Brian Flores – December 2, 2020 (Conference Call)
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Wednesday, December 2, 2020
Head Coach Brian Flores Conference Call with Cincinnati Media
(Just overall thoughts on what you see when you look at the Cincinnati team.) – “I see a very tough, competitive group. Well-coached. Let’s just start in the kicking game. I think Darrin Simmons is probably one of the top special teams coordinators in the league. They’ve got a very good group there. It’s definitely a strength on their team. Obviously they had a big day in the kicking game last week with the kickoff return and the fake punt, and almost broke the punt return at the end of the game to win it, so that’ll be a major challenge. Offensively I know we’re dealing with some injuries. Obviously the quarterback and the running back, but definitely some skill players out there in the perimeter – A.J. Green, Tee Higgins, obviously (Tyler) Boyd, some good young players there. So I think it’ll be a challenge. Defensively I think (Defensive Coordinator) Lou (Anarumo) does a great job mixing – especially when they get into the long-yardage situations, mixing in the mug pressures. They’ve got some good young players. Jessie Bates, I like him a lot just kind of studying him. Will Jackson obviously is very talented. (Logan) Wilson is a young linebacker who’s also very talented. (Germaine) Pratt and (Josh) Bynes, they’re playing well. Carl Lawson over there on the edge, he’s a good player over there. There are some talented guys. You also have Mike Daniels in there. He’s been a good player for a long time. To me, the record is misleading. I know all the pundits, talking heads; but what I see is some talented players and a good coach and it’ll be a tough, tough challenge.”
(What’s been the biggest difference for you guys this year?) – “Can you elaborate on that a little bit? There’s a lot of differences. COVID is a big difference. (laughter)”
(Just in terms of you guys are actually competing for a playoff spot this year. What do you feel like has been the difference in just kind of getting you over that hump and kind of heading in a different direction this year?) – “I think our guys, they work hard; but I think guys work hard really across the board. I think they’re tough, they’re smart, they’re competitive. I think we’ve got good coaches. We try to put them in good positions. I think we try to play complementary football. I see a lot of the same things with the Bengals. Every year is a little bit different. Every game in this league comes down to three, four or five plays. We’ve been able to make some of those plays. I know I’ve watched pretty much every game here and some of these games with the Bengals have come down to that as well. Last week obviously being one of them. I don’t think there’s any specific one thing; I just think our guys have worked hard. Our coaches work hard and we just try to get games to the fourth quarter and then make plays in those critical situations.”
(How much has the experience that you got in the front office with the Patriots helped you as you’ve navigated free agency, the draft, to build a football team in the image that you want?) – “I think a lot of the experiences I’ve had throughout my career have helped me. I spent four years in personnel, so that time was very valuable to me and worked with a lot of really good people during that time. Obviously Scott Pioli, John Robinson in Tennessee – there’s a lot of names so I’m not going to go through all of them – but I worked with a lot of good people, learned a lot from that time and that’s certainly helped me in this role; but I’m lucky. (General Manager) Chris Grier does a great job and his staff – (Assistant General Manager) Marvin Allen and (Vice President of Football Administration) Brandon Shore – so from a personnel standpoint, I’d say they handle most of it. But I’d say in my role, when I walk in there, it’s not like I’m – I’ve kind of seen it through their lens as well as the coaching lens, so I think it’s been helpful.”
(When you have a young coach trying to orchestrate a rebuild, people always talk about the team has to learn how to win. I’m just curious last year, after the 0-7 start, was there a moment, a play, a series, a game where you felt “okay, we’re over the hump?” This is something that just truly told you that you were moving in the right direction?) – “In this league, I don’t think you’re ever really over the hump. There’s just so many good teams. The league is built for parity, so a lot of good players. I think once you think you’re over the hump is when you go back under the hump. I think we just take it week-to-week. Every week is a challenge. Every day we just try to improve and get better. I think when you take that approach, the results take care of themselves. That’s kind of the message I give to the players, the coaches, really everyone in the organization. Yeah, you do need to learn how to win in this league. I think there’s something to that. I’m not sure – if I had the formula, I’d probably bottle it up, but I don’t. But I think part of that is just working every week, preparing every week and good meetings, good walkthroughs, good practice, good routines on the field, off the field and then let the chips fall where they fall.”
(Can you talk a little bit about the ageless wonder in QB Ryan Fitzpatrick at quarterback?) – “Ryan (Fitzpatrick) is a very good leader, talented player, smart, gritty, tough. He really embodies a lot of the characteristics we’re looking for in a Dolphin. He can handle adversity, (is) mentally tough. It’s been great working with him I would say these last two years. He’s been a great mentor to Tua (Tagovailoa) and a lot of other young players. It’s one thing as a coach to try to teach these young guys and mentor them and teach them how to be a pro; it’s another thing when you have a guy like Ryan in the locker room, in the huddle with them, really saying a lot of the same things. He’s been a very, very valuable piece to the growth of some of our young players, I would say.”
(As you’re trying to build your culture, the culture you’re looking for with your organization, how important is it to get guys like LB Kyle Van Noy and guys like that that you know that you’ve been with that you know understand the culture? How important is it to have guys like that to be your sergeant-in-arms and such?) – “It’s always nice to get guys that you’ve worked with before. And in a lot of ways, those guys, they become – you said ‘sergeants,’ but they find leadership roles within the team. They understand how I’m wired, for sure, personally, because obviously I’ve had personal relationships with a couple of these guys I’m referencing. Elandon Roberts is part of that as well. And they can kind of share some of that history with the guys who don’t know me as well. I think that’s been good. So when I lose it on someone, they can tell them, ‘that’s not as bad as it was.’ So that part of it has been good.”
(What’s the biggest change in you and the way that you go do things in Year 2 that’s helped you than it did in Year 1 maybe?) – “I don’t know if I could point to one thing. I think – I feel like I’ve grown. I don’t know if I could point to one thing. I’m trying to think of something.”
(Is there a way to measure that growth and how you’ve kind of – in the way you say ‘Okay, I’m doing this a lot better than I did last year. I really like the way I’ve developed as a coach.’) – “I just think anytime you go through experiences, you get better – whether it’s something as simple as scheduling, days off, shells practice versus padded practices, do we defer the coin toss, do we take the ball, do we want to take a timeout in this situation. There’s several things that I guess I’m a little bit more comfortable with than I was a year ago – in a lot of areas. Not just on the field but in my relationships and the relationships I have with our equipment staff and our training staff and our personnel staff. I think I’ve grown from that standpoint. There’s so much to this job that to pinpoint one thing and say ‘Hey, that’s it,’ it’s hard to say that. I’m always trying to get better. I certainly don’t have all the answers, but I work hard to get them.”
(You’ve got a couple of rookies playing side by side on the right side of your offensive line. How are those guys holding up and how are they developing?) – “Well, we really have three rookies playing a good number of snaps. The two guys on the right side, like you mentioned – Solomon Kindley and Robert Hunt – then Austin Jackson over on the left. We really like all three guys. They’re young, they’re talented, they compete, it’s important to them and I think they’ve gotten better over the course of the year. Look, any time you can get game snaps under your belt and feel the speed and feel the power and see the different schemes that opposing defenses present – and obviously this week will be certainly a challenge from that standpoint, the way Lou (Anarumo) challenges protections – I think that only helps these guys. Look, we’re about helping young players improve and develop, really at all positions. Obviously o-line is a very important position and we’re playing with some young guys. They have their ups and their downs and we’ll just try to keep working with them and helping them get better.”
(One of the guys you mentioned when you were running down the Bengals defensive players – DE Carl Lawson – is near the top of the league in pressures and hurries but doesn’t quite finish as much as you would like. What do you like about his game and where does he rank in the hierarchy of the elite edge rushers in this league?) – “Look, I like the player. I think anytime you can affect the quarterback, that’s a good thing. While the sacks are the big stat, I often – I don’t want to say debate – with our media about statistics and sacks. I’ll say it again. One player can have 1,000 snaps in a season and he’s judged off – let’s say he gets 10 sacks or 15 sacks. That’s one percent of his plays. I think we can all do the math and we’re judging him off of one percent of his plays. I just think that’s – I’m always going to – I like judging the 99 percent. So when there’s hurries and there’s run stops and there’s edges being set and he’s dropping into coverage, those are the things I’m looking at, to include the sacks. But literally, we can all do the math. Twenty sacks is an All-Pro year and it’s two percent of the snaps. Again, we can all do the math. It might be less – I’m not even sure, it may be less than two percent. I’m not that good at math. (laughter) But I do know that there’s more plays – just from a comparison standpoint, I think he’s a good player. I think the pressures are a big part of that. I think the run stops are a big part of that. I think his edge setting – I like his violent play style. I think all of those things are part of it. There’s a couple of other guys who are in that mode as well. I don’t know how many interceptions Jessie Bates has but this is a good player, I’ll tell you that right now. And I don’t really care how many interceptions he has. This is a damn good player. Some people, if those are the stats that you look at – I’m just a little different, I guess.”
(The way you can morph from 3-4 to 4-3 and the different looks and principles and everything with it, you have to have intelligent, versatile football players and you’ve always been exposed to that concept up in New England. So you seem to be going along those exact same lines. Is it coming to where you’re satisfied or getting closer to where you want to be in terms of intelligent, versatile football players for your defense?) – “I don’t know if satisfied is ever a word I would use. (laughter) I think Chris (Grier) and our personnel department, I think they’ve done a great job of bringing in guys who are tough and smart and competitive and love to play. We’re trying to coach them up the best we can. We want to be versatile. We want to give our opponents different looks and apply pressure in different ways. Our players work hard to try to get that accomplished. It’s not always perfect but they work hard at it and I appreciate them for working hard at it. I think when it hits and when we execute it, it’s been – we’ve had some success. It’s been the other way also and we try to make those corrections. But they work hard to get it right and I think our personnel staff has done a nice job of bringing in good players via free agency, the draft, etc. Hopefully we can continue to do that and we’ll just keep trying to coach them the best we can.”
