Chan Gailey – November 17, 2020
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Tuesday, November 17, 2020
Offensive Coordinator Chan Gailey
(One thing that I guess will be helpful to determine this year with your two rookies who were college quarterbacks – RB/WR Malcolm Perry and WR Lynn Bowden Jr. – is whether they are going to be change of pace gimmick players or whether one of both players will develop into legitimate NFL slot receivers. Could you talk about each of them separately, about where each of them stand in terms of becoming a legitimate slot receiver as opposed to being a gimmick guy?) – “I think that anytime you get a player, you hope that they are going to develop into something unique for your football team. That takes on different roles, whether it’s doing some specialty things or playing a bunch of snaps at one positon or the slot position. Malcolm has come a long way. He didn’t play receiver; he’d been a quarterback. He’s really tried to work to become a better receiver. He’s still learning. Lynn’s the same way. Lynn is a gifted talented athlete, and he’s showed that in college and we’ve seen flashes of it here, and hopefully he’ll continue to develop the way we think he can. Both of them have some unique talents to themselves and we’ll see if we can develop them and make them be an integral part of our offense. What direction it’s going to go in right now, I don’t think anybody knows.”
(I wanted to ask you about your offense’s flexibility with different guys playing multiple snaps every week. You have so many guys whether it’s RB/WR Malcolm Perry, who was mentioned there, some of the tight ends playing, RB Salvon Ahmed. Have you been impressed or surprised by how flexible this team is with this next-man-up mentality? Does it surprise you at all with how much success they’ve had with different guys playing so many snaps?) – “I think college programs are really good now. I think guys come to us in a very good frame of mind, and they are able to go out and play. We shouldn’t have them on the team if we don’t think they can play. I think the next-man-up mentality is exactly what we have, and we’ve been fortunate to have. These guys are very strong mentally and they want to play. They are eager and when they get the opportunity, they try to take advantage of it. Am I surprised? No, I’m not really surprised. I think that’s the way a guy should be. I think all players should be that way.”
(We figured you and QB Ryan Fitzpatrick would have some chemistry because of your time together. It looks like you and QB Tua Tagovailoa have started to have some rhythm too. Where would you say you and him are as far as your comfort in what each person wants out of the offense?) – “You’d have to ask him on his part; but from my part, he’s getting better every week and doing what we hoped he would do. He’s taking care of the football, being very smart about that. He’s making plays. Is he missing some things? Yeah, he’s missing some things; but that will come with experience, that will come with time. We just have to continue to help him grow and hopefully he learns and as he continues to learn, I think it slowed down. I’ve made that statement a bunch of times, I know; but I think it’s slowed down for him each week. The more he plays, hopefully the better he gets and the more comfortable he’ll feel.”
(Can you, as an offensive coach, coach accuracy and anticipation to a quarterback?) – “It’s hard to coach accuracy. You can teach anticipation a little bit; but they’ve got to believe it. If a guy doesn’t believe it, it’s very difficult. It’s hard to coach accuracy. I can’t get a guy more accurate than he is. I think we can help him on the anticipation part.”
(With RB Salvon Ahmed, we got to see him in his first start this week. What about his skillset allowed him to be as successful as he was early on?) – “I think he has very good instincts as a runner. He can see a crease and then he’s got the ability, once he sees a crease, to go make something happen. We had a couple of long runs by him – two or three this week. I shouldn’t say long runs. Unfortunately they’ve been long by our standards this year. We’ve got some good execution there from him seeing things, understanding where his cuts are probably going to be. That doesn’t mean that they’ll always be there – that’s where the instincts come in – and then the ability to explode. He’s got that ability. He’s got that explosive ability. He’s taking care of the football. If he wasn’t taking care of the football, it would be a tough deal.”
(The last time the Dolphins were 6-3, do you know of the offensive coordinator was?) – “No.”
(It was Chan Gailey in 2001 – 19 years ago. That was QB Jay Fiedler and WR Chris Chambers and QB Ray Lucas and RB Lamar Smith and RB Travis Minor. It just interests me. It was so long ago. What do you remember about that group and how you’ve changed and how the locker room’s changed and how football has changed in all of that time?) – “That was a strong, tough – I mean they were tough football players. Really tough football players. But you had to be. It was more of a ‘let’s run it down your throat’ mentality then. Now it’s ‘let’s spread it out and throw it around the park.’ That group, they were really a strong, tough football team. We could run it. We had a tight end that played – I can’t remember his name (Hunter Goodwin) – but he was a tackle at Texas A&M and he was playing tight end for us. We just ran the football. Jay did a great job and Chris had a good year that year. It was a fun year. Those two years were fun years.”
(Looking at this roster up and down, it would appear that you guys would be weaker at running back and weaker at receiver without WR Preston Williams. But you guys have been able to run off five straight wins because of the help of the defense and special teams as well. Offensively, what is it a factor of that you guys are having success? Is it QB Tua Tagovailoa not turning the ball over? Is it the next-man-up mentality like you talked about earlier? What’s really working for this offense that you guys are done some bodies at some important positions?) – “I think we have guys who understand the system and what we’re trying to get done. I think they have realized the importance of being where you’re supposed to be and when you’re supposed to be there, and doing what you’re supposed to do. They take what coach says about, ‘let’s pay attention to details,’ and I think they’ve done that. The thing about it is we’ve had some success – not a ton, but we’ve had some success. But we can get better and we need to get better. I’m looking forward to seeing what we can be, not what we are at this present time.”
(QB Tua Tagovailoa is a year past his hip injury. My question is this, why is his mindset the perfect guy to not only recover from that, but now immediately play at a pretty high level – at least to our eyes. What is it personally that makes that click?) – “I think he is a glass-half-full guy. Everything is going to work out, everything is going to get better, everything is going to be just fine, let’s keep doing what we do. If the trainer says hop on your right foot 20 times, he hops on his right foot 20 times even if you’re not looking. He will do all of the little things to get where he needs to be. He has no reservations about any of that. He enjoys it. He enjoys the challenge.”
