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Danny Crossman – October 12, 2023 Download PDF version

Thursday, October 12, 2023

Special Teams Coordinator Danny Crossman

(How much can you tell us about P Jake Bailey kicking off, when and why?) – “There’s a lot of things that go into it. But in our opinion, we have a talented player who’s been a kickoff guy his whole career. He’s got great skills in being able to handle that job. With him and Jason (Sanders), they both have very strong legs. They both have the ability to do a lot of things. I think we’d be silly if we didn’t have the ability to use both of them.”

(I have kind of a multifaceted question, and this is based off my own observations from years of watching punting versus watching P Jake Bailey. I’ve always thought that punters got that plant foot off the ground after they kicked it. He doesn’t really do that. Do you get involved in the mechanics of a kicker at all or do you let them kind of do what they want to do?) – “We get involved, but we don’t change the structure of what he’s doing. That’s the way he’s always been. He’s got the flexibility of – he’s been blessed that that’s part of how his body mechanism works. So that kind of stuff we’re never going to tinker with.”

(When the team makes a trade, an in-season trade like the team just did for WR Chase Claypool, do you go back and look at maybe some prior film to see what he can do on special teams? And how do you maybe see him fitting in with this unit?) – “Anytime we add anybody, you go back to look at all your write-ups of him starting with coming out of college and then all the write-ups of him when you might have played them or did offseason studies from people around the league, comparison studies for the draft. So there’s a lot of stuff that goes into it. A player like Chase (Claypool) that has a history, you usually have a pretty good notebook on that guy. Then it’s a matter of trying to figure out where and how he may be able to help us. Then that goes into the whole operation of the roster and actives and inactives. We’ll find roles for him if he’s available, because he’s a talented individual. We’re very happy to have him.”

(Sticking with players named Chase, how vital is DE Chase Winovich to your special teams unit?) – “Chase (Winovich) has done a good job. He’s been very important to us. He’s played very well in the games that we were able to get him up. Again, another guy that has great flexibility and more importantly, has a great history. When we were able to add him to the practice squad, you’re able to go back and look at him playing in New England, playing in Cleveland, doing a lot of different roles. So you had a pretty good feel on being able to use him and what roles you could use him on.”

(Was DE Chase Winovich actually that 11th, thought to be 12th, but actually 11th guy?) – “He was the guy that came off the field.”

(What was going on on that play? What was the miscommunication?) – “There was no miscommunication. There was just a little bit of a mental hiccup. Fortunately, it wasn’t a situation that cost us. We were in the right grouping, just some guys might have thought something different. But yeah, no issues. Those are the things you can’t have wrong. You can’t have substitution errors.”

(Head Coach Mike McDaniel did credit you for kind of being on it and playing that out. I was wondering how that works? Is it like in the headset, you’re like “Hey, no. We actually…”) – “That was a situation where the entrance and exit numbers were correct. We knew we had 11 so when he came off the field, I knew we didn’t have 12. It wasn’t we had 12 and somebody didn’t get off the field. We had 11 to start, so him coming off the field, he was the 11th player. We were down to 10, so there really wasn’t any gray area.”

(You were right next to Head Coach Mike McDaniel. Were you able to point it out pretty quickly?) – “Yeah, because of course as the head coach, he wants to know what just happened where we possibly gave up a first down with them not having to do anything.”

(Did you insist that Head Coach Mike McDaniel throw the challenge flag?) – “I encouraged him and basically, he asked the question of, ‘Should I, or shouldn’t I?’ Basically the communication between he and I, we came to the conclusion that it was worth the challenge.”

(Does that mean you’re 1-for-1 in career challenges?) – “It has nothing to do – I don’t throw the flag.”

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