Brian Flores – August 25, 2020
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Tuesday, August 25, 2020
Head Coach Brian Flores
(I wanted to get your update on a couple of things. First of all, the decision to put DE Curtis Weaver, waive him with an injury designation. Are you expecting him to be back? And two, how is LB Kyle Van Noy?) – “Weaver – I’ll start there – a lot goes into these decisions: the injury itself, player performance, salary cap, depth at the position, next year’s draft. There’s a lot that goes into it. Those conversations happen with myself, (General Manager) Chris (Grier), (Vice President of Football Administration) Brandon (Shore), the coaching staff. He’s waived. He could get claimed. It’s a small percentage of players who do get claimed in this situation. We’ll see if we get him back. We’ll know this evening. As far as Kyle, he got banged up a little bit yesterday. He’s getting treatment. He’s feeling a little bit better. We’re just going to take this thing day to day and we’re hopeful he’ll be out there – I know he’ll try to get out there – as soon as he can.”
(What kind of camp is QB Josh Rosen having?) – “Like all of the quarterbacks, he’s had some good moments, some bad moments. All in all, I think he’s competing. I think he’s made some – of all the quarterbacks, he’s probably got the biggest arm. He’s made some incredible throws. Consistency – I would say we need to always be more consistent at every position, specifically the quarterback. There’s a lot of competition there from ‘Fitz’ (Ryan Fitzpatrick) to Tua (Tagovailoa) to Josh. But he’s a talented player. He’s been competing. Consistency, really at that position, you need it – situationally, from a leadership standpoint. I do think he’s making a lot of progress and hopefully we’ll continue with that progress.”
(I know you’ve talked about it in different situations before but there was another black man that was shot in a public manner by police with Jacob Blake. I wanted to see if you wanted to say anything about how that impacts you and your team going forward, and if that’s something that you’ve discussed with them.) – “There’s a lot that goes into this. I think for me, when a situation like this comes up again, it just reminds me that there’s a lot of fear in this world, there’s a lot of anger in this world. There’s racism, there’s classism, there’s sexism. There’s a lot of division. And what we need is unity. That’s what we need. Unfortunately, situations like this create more division and I think it’s sad. I haven’t watched it because I’m not ready to watch it emotionally. I think I have a pretty good idea of what I’m going to see; but there’s just a lot of division. We need more unity. I haven’t talked to the team about it yet, but we’ve had conversations about race and injustices. I think they know where I stand on this. I think individually, we all need to be better. We all need to be more empathetic. We all need to take more ownership of how we treat people. Again, there’s a lot of fear, there’s a lot of anger on all sides. It’s unfortunate. There’s a lot of division. Hopefully, I just try to do my best to improve the situation anyway I can. I think our team tries to do that and use our platform to create more harmony and camaraderie in the world. Hopefully we take the situation and try to make something good out of it; but when it continually happens, it’s frustrating. We’ve got to do our best to try to make a kinder, more empathetic, more unified world.”
(We’ve talked about G Ereck Flowers before but in speaking with the three rookies yesterday or two days ago, all three of them were very complimentary of what Ereck has done for them in kind of a mentorship role. Is there a way to describe just how valuable that can be, especially when there’s so many newcomers and rookies on the line?) – “I think it’s very valuable. Ereck has had a lot of experiences in this league. He was a high draft pick, has played for a few different teams, has had a lot of ups (and) downs over the course of his career. He’s learned a lot. I think he’s really kind of taken those young players under his wing to a degree. To me, what better of a guy to do that than someone who has had as many experiences as he’s had. He’s been in different places, been in different systems and had some success also – success and failures. When he talks to a young guy – a young offensive lineman – he’s talking to him with a lot of knowledge. I think if they just do a quick Google search, they’ll read about it and know that he’s been through a lot; and he’s gone through it and he practices hard every day and it’s important to him. He goes about his business the right way. I think he’s learned a lot over the course of his career. That’s been nice to see. It’s Ereck but it’s also Ted Karras, it’s Jesse Davis. I think Julién Davenport, (Adam) Pankey. They all work well together. Danny Isidora. They all kind of work together and helping those young guys get acclimated to the National Football League. Obviously there’s no preseason games, so they don’t get to go out there and bang with another team, but I know there’s a lot of conversations about what it’s like to play a game in this league. Those conversations are happening and guys like Ereck, Ted and Danny, they’re leading those conversations.”
(This is kind of a two-part question. I wanted to ask you about your thought process on rookies because last year, especially with G Michael Deiter, you put him in there and threw him in the deep end to see how he played. It seems like you’re doing the same with a lot of these rookies from CB Noah Igbinoghene to the offensive linemen. Is that just your coaching philosophy? I also wanted to ask you about CB Nik Needham, because he’s gotten a call up to the first team because of Noah’s injury. How has he done so far in training camp in your opinion?) – “I’ll start that with Nik. I think Nik has made a lot of improvement over the course of the year. How Nik came into training camp, he’s learned a lot. I think he’s matured a lot. I think he’s taken a lot more of a professional approach from his rookie year. He’s made some strides. I tell these guys, when you get your opportunity, you have to take advantage of it. It’s like basketball. When you get your opportunity, that’s like getting to the free throw line. You either make it or you don’t. That’s kind of some of the things we talk about. So when Nik goes in because somebody else goes down and plays well, that’s what we’re talking about as far as taking advantage of your opportunities. And that’s not just football, that’s life in general. Nik’s done a good job. As far as rookies in general and throwing them into the fire versus not throwing them into the fire, look we play the guys we feel give us the best chance to win. That was the case with – I know you mentioned Dieter. Last year he played a lot of football – a year ago – and we felt like he gave us the best chance to win. But at the same time, there’s a little bit of forecasting and predicting that we need to do as coaches, as an organization and as a personnel department, where a guy may not be better than somebody else Week 1; but the prediction and the forecast is that he may be better in Week 12. Those are decisions we have to make. Every team is making those decisions in some form or fashion. I’m not saying that’s necessarily the case. We might feel like he is better right now – not Deiter, I’m not talking specifically about one specific player; but in general, we may feel like ‘Player X’ is better than the veteran. But we may also feel like ‘Player X’ is going to be better. That’s a lot of what goes into the decisions here. You guys will never really know what I’m thinking at the end of the day. (laughter)”
(We were asking about G Ereck Flowers. Obviously he spent some time on the COVID list. CB Xavien Howard has been out for a while. Common sense says if they’re on for more than a few days, they’ve got something going on. For those guys have had long absences because of COVID, have you noticed just the normal conditioning they lose from a week of not practicing, that the illness might have some effect on them or that it takes another week or two to get that breath back?) – “I think every case is different. They are. Everyone responds to an infection, that infection, sickness, injury – everyone responds a little differently. Obviously if you’re out for an extended period of time, your conditioning – whether it’s a world-class athlete or you or I – is not going to be as good as it was the 10 days or two weeks prior. That’s always going to be an issue, it doesn’t matter who it is. We just take it case by case and try to work the guys back and work them back into shape, and get them out there as quickly as we can. Everyone needs to practice. Everyone needs to prepare. We’re closing in on cuts and the first week of the season, so we need the guys out there. But yeah, to answer your question, everyone is a little bit different.”
(There were some reports this summer about some teams reaching out about QB Josh Rosen’s availability. Obviously I know you won’t divulge much into that but it seems that whether QB Ryan Fitzpatrick holds up or he doesn’t, or you may not be ready to unleash QB Tua Tagovailoa, that Josh has a role to play here. Can you expand a little bit on where Josh kind of fits in with that quarterback competition?) – “Josh is competing. He’s competing like everyone else. I think we’re – let’s call it halfway through training camp. We’re not anointing anyone the starter. This is still a competition. I think he’s going to fit in and his role is going to be what he makes it, just like we say with every player at every position. Unless you’ve seen our depth chart and you know what I’m thinking – to me, we’re still going here. We’ve got a practice here. Guys will be competing and trying to get better. We’re going to work first, second and third down, and red area and two-minute. We’re going to work some two-point plays today. We’ll just compete and see how this thing shakes out.”
(On LB Raekwon McMillan, where is he in his development?) – “Raekwon has obviously started a lot of games in this league. (He’s a) good tackler, good communicator, smart player, plays in the kicking game. He’s still ascending. I think he’s doing well. He’s playing well this training camp. There’s a lot of competition at the linebacker position between Raekwon and Elandon Roberts and Calvin Munson and (Jerome) Baker and Kamu (Grugier-Hill). We’ll see where the chips fall. Yeah, everyone is still competing. This is practice seven of 14 of training camp, so we’re right at the halfway point. No decisions have been made but we’re closing in. We’re definitely making our evaluations and some people are ahead of others. You’re not going to get that out of me today. (laughter) We’re just trying to – we’re going to try to field the best team we can and try to compete for an entire season. Raekwon is playing well and I think he’s a very good player in this league.”
