Mike McDaniel – December 7, 2023
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Thursday, December 7, 2023
Head Coach Mike McDaniel
(OL Rob Hunt and S Jevon Holland. Rob Hunt, are you putting him on ice and just resting him this week because of the hamstring? Will he do anything in practice this week? And with Holland, is he ready to go full, in practice as opposed to limited with the knees?) – “Do you put people on ice for the Super Bowl? Every game you play is the most important to us. We’re working through stuff. We were trying to avoid what ultimately happened. I think the training staff and Rob did a tremendous job trying to be proactive. We’ll operate with caution but not – we’ll hopefully take those lessons as learned and not as much as, okay, now we have to wait two weeks until after he wants to play. So we’re just going to progress and take that day-by-day. Jevon, you’re talking about one of the better players at his position relative to the whole league. He’s very important to our team. Fortunately, we have some very good players across the board. In the NFL season, your depth is challenged, so we’ll do right by him. He’s eager, but he’s also one of the wisest – I mean, I was probably 10 percent as wise as he is at, what is he 23? He understands where we’re coming from and he’s looking forward to getting back out there. But we won’t mortgage the rest of the season to risk it. It’s all about risk-reward. There’s certain times with injuries that it’s kind of a roll of the dice if resting or playing is worse. You can’t really judge that. Then there’s certain times that you’re like, wow, this is pretty risky. If it’s risky, we’ll just keep tabs on that. There’s a lot of people doing that, so it won’t just be my eyes.”
(When you first got here last season, what was your impression of OL Austin Jackson that made you think this is not a bust and this is a guy who still needs cultivating and can be a prominent part of our team moving forward?) – “First, sitting in my office, I can remember it like it was yesterday. All I took from my interaction with him is a very ambitious, goal-oriented, driven professional athlete. Then I kind of try to put myself in people’s shoes, and it’s never going to draw tears of sorrow, but I think it’s a shame that people overlook – it’s great to be picked in the first round as a 20-year-old. Awesome. There’s also a lot of burden with that. In that, every person that gets drafted every year in the first round, I know one thing they don’t want to be. Everybody wants to be their best. So then you look at the film and you match it with the person that you’re meeting. I think it’s important to treat every individual with full trust, because I’m tough enough if they break trust. You treat them with full trust and give them the opportunity. Don’t harbor past things against people that have nothing to do with those things. To me, this guy is playing multiple positions and he started doing it before he legally could drink alcohol. That’s a ton of weight, and then you have a lot of people talking. Heavy is the crown as they say. You just have a lot of people interjecting on what you are. I don’t know about you guys, but were you a finished product at 20 years old? A 20-year-old Coach McDaniel, you should take the reins away from me as the head coach because I’m not ready for that. I was more meeting him, understanding where his motivation was and the yearning just to be coached. Who am I to put a ceiling on that or to say, he is this, that or the other? You keep an open mind and let people take it upon themselves to dictate what the narrative is or what they can be. I think this year in particular, he had a strong offseason. We felt good about him in 2022. You have an injury right when you’re feeling like, hey, I can prove a lot of these people wrong. Then you’ve just got to sit and listen more. What you’re seeing now is, it is the reason why you do it. to see those type of journeys. It’s much like the ones we talk about with Tua all the time. There’s plenty other journeys like that. It’s really awesome to see someone take the reins of deciding who they are, and not listening to other people along the way. I think it’s very, very hard to do. Unfortunately, this room of impeccable character aren’t the only voices out there. Now, the journey of a professional athlete is insane because you have millions of reporters. It’s hard. So to see him flourish in that, to see the job that he’s done, and what’s awesome is that whole room feels a part of that. It’s awesome for me to say, ‘I believe in you, Austin.’ But when, and this is just my opinion, when he really believed it was probably after the second week of Phase 2 in 2022. Terron Armstead, a guy that has done it at the highest level for literally half of his life, saying ‘no, dude, you can be different.’ That’s what you’re feeling amongst the team is there’s a bunch of shared journeys. A lot of people feel a part of that. A lot of people are proud of that. He’s probably got the least exuberance of everybody today about it, because that’s not how he got it. He’s thinking about Wednesday, technique, fundamentals, assignments, Tennessee Titans. You’re really happy for people to earn everything they’re getting. It’s not his fault that he was 20 years old and has a lot of athleticism. But he hasn’t made that a crutch or he hasn’t lived in woe is me. He’s taken the reins and I think that is something that epitomizes what I think this sport is supposed to be about.”
(For the organization, does it feel like a big offseason checklist item that got done now before the offseason?) – “Yes. You’re defining your team real-time by those type of investments and if you want people to come to work every day and decide their own level of happiness because of their accountability to themselves and their teammates and a complete devotion to what their responsibility is, then you should reward that. You wish there wasn’t a salary cap and there’s a lot of guys in the locker room, that’s what’s really cool about what’s going on – there’s a lot of guys that have – it’s hard to be an NFL player and not have in the back of your mind like us all, ‘I need to earn a living at my dream.’ But with the way business works and how important these investments are and the way negotiations go, they don’t all happen at once and I haven’t felt a single person feel anything but just complete satisfaction, pride. Just pumped up, because I’ve seen it every day. This is a guy that fully commits, that decided on his own to be all in, to believe in everything that we’re doing here and then to believe in (Offensive Line Coach) Butch (Berry) and (Assistant Offensive Line Coach) ‘Lem’ (Lemuel Jeanpierre) and (Offensive Assistant) Mike Judge and it’s cool when people are teammates, the coaches give them the right information, give them the tools; and he takes those tools and helps him fulfill his dream.”
(What have you learned about Titans QB Will Levis in the time he’s been on the field this year?) – “He can throw the ball far and they like to do a lot of it. I think they have currently – the Titans offense – little-known fact, I think they lead the league in plus-20 yard throws, 22 percent of their passes, I believe – you can check me on that, because I’m pretty sure it’s right (laughter) – are of that depth, so they challenge you. It’s cool to watch a guy come into a team with other players that are very much capable and what I’ve learned from afar is that it’s not about him. He was just chopping wood, but you can learn a lot by just watching and listening. And you watch how guys play with him on the field and you can tell he’s earned the respect of veteran players. And you either have that or you don’t. As a quarterback, there’s nowhere to hide. So it’s cool to watch him progress and I think he is capable of making, I think pretty much every throw. They have some guys that can really catch the ball that you’ve probably heard of and teams – we can attest as we’ve had plenty of times that we’re going through some adversity, but you can tell by the way that the Tennessee Titans play in terms of how hard they play and their passion, that it’s just a matter of time that team is at the top of the division with Coach Vrabel. So to be to be a part of that team and to own the respect of his teammates, I think says everything.”
(He’s been under the radar, but how do you think CB Xavien Howard has played this season?) – “Phenomenal. There’s a play in particular, that I would argue is – and you guys know how difficult of a catch I thought Tyreek Hill’s Willie Mays was, right – equally as impressive and probably as rare was – I can’t even remember what quarter, I have too much Tennessee Titan in my brain – but there was a zero blitz and he had a long ball. He was in zero bump and he turned, saw the ball and then timed up at the point of attack the PBU. I think that play is absolutely incredible. It didn’t go viral like Tyreek’s did, but you learn a lot about – like I’ve learned a lot about ‘X’ (Xavien Howard) this year. You learn about what’s important to him. It has probably gone under the radar to the to the public and just the narrative, but it sure hasn’t gone under the radar to the team and his teammates. He’s taken his game to another level and he’s really enjoying it. You just learn about people on the fly, new circumstances, new situations. You don’t know how it’s going to play out. You believe that he’ll embrace a fellow Pro Bowl-caliber player and a new defense and all that stuff, but watching it happen, ‘X’ is everything you want. He wants to win. That’s all he cares about doing. He’s very prideful in doing his job for his teammates. But it’s not about him. So it’s been really cool. I think he’s a captain for a reason and I know for as long as he wants to play, his teammates will continue to vote. It’s been really cool to be a part of. Those guys push each other every day, which makes practice awesome, which is good because it’s the most important thing of our lives.”
(You mentioned last week in practice with QB Tua Tagovailoa, you brought up Michael Jordan, Kobe and Tiger – it was on TV – you mentioned channeling emotional energy and how he could that. How much have you looked into those specific athletes and is there a reason you brought those guys up to Tua?) – “Super creepy that everybody knows personal conversations, but not your fault. (laughter) When I grew up, the most impactful player, one of the most impactful people in my life is Michael Jordan. I was born in ’83. One of my first sports memories viewing was one of those postseason matchups. I think it maybe was ’88. I can’t remember. But it was against the Lakers and so sports start with him as the pinnacle of performance and then my entire maturation process from boy to grown man like you see today, he continues to do things that other people can’t. So you pay attention to stuff and I’ve seen him have a 5-for-20 something shooting game, and then in the fourth quarter with everything on the line, without blinking, he takes a shot again. That from a young age really impacted me. So I have paid attention to those specific players and there’s a commonality with all of these high-performance athletes that I think is overly obvious now where everybody wants to do well, and everyone has things every day that they’re not happy with. And so that, how you handle that is everything. It’s not about how much you succeed; it’s about the invariable failure that will happen, what do you do with that? Because there is going to be emotion, especially when you care. And the point is not failing. The point is taking that and making that failure a triumph. So I love seeing that in practice. I get fired up when a bad play happens immediately only because that’s something – I can go down the line. You guys know my story. There’s a ton of stuff that if you’re thinking through my life in that moment, there’s a lot of things that have happened that at the moment seemed catastrophic but then you look back on it and it’s like, ‘wow, that was the best thing that ever happened.’ That applies to everyone. It’s not just professional athletes. It’s just one of the little life hacks that I think if you can really focus on, you get over the fact of – like listen, no one expects to be infallible so then why commit to that? And I’m seeing Tua in an incredible fashion. You want to talk about a coachable person, these are like, philosophical psychological things you’re talking about. It’s one thing to hear it, but in the course of a year and a half, I was really fired up because he captured it. It was the right balance of ‘I’m frustrated’ but he wasn’t overthinking what had happened that caused him the frustration. He was locked in on the moment and that’s what you have to be. That’s never going away.”
(Are you still surprised when teams play man, single-coverage against WR Tyreek Hill?) – “There’s a lot of different philosophies and man coverage gives you a lot of advantageous situations with regard to the rest of the team, where you have a firmer-fitting front for the run and there’s a lot of people that look at it like, ‘well, you have to have the right play called to make you pay.’ I’m never surprised. We see man every game, but I think there’s – I’m more surprised when they’re not hedging their bet to protect themselves sometimes, but that’s just football. It’s 11 people on the field. Man coverage gives you a lot of versatility as a defense. Guys will try to play it as best they can. We wouldn’t be talking about that if Tua hadn’t been locked in all week with Coach (Darrell) Bevell and recognized the situation and then their non-verbal communication, if they weren’t on the same page. It’s hard to do, so it’s not like – every team will try to play in man coverage as competitors. I know Tua and Tyreek know that as well, so they’re looking for those opportunities to make people pay for it and if you think by any stretch I’m trying to dissuade people from playing man, I mean, yards are hard. Running with the ball in your hands, he’s really fast, it’s a lot easier on a lot of people. Every game we have to prove that we can beat man coverage. That’s the way you have to look at it and I think we’ll see those opportunities each and every week at least once in a while based on the situation, and that’s why Tua and Tyreek wake up every morning to go work together. It is because they know each and every week they’ll have their opportunity to make plays.”
