started doing well again.”
(You mentioned earlier this week that you need the defensive tackles to stop going around blocks. Can you explain what you mean by that? Are you talking about stunts or not being in their gap?) – “The biggest thing that we’re talking about is one, setting the edge, and then our interior guys just understand run-pass options of you don’t want to run around the quarterback if you’re inside especially, because that’s just going to open up massive holes inside. Then in the run game, you want to make sure that we’re fighting pressure against blocks. We don’t want to just pick an edge and now all of a sudden we get inside zone and we’re just running up the field. It’s just understanding the blocking schemes and how we need to take those types of things on. I think our guys have done a good job this week of trying to understand the big picture. It’s not always going to be a pass. Let’s make sure we’re doing a good job of taking on our blocks correctly, being square (and) using our hands. Just like all of those little details that we work on every day in individual. I watch (Defensive Line Coach) Kris (Kocurek) do it every day. We just need to translate what we’re doing in practice to the game. If we do that, then it cleans up a lot of things.”
Jakeem Grant – November 1, 2018
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Thursday, November 1, 2018
WR Jakeem Grant
(You’ve done this a lot even while you were returning, turning a smaller gain into a large gain. Was there anything added, if not obviously a package of plays, was there anything added as far as mentality for you of ‘I want to be able to replace some of what WR Albert Wilson gave us?’) – “No, not at all. I’m going to continue to do what I’ve been doing and just continue to get better each and every day. I wasn’t going to do anything more, anything less. Just continue be me every day.”
(All you guys are pretty close. Did you guys feel good for WR DeVante Parker knowing the bad luck he’s had this year?) – “We have a saying against bad luck, don’t believe in it. Injuries come in this game. Unfortunately, he was going through some injury stages earlier in the season. Now, he’s healthy and he’s ready to go, and he put on a big performance last game.”
(I know you guys are confident players, but can confidence like that, can you feed off of something like that?) – “Yes. Even with the loss, it just shows you that with that being said, he can go out there and make big plays like that and continue to make big plays after big plays. A lot of people were down on (DeVante Parker), saying that his injuries and stuff like that. Nobody on this team was lacking faith in him. We all knew that once he got healthy, he was going to do exactly what he did on (Thursday).”
(Have you guys tried at all to boost QB Ryan Tannehill’s spirits or has there been no need to among the skill position players who spend a lot of time with him?) – “No, not at all. Ryan is one of the most confident guys. He doesn’t need to boost his spirit. Whenever he gets ready and gets healthy, we know exactly what time it is. A guy like that, you don’t have to go up to him and tell him ‘Hey, come on, we’re here for you’ and stuff like that. Ryan knows that we have his back and he has ours.”
(Do you feel like the offense has withstood the injuries to him and WR Kenny Stills and WR Albert Wilson? Do you feel good about how the last two weeks went?) – “Yes. I would say just as far as just communicating, just having that chemistry and continuing to play for each other. It sucks when guys go down but like we said, we have a mentality of the next man up. We’re going to continue to play like that. Obviously we hate that we lost a couple guys, but we have to get back on track.”
(You guys are a little night and day, home and road. What’s the difference of that, why is that?) – “I don’t know. Somebody set up our schedule I guess. We do a good job at home, play good games at home, seem to come out with victories and we just have to transfer that over to road games. We won one road game this year and I feel like this is the second half of the season, so we have to win those road games because those are going to be big for us.”
(How much more fun or different has it been for you this season as involved as you’ve been on offense?) – “It’s been much more fun to me this year, just being able to be out there on offense, make plays on offense, doing it on special teams. It’s just showing people that I’m not a special teams player. I’m a receiver and then I’m a special teams player. I’m going to continue to push that message and continue to get better at both.”
(How important was that for you to get that out there?) – “It was very important because a lot of people like to label me as a gadget guy. No, gadget guys only come in for a couple plays. My snap count is way up there with starters and everything. I’ve started games and all of those things. I’m out there almost every possession. So, a gadget guy, no. I’m a receiver and then a return specialist.”
(You were that before. You started as a return specialist and then kind of a gadget guy. I don’t know if that’s exactly the right term, but you were used about that much. Now you’ve kind of had your breakthrough it seems like.) – “I feel like I was never a gadget guy.”
(What would be a better term for that? I don’t mean to offend you when I say that.) – “It’s cool. I feel like it was just I had to build that trust in the coaches in order for them to leave me out there and to know what I’m doing on every single play. I feel like a lot of that was on my part. I didn’t gain the coaches’ trust during the time that I needed to for them to put me out there and leave me out there for longer periods of time.”
(It takes a lot of patience for you, though. A lot of guys would come in and maybe not progress into that next level of getting some snaps in the offense and now where you’re at as a regular part in the offense.) – “I’m patient. I’m very patient. The thing is about me, I strive for perfection. I want to be great. I always go to the coaches and ask them ‘what can I do better? What is it?’ Once they let me know, I’ve honed in on my craft and I’ve just continued to perfect my craft so they can see that I am a receiver and they can trust me and leave me out there to make big plays.”
(Can you point to a moment, game, practice where you felt you were really at the point where you had gained their trust?) – “Not a moment. It was just consistently making plays, doing the right thing. It just carried over from offseason workouts, spring ball and going into camp just continuing to make plays after plays, and just showing the coaches that I know exactly what I have and I understand the concepts of the offense. Just doing things of that nature, it just built that trust in them. Being consistent with catching the ball, doing the things and being in the right place at the right time. With that, I was gaining trust in the coaches and the quarterbacks.”
(Do any of your long touchdowns stand out above the others?) – “Not really. I love touchdowns, don’t get me wrong. I love them. But I don’t really worry about the stats. My goal is to get a touchdown every game. If you get a touchdown every game, that’s saying something.”
(What do you think about this ‘bully’ nickname that they gave you?) – “I like it. They gave it to me because of the physicality that I have in the run game. I think it all comes mentally, just not wanting to let your man to make the tackle. I’m selfless. I want to see the backs shine and make that touchdown block. I don’t think it’s all about catching passes and doing that. I feel like a big block is just like a home run catch to me. That’s what I like. I love to see other guys like ‘K.D.’ (Kenyan Drake succeed). I make a great block for him and he springs one down the sideline and scores a touchdown, that’s big for me. I feel like I just scored. With that being said, that’s how I earned the name, just being physical with the DBs and just not letting them be able to make the play.”
(Have they all at one point or another wanted to fight you?) – “Definitely. It’s all good, though. I don’t back down from anybody, don’t fear anybody, but respect all. Fear no one and respect all. That being said, I’m going to continue to play like that and be I guess, what they say, a bully.”
