Adam Gase – December 5, 2016
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Monday, December 5, 2016
Head Coach Adam Gase
(Are you in the school that some losses are easier to flush than others?) – “I don’t know if any loss is easy to get over. It takes a couple days, and you’ve got to move on quickly. If you hang on to it, one becomes two, and then two becomes three. It becomes a bad cycle. The good thing is in the NFL, no matter how many you win by, how many you lose by, it’s one win, one loss. It’s not like college where it matters who you played and all those type of things. We’ve got to make the corrections we need to make and get to Wednesday and start over again.”
(How did LB Kiko Alonso come out of yesterday’s game?) – “Not good. (He) broke his thumb. (He) had surgery. Right now, we’ll see where he’s at for next week. There is a chance that he can play. It’s just going to be really how everything went. I’ll have a better idea, really, probably tomorrow.”
(Was LB Kiko Alonso hampered by the hamstring at all as well?) – “He’s banged up, probably more than that. He’s one of those guys that doesn’t complain a whole bunch.”
(What’s the outlook for C Mike Pouncey this week?) – “I’ll know more tomorrow night. We’re going to take a look at where he’s at, and we’ll move on from there. But I don’t have a definite answer for you right now.”
(Do you have confidence C Mike Pouncey will play again this year?) – “I hope so. Everything that I’ve heard is there’s a great chance he could come back. It’s going to be what they tell us. Obviously, if we didn’t think he was going to come back, he wouldn’t be on the (53-man) roster; he’d be on IR. We feel like we have a chance. Knowing Mike, he’s one of those guys that – like he always says – ‘I’m a quick healer.’ We’ll see what happens.”
(Do you want to see how the team responds after a loss like that, getting punched in the mouth?) – “I expect us to. That’s this game; that’s this profession. It isn’t the first time we’ve got smacked around a little bit. It has been a while though.”
(On the plays, like the first one of the game for Baltimore – in that case it was LB Kiko Alonso and LB Spencer Paysinger – space between them, too much space, which seemed to happen on a handful of those. What happened on those or what should’ve happened on those plays?) – “It’s zone coverage. You just have to be as tight as you can. When you play a guy like Joe (Flacco) and he gets hot, it makes it tough. Unfortunately, I feel like I’ve seemed to be the rebound game for him most of the time. I’ve been through that about three different times, going into Baltimore, and everybody is complaining about the way their offense plays, and he catches fire. I’m tired of being the bounce-back game for him.”
(Among everything that went wrong for you yesterday, were there two or three things that you thought really did, whether it’s falling behind early or whatever?) – “I think we just missed our opportunities. When you play a team like that in that environment in this part of the season, you can’t miss on the chances you have. We crossed the 50- (yard line) three times. One time, we were second-and-3 and all of a sudden we’re third-and-12. You can’t waste opportunities. When you waste opportunities, it’s going to avalanche on you quick, especially at that place. That’s historically what happens. You miss your chances against them, they’re going to make you pay.”
(The playoff situation, not a lot of margin for error at this point is it?) – “I’m not even going to worry about it, because you hear that every year, and really everybody is usually wrong. That’s what it is. You play until somebody tells you don’t, you can’t play anymore. If you try to figure out all the scenarios … We were 1-4, everybody said our season was over. I’m pretty sure if everybody went to Vegas, put money on that, they’d be broke.”
(How tough a call was it to determine – as a play caller – how much to run the ball with when you’re down virtually the entire game? RB Jay Ajayi got 12 carries.) – “I think we called six more runs. It ended up the ball goes outside, because they give us the look we needed, as far as their called runs. You’re down the way we were, we’re trying (to) at least keep them somewhat honest, but it’s hard. When you get down like that, you’re in a bad spot. That’s the last thing we want to do is make this a drop-back game. We’ve got guys out there that are fighting to … That aren’t really necessarily 100 percent healthy. They’re fighting to try to protect Ryan (Tannehill), but you don’t want to back it a drop-back game. You’d like to make it a play-action, run the ball, grind it out type of game. We got down, and we missed our chances when it was at least like 14-0. We have to find a way to get into the end zone, and we couldn’t do it.”
(What happened on the K Andrew Franks missed field goal, and will that affect your thinking going forward?) – “He missed it. That happens. As a field goal kicker, we would love for him to hit that. I decided to kick the field goal. I felt like, ‘Let’s get some points here.’ Those guys had that drive. I felt like ‘V.J.’ (Defensive Coordinator Vance Joseph) and those guys would get everything straightened out on the other side, get some points and reload here. He left it down the hash.”
(Wanted to confirm DE Jason Jones back with the team and what his return possibly means.) – “Yes. Any time you get a guy with experience – that’s a veteran – that has been a key guy for us as far as what he brings to the defense, that’s a good thing for us.”
(You’ve battled injuries all season at the linebacker unit. Now LB Kiko Alonso – the leading tackler of your team – is kind of iffy. How do you compensate or mask for all of the substitutions that are in the unit?) – “We’re going to have to look at who we have, who’s available, what do we want to lean on as far as coverage, blitz. We have to take a hard look at all of this (and) who’s going to be where. That’s going to be our first step. It’s early in the process for us, because you come in, we evaluate this last game, we correct it with the players, and now this afternoon we’ll be able to go back through and say, ‘Okay, here’s who we have. What do we need to do?’ then ‘What do they do with Arizona, and what do we want to look like as a defense?’ We’re beyond the early stages it feels like. We’re starting from scratch right now as far as what we actually want to do for this week.”
(With LB Mike Hull when he was in there, how did he perform?) – “I thought he did a good job. He’s so instinctive. It’s interesting to watch, because you see him move and guys are always not as quick as him to see things. He’s one of those guys that has that ability to see things happen before they happen. I’ve always enjoyed watching him play, because you see a guy that absolutely just sells out. You see him flying around, making some of those tackles. He gives you everything he has.”
(How did G/T Laremy Tunsil and T Branden Albert play with their health issues?) – “I thought ‘B.A.’ (Branden Albert) did a good job. It couldn’t have been an easy job there going against No. 55 (Terrell Suggs) and you got one hand. He battled. Same thing with Tunsil – he battled. I know it wasn’t as clean a day as he wanted. It’s that group. It’s a tough group to go against, and when we become one dimensional, we have nothing to really keep them off balance, and those guys start pass rushing. The guys fought (and) tried to do everything they could to keep them off of Ryan (Tannehill). It wasn’t always what we wanted, but the fact that those two guys were out there makes a difference for us. I know their teammates were thinking (about) the fact that they fought to get back. They wanted to be out there. They wanted to try to help us win.”
(For WR DeVante Parker to go out there and give the effort that he did in that game, what does that say about his maturation and where he is right now?) – “I was impressed. I was impressed. But he told us on Monday. Myself and (Wide Receivers Coach) Shawn Jefferson were asking him, ‘What are you thinking this week?’ And he really couldn’t even … He wasn’t walking real well. He’s like, ‘I’m playing.’ Shawn was great as far as encouragement all week. I thought Jarvis (Landry) and Kenny (Stills) did a great job as far as encouraging him to keep doing everything he could to try to get ready for this game. When I saw him on Friday and Saturday moving around, and then when we went out there to work out on Sunday he was … I asked him, I was like what do you want to do? He goes, ‘I’m going.’ It was impressive that he went out there. I know he couldn’t have been completely pain free.”
(Any setback now?) – “I don’t think so. I talked to him last night. He felt pretty good and this morning he looks … I know he’s not feeling great; but, that’s what this league is right now. You’re in a car crash once a week.”
(Baltimore had a lot of short passes. How many sack opportunities did you guys have and how did you do with them?) – “Not a lot. The ball was coming out quick. That’s the tough part. You play that offense, you’ve got to squeeze on them quick and close the windows as fast as possible and try to make him get to the second, third … if they have a fourth progression. It was coming out so quick there was no chance for our line to even do anything. They’re taking one or two steps and the ball’s out. I thought Joe (Flacco) did a great job as far as just taking what we were giving him and we’ve just got to make those windows tighter. We have to take away his first progression. That’s the first part of it, and if we get to the point where it’s take away number two, now we’ve got a chance with our pass rushing.”
(You guys were bringing some of the linebackers and then dropping some of the defensive linemen at times. What was the idea? Was that kind of closing the windows based on his passing lanes?) – “Yes, when you’re playing zone defense, you add one more guy to their passing game. It makes it tough. It makes them hold on the ball. When you have a three-man rush, they’re holding onto the ball longer but a lot of times you’re not thinking that’s going to happen when you zone pressure and you’re trying to basically try to free a guy up and you lose an end sometimes. It’s kind of all that cat and mouse game that you’ve got to play with the other side of the ball.”
(Back to WR DeVante Parker. What did you see on that first interception? Is there anything he could have done?) – “I thought he had it actually. I thought it was a good ball. It was where it was supposed … Everything was where it was supposed to be. It’s just one of those ones where we’re going to one of our guys that we think can make plays. When I was standing on sideline, I thought (Parker) had it, and then I just saw the ball come out with the defender.”
(Why were the windows so open?) – “When you play a team that’s a spacing-type team, and he starts his body in one direction and you start taking away, everybody’s got to be almost tight on a string and working together. If you have the slightest guy off, it creates enough of a window to where he can put it in there. He made some good throws to where there were some tight windows and it’s just as the game goes on, it feels worse and worse when a guy is really … He did make some really good throws. He made some good decisions and we have to figure out a way to tighten him up even more than what we were. I know earlier it was loose and I know we tried to tighten him up, but it wasn’t going our way. We just did not get on the same page fast enough.”
(You had a couple of your guys that had some pointed comments about the condition on the field yesterday. What were your thoughts?) – “For me, I always feel like we can control it. It’s really about body positioning, getting your cleats in the ground. If there was any kind of issue as far as too slick or their cleats weren’t right, then that should have been dealt with long before we started the game. That’s a hard one for me to even acknowledge because if we weren’t ready for that, then that’s just bad ball.”
(Not to try to make any excuses or anything with dealing with the cleats. Yesterday, they had that My Cleats, My Cause thing going on and was that in any way a factor in terms of say, players getting new cleats they weren’t use to and they had to adjust in that regard?) – “That’s hard for me to answer. You saw some guys falling from their team. I can’t say these players were wearing different cleats over somebody else. We had a couple of guys go down on routes where we were correcting more footwork things than worrying about what their cleats were. We’re leaning back on a route and then we fall down. I don’t know if that really has anything to do with cleats. That’s hard for me to answer. You can go through and tally that one up.”
(Are Arizona Cardinals QB Carson Palmer and Baltimore Ravens QB Joe Flacco similar players and do you expect to see the same type of offensive strategy this week in light of the success the Ravens had?) – “I don’t know what ‘B.A.’ (Bruce Arians) is exactly going to kind of do in that area. I think they’re completely two different offenses. ‘B.A.’ has been very successful pushing the ball down the field, obviously when you have Larry (Fitzgerald). He’s been doing a great job being an underneath guy but still being able to push the ball down the field when they want to do it with, working the slot, things like that. But they have some guys that can run and they like throwing it down the field. They’ll look at our tape and try to figure out what’s best for them for that week. That’s one of the things that ‘B.A.’ does a great job of. We have to play what we’re calling better and we’re probably going to have to make some adjustments. That’s what football is. You’ve just got to go back to the drawing board and figure out what’s best for this week.”
(Do you think this might be the week for CB Xavien Howard?) – “I’m not sure. I’ll see how he feels tomorrow and then we’ll make a decision on Wednesday how much we want to practice him. We’ll figure it out by Sunday.”
