Josh Rosen – August 20, 2019
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Tuesday, August 20, 2019
QB Josh Rosen
(Have you been given any update by Offensive Coordinator Chad O’Shea and Head Coach Brian Flores about where things stand with the competition whether you feel like you’re still very much in the race?) – “No. They just tell me to run plays and I run them.”
(Do you have any sense of where you stand obviously knowing that QB Ryan Fitzpatrick – Head Coach Brian Flores told us – is likely to be starting Thursday?) – “I don’t know. It’s not my job. I’m trying to be the best quarterback that I can be and it’s up to them to decide where that goes.”
(How have you been running those plays?) – “Better. Better every day. That’s the goal.”
(What’s one thing that you think you’ve done better?) – “Just command of the huddle. I think my Mike (linebacker) points, understanding. I think I’m getting more fluid and more efficient with everything.”
(Do you feel like if there was – a hypothetical, another two, three, four weeks of preseason you might be all the way there? Is that something is it just a matter of time for you because you got the late start?) – “I don’t want to really deal in hypotheticals; but yeah, the more time, the more reps you get, the better you’ll get with anything – the more you get to do it. Whether we had 100 preseason games or one, the next day will hopefully be better than the previous and that’ll lead to improvement.”
(Head Coach Brian Flores mentioned Patriots QB Tom Brady and Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes among the guys who benefited from watching and learning and not necessarily being on the field. How can you compare and contrast learning on the field experience versus when you can actually capitalize on from watching from the sideline?) – “I don’t know. I think that it’s really just trying to learn from any opportunity that you can. I’m still on the field taking reps in practice, it’s just not in a game. Everything is pretty much the same versus not getting hit. A lot of things aren’t the same – I don’t want to take that out of context. I sat for a couple games in Arizona, but I haven’t really sat much in my career, so there are opportunities to learn from whether you just took a sack and you’re on your back or whether you just threw a touchdown or you’re sitting on the bench with an ear piece dialed into every single play. Tomorrow will be a new day and we’ll see what comes. With regards to what happens, I don’t know what you’re going to get out of me. I got nothing to give you. It’s sort of all out of my control. I’m just trying to, like I said, make today better than yesterday.”
(Head Coach Brian Flores said that when players have to sit down behind a starter they gain a hunger to play, they feel more privileged to play and they understand how important the opportunity is when they do get a chance to play. Where is your hunger level? How much do you want to play? How much do you want to start and perform for this team?) – “I don’t need any additional drive or hunger. I’ve got plenty chips on my shoulder. I’m just trying to be the best player that I can be. I’ve sort of reshaped my focus and how I approach the game a lot, basically since the end of last year. I’ve tried to reign in the focus more on me and what I do every day and how I can help the team and becoming the best quarterback that I can be. Because a lot of the, ‘This guy played right away. This guy sat. This guy won a Super Bowl. This guy didn’t. This guy busted,’ it’s sort of extra information that I don’t really need in my life right now. Really, my goal is to perform the best that I can this preseason game and the next game perform the best that I can that preseason game, let the cards fall as they may and let the important people make the decisions that they have to.”
(Did someone suggest that to you or is that something you came up with on your own?) – “I’ve always been told since I’ve been a young kid – I don’t know if it’s a cliché or whatever – but control what you can control. I just insert a lot of the … that was going around, grab that from my memory and clung to it and I’m going to control what I can control.”
(It’s got to be a crazy six years for you from the time you were recruited, you got to UCLA, first-year starter and all that. Did you have to recalibrate how you approach the game after all that – chaos isn’t the right word?) – “Yeah. That’s what I’m saying. That changed – I didn’t change how I approached the game. I changed how I approached my day-to-day and tried to focus more day-to-day, day-by-day, as opposed to month-to-month, year-to-year. I think you can get caught up in not worrying enough about the little things if you’re constantly looking so far ahead, and it’s worked very well for me so far. I think I’ve made some pretty good progress since I’ve gotten here and I’m going to continue to progress and once coach thinks that I’m good enough to go, I’ll be ready to go.
(Are there certain techniques you’ve used or continued to use that help you refocus and stay centered on the micro rather than the macro?) – “There’s kind of temptation. Just resist it once you’re – I wouldn’t say it’s temptation. I don’t know. Just discipline. The second you feel your mind wandering a little bit, you’re like, ’I’m watching this film. I’m doing this set of plays,’ and whatnot and to not – You’re always going to hear noise. It’s almost impossible to not hear noise in today’s generation. If you’re not online, your family is and they’ll give you a call and slip it in there on accident or something. A lot of if it is just discipline to stay on the straight and steady and keep working.”
(How close do you feel to being ready to be an effective NFL starter?) – “Effective? I think I’d be effective right now. I think I was – in Arizona, understand the situation, we got three wins that we didn’t have while we were there, so I think I’m effective to a degree. It’s just about getting more effective.”
(What are you looking for Thursday to make this competition harder for the coaches to make that decision?) – “I think that’s – I’m not focusing on the competition at all. Anything ‘Fitz’ (Ryan Fitzpatrick) does well, I’m trying figure out why he did it well and how I can replicate that because we will run the same plays inevitably. Anything that he does poorly, I try to find out why he did it poorly. He’s humble and generous enough to help me out as to why that went well or why it didn’t do well. I’m trying to go out and execute my next play the best that I can. I obviously care about playing and all this; but in terms of where I stand, I really couldn’t care less about the whole competition. I’m really just trying to be the best that I can be. ‘Fitz’ is trying to be the best that he can be. We’re trying to help each other. A rising tide raises all ships, so either one of us that proves worthy to rise the tide the most I guess will be the guy. It’s about becoming the best quarterback that you can be. It’s not about one-upping the guy next to you, because that defeats the purpose of being a teammate in the first place.”
(What do you use are your own barometer? You said you feel like you can be an effective quarterback now. What do you say, “Okay I can be an uber-effective quarterback. I feel like I can be an elite quarterback.” How do you measure that?) – “Mental errors. On a per-practice basis, mental errors, physical errors and the overall general feel of practice and how effective our team periods were, move the ball, 2-minute (drills). And then on a plus-minus basis, how many mental errors I had, how many physical errors I had, and try to make those as small as possible. As your reps go up, you have more opportunities to mess it up. (laughter) So as reps go up, try to keep those MEs (mental errors) and physical errors down.”
(Do certain mental errors weigh more than others? Obviously we see interceptions, but is there something you look at, “That’s the ultimate mental error I want to avoid?”) – “Yeah. I mean it’s tough for you guys as journalists and all that to grade – you guys were all ripping our offensive line and stuff, but I had a couple of those mistakes by miss Mike’ing things and not throwing the right hot (routes) and stuff like that. It’s a tough job for you guys, because you weren’t really raised or taught about the Xs and Os in such detail. There’s a whole understory to the understory to the understory on why all things went wrong. It could be as simple as this sounded like this, he stepped with the wrong foot and I did this. It’s on everyone. There are MEs that look like someone else’s physical errors but were actually my mine. So there’s a lot going on.”
(How many sacks are you taking responsibility for specifically in the last game?) – “I’d probably give you a better answer right after the game. I couldn’t tell you right now.”
