Frank Smith – December 14, 2023
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Thursday, December 14, 2023
Offensive Coordinator Frank Smith
(I guess I’ll start it off the question everyone is wondering. How are you guys handling the center situation? Obviously OL Liam Eichenberg is dealing with an injury, but with the two new guys that you’ve brought in, is there a possibility or a strong likelihood that one of them could be starting on Sunday?) – “As we’re working through it, we just have to have a plan for all the potential situations that occur. Just making sure that when we bring guys on, that guys fit what we’re trying to do. Basically when you come off a short week, you get home and it’s Tuesday. The whole part about this week is getting everyone back – players physically ready, mentally ready, coaches mentally ready. It’s such a quick turnaround for your next opponent so as we’re working through all positions on this week, the key would be just making sure that whoever is available to help us win, that we’re putting everyone in the best situation possible.”
(What is your confidence level in OL Lester Cotton snapping the ball if he has to?) – “You look at in the spring when Connor (Williams) was out, it forced us into working contingency plans and that’s the best part about spring, and it kind of even took us down a whole other level of cross-training guys and making sure that we had ‘hey, get him here, get him here’ so as far as Lester’s ability to snap the ball and play, him at guard, him at center; the versatility of the group is something that is a strength. I know Butch (Barry) and ‘Lem’ (Lemuel Jeanpierre) make sure every day we’re always getting guys different things. So I think when it comes to Lester and all the guys, we feel the most confidence because also it’s not them by themselves. It’s all of us together and us as coaches making sure that everyone who plays is in the best position possible to succeed.”
(How do you prep the game plan with maybe only one starter available to you on the offensive line?) – “There are many variables like unfortunately this is not my first time going through this. It flashes me back to sometimes the other places I’ve been when you don’t have certainty and you’re working through the week and you’re working through the variables and anticipation of things. So when we’re looking at stuff, it’s not like it’s different, but it’s more of how we communicate about what we’re doing and we’re making sure that whatever we do is able to be versatile if we have to go through multiple scenarios. But ultimately, we look at the defense, we attack the defense for what we think it is and use our guys as best we can to attack the parts of the defense.”
(When going through that, are you of the ideology of having as few moving parts as possible or do you have to sort of prioritize you have to be good at center first and then figure other things out?) – “You can go ‘if this, then that’ and you have your plans for personnel variabilities, but you can’t – we factor in things, but it’s not like you’re just drastically going to shift everything you do. But it’s like you’re very conscious of the different elements that could be in play and we just try and make sure that like every week, we’re always trying to make sure we put the best plan together for our guys to be successful and that’s our driving force, is we look at defenses and attack them.”
(What’s your confidence level in two of your more explosive players – WR Tyreek Hill and RB De’Von Achane – being out on the field on Sunday and being effective out on the field?) – “For our guys to play on any game day, it’s the communication that they have with the training staff, coaches, everyone involved and making sure guys are ready to play. When we put the guys forward to play on any game day, we feel confident that they’re going to be able to execute and play the level that they feel comfortable with because it’s December in the NFL. If you feel completely great, then you probably haven’t done anything. Same thing for coaches. Like if I said I felt fresh and spry like I did in July, then I’m definitely full of it. But it’s that process of as you go through it and you just know, ‘what do I need to do to be at my best and perform to help my teammates and fulfill what we’re trying to do as a team?’ And everyone that plays on Sunday goes through their process and we feel good about it.”
(At the risk of sounding ridiculous, what changes when WR Tyreek Hill is not on the field for your offense?) – “That’s why we have all the guys that do what we do. It’s kind of like for me, I go, ‘well, this is why we practice the way we do in the offseason,’ where when you guys see different guys in there running routes with Tua, you see different guys – Tyreek running routes with Mike White and Skylar (Thompson). We do all this intentionally to make sure that we have cohesion and guys we’re developing that chemistry throughout the entire offseason because in-season, you just have to work different possibilities and we’re counting on our guys to be in the right spots at the right time and do the right things, and that’s where we as coaches help them through the plan and all that. We adjust throughout any game plan so when guys are in, guys are out, not every guy on the team –they come in and out. Like ‘Cheetah’ (Tyreek Hill) doesn’t play every play. We make sure we have plans for all that.”
(When a top offense is slowed down, people will say that’s the blueprint to stop that offense. I’m curious the converse of that. If you guys don’t play up to your usual production, is there value in that tape of how somebody else is able to slow you guys down based upon your average game?) – “When you go through history – this is me going full nerd – how many people go through – you learn from your failures. You learn more from areas where you can go, ‘oh, and this is why.’ So I always go to the story of Abraham Lincoln. There’s that quote with Michael Jordan about how many shots he missed and everything. We all remember one side, but he remembers the other. Whenever you have adversity, you can either run from it, hide from it, or you embrace it, learn from it, grow from it, become stronger from it. I think so many guys on this football team, that’s kind of who they were and how they got here. I think a lot of us when we go through games where we had our expectations not met, it’s time to go back to work. That hunger and that fire as a competitor, I mean for me, I know how I feel. I’m excited for every day, including today, as I know everyone else is in the building.”
(One more thing on the center. For a position that is demanding physically and mentally, having to make many ID’s, is it realistic, even for veterans as experienced as OL Jonotthan Harrison and OL Matt Skura, who haven’t played in a game this year, to come into a building mid-week and be able to, if needed, start at center with all that’s required? Is that realistic do you think?) – “I mean, we have to plan for all contingencies just in case what occurs. I think when we go through guys who are acquired and what’s going to happen on that weekend, it’s going to take a collective process to make sure everyone’s ready to execute, if necessary. They’re not on their own to learn everything on their own. It’s on us as a staff to make sure we’re communicating what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, on players collectively to have inclusion and making sure that they’re catching everyone up to speed. That’s when you have strong teams. Guys really work together and communicate together. But is it unheard of? No, it’s not unheard of. I remember I was in Chicago in 2016 and it was last cuts and we signed Logan Paulsen. He showed up on Monday and started that Sunday. He had no idea when he walked in what any one of our words meant. So that was actually very impressive. It’s a measure of being in the NFL, being a professional football player. If it’s easy and anyone can do it, that’s not really what this business is. It’s tough.”
(In the five sacks, where there any common themes? Coverage sacks, pressure up the middle, pressure off the edges, anything?) – “There’s variable of stuff. Like we were talking about, this tape is tough to watch because you expected to have something different to happen. But for where we want to go, for our goals, this was a good game for us to learn in many areas. We’re just ultimately looking forward to getting back to work and finishing the day, get tomorrow, and then get ready for Sunday because the greatest thing we can do is get back and play some more football.”
(On the snap, cause for concern? Or a one-off? What are your thoughts on that?) – “I mean, it’s clearly unfortunate. But it’s a thing that we’re aware of and there’s nothing that we’re sitting here going to express great concern over it. We understand what occurred. We know how to fix it. And we’re going to work the process together.”
(This offense, a lot of it is so predicated on the speed and your ability to stretch them vertically and horizontally. Does that change at all when WR Tyreek Hill is out of the game?) – “I mean, no. I think the basis of all offenses should be that. A lot of people don’t adhere to it. I think that’s where we try to make sure whoever’s in the game, we have a certain width of the field and length of the field that if you don’t make them defend it, compression, compression, compression; and that’s what they want. Defenses want you to play small, play in a close space. And our job as an offense is to challenge the space and make them defend it all. However we do it, with all the people we have at our disposable, that’s what our job is every week, to make sure all the guys on the field are executing concepts that do stretch defenses and challenge them to create space for us to maximize the space and score. So I think ultimately, a lot of times when you look at other teams that don’t move as much as us and do those things, they have different philosophical ways that they believe in attacking. I think we look to attack a defense in a certain way. However our personnel changes, our job is to adjust, but ultimately, all of our plan is derived from who are they? What do they do? And how do we use our pieces to challenge them and put them in conflict?
(Where is WR Chase Claypool in terms of his digestion of the offense and the motions? I know Head Coach Mike McDaniel has talked about there’s a Claypool package, but is he well-versed in the entire offense now?) – “Yeah, I mean in practice, we have our packages of plays, and we go through them. It’s just what is the nature of the game and how is it going? Sometimes we reflect after we’re done and say, ‘Hey, maybe we should have gotten to these plays,’ or ‘Maybe we called too many of them.’ There’s stuff that we have to reflect on as coaches after the game and making sure that we’re putting guys in the right position. He’s doing a great job. I really enjoy talking to him. He’s got really just a great perspective of life and he’s really hungry to learn and get better every day. Because I mean ultimately, you want to surround yourself with likeminded people whose drive to be their best is just a daily, every day, and you can feel that out of him. So we just keep working every day, and his number is going to be called at some point, like everyone’s is. I’m sure he’ll be ready when that time comes.”
(What stood out to you about what the Jets did last week against QB CJ Stroud and the Texans?) – “Overall defensively, they have a very together system. You can tell they communicate very well, they play together well. They’re physical. There’s a lot of challenges they’re going to present. Whenever you have to travel on the road in the NFL, every game is tough. When you look at the challenges that they gave Houston, those are obviously challenges defensively that we’ll have to handle. I don’t really – it’s not like it’s one thing. Every game is just so many different components that are little things that can add up over time, so for us to be able to come out on Sunday and do what we want to do, it’s not really about whatever they’re doing, it’s about us and making sure we’re on our plan and on our communication so we can execute together.”
(How does preparation change when you just saw this team three or four games ago and they’ve only played two games in between your two meetings with them?) – “Well first, it feels like, ‘Wait, it was three weeks ago? It feels like a month ago or two months ago.’ It’s just funny how time, just you’re in a vortex and next thing you know, you’re like, ‘Oh yeah, I guess that was Black Friday.’ But as far as our preparation, it gives you – you can reflect on what you did and why you did it, and then you can learn from that, the positives and the negatives. It just helps you in your next evolution of how to attack an opponent. Yeah, it helps, but there’s no guarantee to anything. So we’ll just make sure that we’re on what we need to do for Sunday and make sure we’re communicating and playing well together.”
(Your touchdowns came as a result of special teams and defensive turnovers, which was advantageous of the offense. Is that frustrating for you not to get in the end zone? Was Tennessee doing stuff? Did you guys limit yourselves? How do you view that?) – “It’s a combination of things, but you’ve got to give credit to them for making it a challenging day for us. But at the same time, we need to look at ourselves and make sure we’re operating the way we believe we’re capable of operating. Whenever we have setbacks or things don’t go our way, it’s why did it occur and how do we improve from it? I mean there’s a lot of things that we’re going to grow from that, because like we were talking about it earlier, if you can run and hide and you push it anywhere else, it’s like, no, absorb the reality of what occurred, handle it appropriately, communicate why, don’t shift – it’s just the hallmark of why it’s a joy to work here, because you have an entire building of accountable people who after failure occurs, everyone is going like (raises hand). Everyone everyone is accountable to each other, that’s how you can improve and we can get better, because you don’t hide from adversity. You embrace it and learn and grow. That’s the great part about December. We can get better together.”
