Mike McDaniel – October 28, 2024
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Monday, October 28, 2024
Head Coach Mike McDaniel
(Kind of a global question. I preface this by saying obviously we don’t get to see practice and you’re always going to play who you think gives you the best chance to win. But I wonder in general, I’ll give you a couple of examples, whether you think a case could be made to make playing time more of a meritocracy? I would cite a couple of examples. One would be you had 43 outside linebacker snaps against the Colts, LB Mohamed Kamara was the only one who had pressures. He had a couple. He was inactive yesterday. RB Jaylen Wright – highest per carry average on the team. Highest among all of your running backs. Had two carries yesterday. Obviously you have good veterans in that position group. Do you think it’s fair to say that perhaps it should be more meritocracy in terms of the guys best in games play more? Is that a fair point at this point?) – “It’s a fair point for any and all things to be questioned when the results don’t match the desire. One of the things that I think I’m very comfortable with as a head coach is the expectation of absolute second guessing of any and all things. So that’s fair. I think there’s reasons behind it. I think the guys that are having success on the field that maybe all people would want to see more of. There’s things that go on based upon not just – for instance as a pash rusher there is a complexion of the entire team that’s involved including special teams and a complexion of other phases, not just pass rush, the run game. And so you’re able to when you do have some production from guys to challenge them to maybe be two steps ahead and be that much more on the finer details because their opportunities are going to come and you don’t want to have those opportunities and then lose them. I think each and every decision is particular to its own, but the idea is to have the best players on the field. There is no doubt that Jaylen Wright has exhibited a lot of things that are connected to why we drafted him. I think he continues to improve as well just like ‘Mo.’ (Mohamed Kamara) And I think they are important pieces of our young nucleus that will get more opportunities. I think in hindsight our plan in the game in particular with Jaylen was to have him get more opportunities. It was trending that way and then the offense had eight possessions. You’re trying to get backs into a groove. There are things I can do from a game planning standpoint that can ensure that – we’ve done a multitude of things here with two backs on the field and various things. I think that it’s not lost. I think there’s a lot of things at play and the most important thing is that is that they continue to grow in their game because they are not in charge of the opportunities; they are in charge of making the most out of them. And the more you see guys like Jaylen Wright continue to make plays the more pressure there is for us to find a way to get them involved. They’re all fair. Literally you can just line them up. You could name five people that you need to get the ball more to. You can name some young players that need to see the field more. It’s all very, very fair when you lose. like what else would I expect. I think we’ll continue to address that and I would expect those two players in particular to be able to contribute and help us because we need them to.”
(When you personally have long relationships with a lot of guys on the team, how do you balance trust and upside. Because sure you trust RB Raheem Mostert implicitly. RB Jaylen Wright at this point in his career might have a little bit more upside. How do you balance that?) – “It takes 11 people to execute a play and then you’re trying to access the different tools that each player has and their ability to execute each and every play, not just when they have the ball, but without. And then you’re also firmly assessing – I’m not going off of Raheem Mostert’s productivity last year. When he’s playing – he was a gigantic tone setter for us against Indy. And there was a play in particular, I think it was second-and-11 where he kind of checked down and ran over four defenders to get the first down and made some really, really decisive reads on the goal line which when you are featuring somebody close to the goal line their yards per carry is not going to be high because of the short distance. I think those are all factors into it. But you have to take the information that the players give you and constantly adjust. I think Eric Studesville has done a great job in bringing backs along here. Starting with De’Von (Achane) last year and Jaylen this year. I would expect a hard guy to tackle that continues to get his assignments right to get more action. There are residuals to the flow of the game. I would’ve been surprised if you guys would have told me he had two carries. I would’ve been like, ‘What? What happened?’ So that wasn’t the plan going in; however there are things that unfold in different areas that we like to feature people and also it becomes a little more convoluted. I think that when you’re having plays made by each player, although that’s something that is a – having good players is a good problem, not a bad problem. I’ve been on the other side of that. But there is absolutely without a shadow of a doubt ‘25’ (Jaylen Wright) can help us and will, and we’ll make the necessary adjustments to make sure that he can contribute his skillset.”
(Is this a week where LB Bradley Chubb could potentially return to practice?) – “I think Bradley Chubb wishes that would be the case; however, he’s not on my radar right now because guys get on my radar when they start getting close and I just check in to make sure things are going appropriately and we don’t have major things happen. I don’t see that timeline. I think having a ACL plus in terms of what type of injury he had around New Year’s Day, I wasn’t expecting him as of yet, and I think he’s going to continue to work to try to get back sooner than later, but it’s not on my immediate horizon.”
(Do you have more info in terms of S Jevón Holland’s knee?) – “The info is that it wasn’t serious by measure of surgery or extended time. I think it’s still a little too early to tell what it means for this week. So it’s kind of in that area that you just don’t want to get ahead of yourself too soon. Right now it feels like it might be week-to-week. There might be a possibility for the game. I’ve just really got to let the week play out a little bit with him in particular because what we do know is that it wasn’t serious in nature of extended time, but how strong it feels and how he’s able to do his job, that will be kind of dependent upon these next couple of days.”
(Was it different than the knee injury he had last year?) – “Yeah.”
(How did you guys do as far as getting the ball to WR Tyreek Hill and how did they do defending Tyreek?) – “Well first of all, I think it was one of my favorite games Tyreek has had since I’ve been here. And there are a lot of games that he’s had a ton of numbers, but what is required from one of your best players, making plays with and without the ball, he was such an impact player. There were a couple times that I think the stat line could be more normal to what people would be expecting in terms of three-digit yardage and stuff. There was a leverage on a third down that was kind of messed up and then pocket movement took Tua (Tagovailoa) off of him in the second half on another, so there was more opps. I thought he was convicted as he has ever been on the line of scrimmage. There were a couple times that he was No. 1, that he knows he was but the defense, not the guy guarding him but some of the underneath stuff kind of took the ball out of his hands. But you want to talk about a guy that has tried to that is actually not just speaking that he hates to lose, but he is putting into action some of the best – he threw some of the best blocks and then got depth in the timing of the play, was a factor on third down, was a factor on first and second and it was as complete of a game as he’s played. There were a couple of times that we were trying to get him the ball in the second half and the defense decided to over-invest in guarding him and good offense allows for other opportunities for other players. For instance, Jonnu Smith’s last third down conversion – the third-and-12 I believe. That’s something that Tua had his eyes on ‘Reek,’ (Tyreek Hill) but that over-focus on ‘Reek’ gives you some opportunities for other guys. So I was very, very happy. As a matter of fact, showed the team an example of two things can always be true – you can fail, which our team failed, but we can get closer to the everything that we’ve been trying to grow into from the second that last year ended. We can have growth in certain areas as well, so we’re trying to have across the board growth and the best way to do that is to have one of the best players in the league and the top player on your team to exemplify that, which is what he did.”
(I wanted to ask about WR Odell Beckham Jr., I believe it was 11 snaps for him, no targets. Was that just a product of how the game played out? And I guess, what needs to happen to get him more involved and kind of maximize the impact that you guys intended when you brought him in?) – “No, timeline for how everything has played out has been I’m sure challenging in talking to Odell – the snaps that he had, not targeted, which a couple of them he was primary and the shell of the defense dictated the – but I thought he looked as comfortable as he’s looked and. I think Tua sees that on tape and we kind of adjust to what players show us and I thought he was running the best routes, so my expectation would be more involvement based upon him being consensual in that and owning that much more of the offense so we can get him on the field more. So I think it was a step in the right direction, albeit, the box score doesn’t really assess that. From our standpoint from the way we look at offense and the way we look at doing our jobs, I thought he did a good job with the opportunities he had, and we’ll continue to push that envelope because we’re trying to max out what type of football team we are and we know he can help us.”
(Just to be clear that nobody in this building is waving the white flag, you guys believe still your season’s ahead of you – why are you optimistic that things can turn around?) – “Well, from my standpoint, the things that have come up this season are very much things that this collection of players and coaches needed to really conquer to get our ultimate goals, which we’ve never hid from. I think when you’re pretty clear about what you want from the season and from the team and you’re not eliminated from those circumstances, I think we’re optimistic because it’s not that we’ve made our climb more difficult or haven’t made the climb more difficult – absolutely we have – but conquering the things that have kept us from winning some of these games are some of the things that we went into the season focused on that we knew we had to work through. It’s a lot less about who we play and where we play and how we play. I think one game at a time and being able to continue that evolution, we aren’t as far off based upon tape and empirical facts. We’re not that far off from being able to challenge any team we play each and every week. So to me, and it’s also based upon empirical experience – I’ve been on teams that have been sub-.500 before. I’ve been on teams that have finished the season that way and I’ve been on teams that have utilized that to start to win one game and then snowball and I think that as long as you have the buy-in and the effort and you continue to learn lessons, now you just are more accountable for those lessons and can’t trip yourself up in a multitude of ways. A ‘for instance’ would be, I think we’ve learned lessons for playing more penalty-free football. So that was hard earned that we had to learn the hard way. Do you take that and apply that moving forward as your standard? Then it’s not a lesson in vain. And with this team and the type of individuals we have, nobody’s ever been afraid of a challenge. The National Football League is not very forgiving and you learn some hard lessons and you have some situations where you and the crew that you’re working with every day are about the only people that believe and that’s not a bad thing necessarily. But I believe in people that give me reason to believe. Individually, I have a lot of belief in really everybody that comprises our team and now collectively, we just have to continue to do the hard thing which is work and not get results and continue to work. So I think that a lot of guys have a lot of pride and expectations and this is one of – no year in the National Football League is anything but a gigantic opportunity relative to every player’s total career timeline, and it’s very important to these guys. So we’ll continue to work incessantly and I think the biggest thing is that however the season is, and we’re sitting at 2-5 and that is real and you have less room for error as the season progresses – that is real – how big of lessons were those things? All the pain and sorrow that goes through learning these lessons, how real are these lessons learned and I believe that we have the right guys to get that fixed and so we’ll press forward with no other thought, but that’s to be proud of the game we put out there and understand what it takes for this team to win against any opponent. And the biggest opponent that we have to overcome is ourselves, really, each and every week. And if we can do the little things that it takes to win football games, all you have to do is be the best football team on that day in that stadium and then things will take care of themselves. Long season, it’s front-loaded with results that nobody’s accepting and have a lot of guys that are trying to be the reasons for the solution and not the reasons of the problem.”
(You speak to Chairman of the Board/Managing General Partner Stephen Ross after each game. I’m wondering last night, do you have anything you could share about his concerns, or disappointments or what he has spoken to you about?) – “He’s always – it usually goes like … I right, wrong or indifferent, the way that I approach the job is when you feel accountable to all things, he’s like every fan and coach; my knee-jerk is to apologize for the result, regardless of how the game and my position within it go. And he knows how the people that he’s hired that he really believes in and so he’s very supportive and that was very similar to what last night was. I think he’s also supremely competitive so he doesn’t like to lose, but he’s kind of – we’re definitely aligned in that it’s the process and evaluating that and sometimes results are fleeting, and they fall in different arenas. He tries to do everything in his power to facilitate success, so he’s disappointed obviously when we don’t have it. And then we just communicate about the factualities that I know without looking at the tape and he was making sure – he’s very consistent in making sure that he knows that tough times don’t last; tough people do. So it was good to see him after the game, but I struggle with all parties involved after losses just trying to lead by example and yeah, no loss feels like it doesn’t start with me.”
