Mike McDaniel – November 28, 2024 (Postgame)
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Thursday, November 28, 2024
Postgame – at Green Bay Packers
Miami Dolphins Head Coach Mike McDaniel
(On the narrative of playing poorly in cold weather.) – “That’s the thing with narratives. There’s one way to change them and so my expectation would be those who, the naysayers, you prove them right, they’ll be louder. That’s part of the territory. You carry that until you do something about it, and unfortunately, we didn’t tonight.”
(On what went wrong on defense.) – “I’ll have to have a calculated answer for that. I’ll have to refer to the tape. From my eyewitness accounts, it’s an accumulation. Partial is that you have to give the Packers credit. That’s kind of their game. They put guys in space and force you to tackle them. That’s part the missed tackle players, part pursuit. Collective defense against talented space players. You need to stop the ball or force the guy to redirect and then you have to have a teammate come to your aid. Generally, from what I saw, it was a collection of things. I think that there were some positive parts to how they played, but I know that there’s going to be some frustrated individuals when they watch the tape because of that.”
(On how much of tonight’s lack of success is attributed to the cold.) – “I think, the weather and the cold, I didn’t really see that as much of a factor as it was playing football and technique and fundamentals of bringing our feet collectively and getting our hips into tackles and wrapping up. I think the biggest thing is that on a Thursday night game in a short week, you have to be clean, and we weren’t. They were a lot cleaner in terms of penalties. In terms of just our style of play. How complimentary we were specifically in the last game, we were not that tonight and I thought they made us pay. For instance, the first drive, you’re three and out to get the ball back, and that special teams turnover equaled seven points. A turnover on downs on the one-yard line equaled seven points. That’s 14 points in a 13-point game.”
(On what happened with WR Malik Washington on the muffed punt.) – “It was a tough spiraling punt that kind of turned over unexpectedly on him and as a competitor, he’s trying to field every ball, but when you’re reacting to a flight change at the last second, you have to fight your instinct and run the opposite way. He’s trying to be great and not allow an inside the five drive, but that spirit worked against us. The most important thing was hanging onto the ball. We’d prefer the ball on the three-yard line with our possession as opposed to their possession at the nine. That’s a tough learning lesson, but fortunately at least with a guy like Malik (Washington), it won’t be in vain. I know it’s going to be tough for him to swallow and for all of us to swallow.”
(On the turnover on downs at the Packers one-yard line.) – “There’s three plays in particular. The first down on the nine and then the following play that I thought there was some technique errors that could have gotten us into the endzone. Then there is a play call that I’d absolutely like to have back. It was a collection of things over the four-play process that will be tough for us to swallow when we watch the film.”
(On what he told the guys in the locker room.) – “We didn’t come all this way to have this stop us. Yeah, your margin of error is smaller, but tough-minded individuals can learn from the things that kept us from the victory column this game and utilize it in last five games. The biggest thing is that you hyper focus on the next thing and take it one game at a time. The same way that we did when we were 2-6. I told them 5-7 pales in comparison to 2-6. To me, we positioned ourselves to be in a situation where we can withstand a one game setback and still be able to get things done. It’s a long season left, and a lot of things can and will happen, but the main thing we have to do is make sure that all these things that, specifically the self-inflicted wounds, that we use to our benefit and make sure that those things aren’t keeping us from winning football games and moving forward. If you are tough enough to withstand that, which I really believe our absolutely frustrated locker room who knows that it just gets really, really frustrating when you know you’re capable of winning a game and you can point to yourself as why you lost it, and that’s the biggest thing that they are eager to make right because they believe in each other and they believe in this team. We didn’t do it justice this week, and so you have to press forward and that’s really all you can do.”
(On still having more cold weather games this season.) – “There is correlation or causation and that will always be the case from my vantage point. We weren’t failing to snap the ball before delay of game or false starting because of the cold. I think that the tape will show that when we watch it tomorrow, but like anything else you eventually have to overcome it if you are trying to do anything in this league so that narrative like good teams and etcetera, etcetera correlation causation. It will always exist until you defeat it. So I think our guys will look forward to executing in the cold weather at the next opportunity because I think that they know that they can, so they need to and they want to, so we will take advantage of that opportunity when it comes.”
(On the injury to CB Kader Kohou.) – “Yeah, lower back. He cleared protocol. They checked him for that, but it was his lower back so we will find out some more information tomorrow.”
(On the injury to CB Cam Smith.) – “Yeah, his shoulder. I think it came out so he was in a good amount of pain so we will see what that looks like tomorrow.”
(On not activating LB Shaq Barrett this week.) – “In just talking with Chris (Grier) where are roster is at and the players that have earned the right to be on it, it is just a numbers game in the NFL so the timing I don’t think was necessarily ideal.”
(On if LB Shaq Barrett was clear with who he wanted to play for.) – “It wasn’t any measured situation like that posturing one way or the other. Like I said we just found out on a day that I had a press conference with you guys, and it was more of that. It wasn’t whether he wanted to play there or here. He knew we had his contractual rights, so it was more of where we are at, and let’s look at our roster.”
