Matt Burke – December 13, 2018
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Thursday, December 13, 2018
Defensive Coordinator Matt Burke
(Your thoughts on how your corners did without CB Xavien Howard on Sunday? If you can talk about how Torry McTyer, Minkah Fitzpatrick, Bobby McCain and specifically, who you got the most from?) – “We scored one more point than they did. They battled. They battled all game. Obviously, that’s a tough offense to match up against. (It’s a) tough quarterback to go against. They all kind of gave up some plays and made some plays. They battled all game. Really, what we asked from all those guys was just keep battling and try to keep playing the techniques and the calls and stuff we’re asking them to do. (We) won some, lost some, made some plays and gave up some plays. Especially kind of the way the first half went, we left some plays out there in the first half and kind of responded better in the second half. I thought we kind of re-grouped and all of those guys – not just the corners but defensively, I thought we kind of came back out in the second half and did a better job. Really, for us it was about with those guys, just keep battling. You’re going against that caliber of quarterback. He’s going to make some plays and make some throws on you. We have to keep coming back and make the next play, and I thought they did a good job of doing that. Cornell (Armstrong) probably didn’t get as many reps as some of the other guys. We were just trying to work groups and kind of keep the targets moving and changing and try to get some matchups that we liked, so we just kept rolling those guys around a little bit.”
(Has the light come on for LB Raekwon McMillan?) – “Sure. I thought he played his best game of the season. I think Raekwon was one of the main factors in our run game. I thought our d-tackles played really well in the run game. I thought Raekwon and Kiko (Alonso) did a really good job in the interior. T.J. (McDonald) as well. That kind of collection of guys really helped shut the run game down. It was a nice step. I don’t know if the light’s come on or whatever the saying is, but it was a good step for him. He played square, he played stout, he was very firm. I don’t think he misfit a run all day. On some of the stuff where they were doing a lot of two-back run game, which we had maybe struggled with earlier in the season on some of those fits and how that lined up. He played well. He did a good job all day.”
(What would you say about S T.J. McDonald in terms of how he’s played this season and how he’s sort of meshed with your secondary?) – “I think he’s done a great job. He’s obviously a physical presence for us. He’s done a really good job obviously when we use him down in the box and doing some of those things. Like I said, I thought our tackles, those two linebackers and T.J., really were the kind of driving factors in the run game being successful for us last week. He’s done a great job with that and fitting. He’s honestly probably one of our best communicators back there too in terms of just getting guys lined up and getting the checks out and being in tune with the game plan and those sort of things. He does a really good job with that and taking care of his side of things, whether it’s talking to the corner or talking to the nickel or getting things right when he’s down in the box working with the linebackers. I think he’s actually had probably an underrated season to be honest with you. He’s done a good job for us.”
(You’ve been using a 5-2 front.) – “Have I? (laughter)”
(Well, five defensive linemen. What are the pros and cons when you do that? Obviously, I’m assuming you do that to stop the run.) – “Sometimes. It depends. We have different variations of some of those fronts. Obviously, probably with the ones you’re referring to, yes. If we’re in a heavy run situation or a two-back set or some of those things, we have packages where we can put obviously a bigger body on the field and load up in some of our fronts and kind of get a little bit stouter and get more firm in there. Obviously, you’re taking somebody else off the field so whether you’re limiting yourself in coverage or … I don’t want to say you’re getting predictable, but we have to have enough pitches off it where they don’t know … They can see the five guys coming out on the field so obviously we have to have enough changeups where we’re not just stuck in one thing. We just try to pick our spots with the matchups when we feel we have a beat on a particular something we’ll get from the offense that we’ll throw those guys out there. Sometimes we do it honestly to get matchups in a rush game. We’ll put five guys out even on third downs and those sort of things to try to spread guys out or get matchups in our pass-rush game. We utilize our fronts in different ways.”
(You’ve used a number of packages – I believe you call it elephant – the one where everybody is standing up and then there’s one guy who is the primary rusher kind of disguised in the coverage. You haven’t used that much this year. Is there a reason why?) – “Not really, actually.”
(The package where a lot of guys are standing up. DE Charles Harris used to be on the inside.) – “We have some stuff like that where we’ll do some of those things. Again, we just go week to week. In those sort of things, it’s more like we’re trying to dictate protections or how we can attack a protection on a third down. Again, anytime you’re either putting more d-linemen out there or utilizing more guys in the rush, obviously you’re taking away from you’re coverage so it’s always a balance in terms of how many guys you can dedicate to rushing or attacking the quarterback versus how many guys you’re putting in coverage. Week to week, we just make those determinations on whether we’re using those type of packages or not. I couldn’t tell you right now off-hand the percentages we used it this year versus another year. Every week, that’s something that we examine, kind of how we want to utilize those things. As a core philosophy, we try to use our four-down rush as a starting point so then anything off of that is adjustments we make from there. We have a few different tricks up our sleeves sometimes.”
(The Vikings changed offensive coordinator. I don’t think they’ve had time to completely overhaul their scheme. The coach has publicly said they want to run more. Obviously you’re aware of those sort of things. I’m wondering about tendencies. How important and how much time do you spend on this coordinator’s tendencies on third-and-1 with the score close in the second quarter? And then not having tendencies on this guy, does that mean you discard that notion for this game?) – “I think it’s going to be an adjustable game plan. I agree, they are not going to put a brand new offense in and I don’t know much about the new coordinator. He’s been there for a long time so there is a lineage of what they’ve done there from that point of view. From a tendency standpoint in terms of how they are calling things and when they are calling what plays, I think it’s going to be a fluid thing and we have to get a feel for what their approach is. It’s like any week. Everyone self-scouts and they have a feel for their own tendencies as well. You have to be ready to adjust and to adapt to different things that are being thrown at you on Sundays week to week anyways. This week is probably just going into it, there’s a little bit of unknown from that point of view. We really just try to focus on us and getting us down and doing our things right and making sure our calls are being executed and if there is something new that’s thrown at us, then at least we’re doing our thing and be in the right spot and we’ll adjust to anything we see from there.”
(Do you think in general, offensive coordinators spend their time focused on tendency break from game to game than defense?) – “I’ve never coordinated offense, so I can’t necessarily answer that. We look at ourselves and we self-scout every week. We keep a running full season self-scout and then a four to five week look back on some things. I try to gain a perspective that if I’m very predictable in a certain area … Sometimes it’s okay. Sometimes I don’t care. That’s just dictated by whatever the situation is. We’ll have pitches off things that if we’ve shown a certain blitz or haven’t blitzed in a certain area, that we want to kind of change that when we know the offense is expecting one thing. I’m sure offenses do that. I know (Head Coach) Adam (Gase) does a lot of that where he tries to make sure he’s got corrections or answers to things he’s doing. I’m not sure that’s an offense or defense thing. I think that’s probably coach to coach and how much stock you put into all of that stuff.”
(When you’re facing a quarterback that’s completing 71 percent of his passes and has two very dangerous wide receiver, probably arguably one of the best duos in the league.) – “Yeah, I’d say so.”
(How do you neutralize that?) – “That’s the answer, right? That’s the answer everyone is looking for. (laughter) I think it’s just like we do everything else. The completion percentage stuff … One trend in the league is obviously the quick-passing game and the ball getting out quick. Sometimes it’s hard to stop those. We have to be good at tackling so they don’t get those yards after the catch. You have to keep the short passes short and keep those things in manageable situations. I think just like every week, it’s about changing our coverages and keep giving different looks and keep giving different answers. Again, we try to buy time for our rush to have another second to get there and maybe make him pull it down and see something that he is not seeing. They are two great players (Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs). They’re both top 10 in the NFL in targets, receptions and all of that stuff. It is a challenge and I think it’s just like every week, we’ve just got to … There are going to be balls completed. He’s going to complete passes. It would be great if we go 0-for-something on passing but I doubt that’s going to happen. We have to tackle when they are completed and keep the short passes from becoming big gains. We have to keep everything in front of us and tackle those short passes. We have to change up enough looks and keep our coverages mixed up that maybe they don’t get a beat on what the answers are.”
(Do they throw the ball down the field at all?) – “Yeah. I don’t know the exact numbers but I think both of those guys have almost 20 explosive (plays) each.”
(That’s not catch and run?) – “Some are. They do a good job at both. Yeah, they take shots down the field. It’s not exclusively a short passing game. We can’t just put 11 guys inside the 10-yard line.”
(What do you see as the strengths of WR Adam Thielen?) – “They deploy him in the slot a decent amount. He’s a bigger body for that position. He’s a 6-foot-1, 6-foot-2 guy and he’s got good length. He has really, really, really good body control. He understands leverage and how to get open. He has great hands and probably better athleticism than people give him credit for. He runs really good routes. He understands how to get open. He’s got really good body control and makes a lot of good catches because he positions himself well. He has a good rapport with the quarterback. He’s a good receiver. I don’t see a lot of holes in his game, to be honest with you. He’s crafty. He’s smart. You can see the way he works to get open. He understands coverages and how teams are trying to stop him. He has good counters off everything to keep people (from) what they are trying to do to him. We’re going to have to work to get after him this week for sure.”
(How much do you think that S Minkah Fitzpatrick could learn from last week’s game? Obviously it’s a tough opponent and he’s young at the position, but he said that was the worst game that he’s played this season.) – “I’ll let him speak for that. I feel like this is my philosophy with all of those guys. Every week, he has some hard lessons. He probably learned last week that that was a Hall of Fame at minimum quarterback. They have a good receiving corps and again, for an unfamiliar position for him, he learned some lessons I hope. I think that’s just all of those guys. The more he plays and the more he experiences that … He came in after the win. Adam (Gase) gave the guys Monday off but he came in first thing Monday morning and sat through with (Defensive Backs Coach) Tony (Oden) and watched the tape. He literally showed up first thing and texted him and said ‘I want to go through this with you.’ He didn’t wait and that’s the kind of kid he is. I think that all of his experiences at all of the positions he’s played and playing against good players and good quarterbacks, I think he’s going to keep growing and learning from that as he grows. Sometimes you’ve got to learn some tough lessons and take some knocks on the chin to get better.”
