Raekwon McMillan – September 9, 2019
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Monday, September 9, 2019
LB Raekwon McMillan
(There’s a report that came out that after yesterday’s game, players were so upset, they reached out to their agents demanding trades. C Daniel Kilgore probably said it best: if guys are requesting trades, you don’t want him here anyway. Just your thoughts on if guys actually reached out to agents to request a trade?) – “I try to stay off social media as much as possible because there can be misleading stories on there. Nobody has come to me about it, so I don’t really know much of it; but like (Daniel Kilgore) said, if they don’t want to be here, it is what it is. We’re going to move along with what we’ve got.”
(And how disturbed do you get when you hear pundits and fans saying, “Oh the Dolphins are tanking because they want the first pick,” and stuff like that? Guys are working hard. I doubt you go out there to risk injury just to tank.) – “Like you said, I’m not going out there to put my body on the line, put my future on the line just to lose games. I’m going out there to win, put my best effort out there on film and give my everything for my teammates.”
(What do you do a day after that game? You saw the film – now, how do you move forward from that now?) – “What do I do after the game? I go home, get some ice packs (laughter), go to sleep, wake up, watch film and do it all over again.”
(Now you’re watching that film, and what’s going through your mind when you guys prepared so much for that type of offense?) – “Like everybody was saying, we can be a lot better. We made a lot of mistakes – a lot of in-house mistakes. It’s not anything that they did special. We came out flat, and we didn’t show up on Sunday. We’ve got to do a better job next Sunday.”
(You seemed to make a lot of what was not a great number of snaps. Do you think you showed enough yesterday to get more playing time?) – “That’s not my decision. I go out there whenever I get a chance to. I put my best tape out there on film and just worry about the other stuff later.”
(What could this defense be like if you were on the field a little bit more?) – “My coaches feel like this is the best thing for us, so that’s what it is. No complaining. They can be special with or without me on the field if everybody just goes out there and does their job right.”
Minkah Fitzpatrick – September 9, 2019
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Monday, September 9, 2019
S Minkah Fitzpatrick
(There was a report that came out last night about players requesting a trade. How would you feel if you found out some of your teammates were requesting a trade?) – “It is what it is. Everybody has reasons to do that, but we all have to stick together as a team, fight it out as a team and keep moving forward.”
(What do you say to the knee-jerk reaction from some of the Dolphins fans out there after yesterday’s loss?) – “The knee-jerk reactions?”
(Their negativity.) – “I’m not really concerned about what they think and everything else, but it’s still early in the season. Coach said to us earlier there are 16 teams that are 0-1 and 16 teams that are 1-0. The only difference is how they react. That’s what’s going to control our season moving forward is how we react to this, what lessons we learn from it and how we move forward.”
(Do you sense at all that there’s any issues in the locker room given the changes the last two weeks and then to have an opener like that?) – “It is tough. There were a lot of changes made. A lot of guys came in here on Monday and Tuesday of last week and it is tough. We were trying to go out there and even with all that adversity just establish ourselves as a great team, great offense, defense and special teams; but it is what it is. It happens. Like I said, all we can control is the way that we move forward, the way that we think moving forward and the way that we carry ourselves moving forward.”
(How much confidence do you have that from one week to the other can be huge difference?) – “It’s football, so every single week will be a different week. We can have a game like yesterday and on Sunday, this Sunday coming up, we can play the best game we ever played. Like I said, all it is, is how we go into it mindset-wise. That’s all that we can control. If we tell ourselves this is going to be a bad season, we listen to all of the outside noise and everything else, then that’s what it’s going to be. But if we tell ourselves all I can control is how I play and if you want to play great, you’re going to play great and make a decision to play great every day, that’s what you’re going to do. That’s all we can control.”
(What did you see on film? What were the issues in the secondary?) – “It was a lot of different things. Guys looking at the wrong – that’s what I did, personally – just looking at the wrong things. Sometimes we weren’t put in the best positon; but even still, we know it’s up to the players to make the play. Coaches can call whatever they want, but like on my play I wasn’t in the best position but I’ve still got to make a play, got to cover my guy. That’s usually what I do. I’ve just got to do my job. That’s what is all boils down to, whether it was with the front, the secondary or the linebackers. Everybody has to do their job. There’s a lot of people just not doing it or trying to do it differently than what we were coached to and that’s what happened.”
(Did you get an explanation as to why you were taken out of the game?) – “No, I did not.”
(Do you have an idea as to why?) – “No. You can talk to (Head) Coach ‘Flo’ (Brian Flores) about that.”
(Would you like that? Is that something that you wanted?) – “What?”
(Getting that explanation why?) – “I don’t need an explanation.”
(Do you still want to be here?) – “Yeah. I want to play football. I’ve lost games before. It hasn’t been like this, but I’ve lost games before. Like I said, all I can control is my attitude, the joy that I have for this game and the passion for this game and that’s it.”
(Are you aware of any players actually requesting a trade or reaching out to representation for one?) – “No. No, sir.”
(You’re always going to have confidence in yourself. You know there’s talent or how much was it just technique-wise across the board?) – “All of it was us, like I said, just not doing our job. I think talent-wise we’ve got a great secondary, one of the best secondaries in the league. But just technique-wise, not making excuses for ourselves and not trying to point the fingers is going to allow us to move forward. I think, like I said, we’re one of the best secondaries in the league, so we just have to focus on ourselves.”
(Do you guys believe that the secondary is all in the right position?) – “I mean, yeah. Yeah.”
(What’s it going to take against, especially, against a strong wide receiving corps like the Patriots this Sunday?) – “Do our job. That’s all it boils down to just doing our job.”
Jerome Baker – September 9, 2019
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Monday, September 9, 2019
LB Jerome Baker
(Any day after a loss is always tough. The day after 59-10, is that any more difficult knowing that the game just wasn’t competitive and so many mistakes were made?) – “A loss is a loss so we’ll just go in there and correct the mistakes we can. We just need to go out there and execute and try to get a W.”
(You posted something on Twitter today. What really prompted that post?) – “Social media? It’s just a part of the game. I don’t want anybody to question that we’ll all stick together. It’s just one loss. We’ve got to bounce back and ultimately stick together.”
(Did you see the report from Pro Football Talk last night saying there were guys in the locker room already maybe wanting to get out of this? What do you think about when you hear something like that?) – “Get out of what?”
(Not want to be on the team or comments to their agents, according to this report, that some guys don’t want to be here.) – “I didn’t see or hear all of that. Just being around this team, we all stick together. We all just want to win. We didn’t get the job done yesterday. It’s just one loss. We’re 0-1 just like 15 other teams. We just have to bounce back.”
(You guys went from believe this or not – 500-to-1 to 10,000-to-1 to make the Super Bowl. What are your thoughts when you hear something like that?) – “We’ll see. We’ve got to go out there and just perform. We know what we’re capable of. We know the Super Bowl is in our city. We all have a goal but also we just have to take one game at a time.”
(When you look at the film of that, where does it even start to try to correct the issues?) – “Execution. We just didn’t execute. It wasn’t that they did anything special. We just didn’t execute. We also didn’t start out fast. They started out fast. They’re a great team and we ultimately didn’t get the job done.”
(How much is trusting the system and trusting yourself when you’re on the field – how much does that go into it? Do you think guys are there yet with this defense?) – “It’s a work in progress but as far as trusting the system, it works. You have countless examples of it. We definitely know it works. We just have to ultimately get better and really perfect the system that’s in place.”
(LB Sam Eguavoen said yesterday after the game that you guys were going to take a look at the tape and then burn it. What was the message from Head Coach Brian Flores and the coaching staff today after you guys got a chance to evaluate some of that tape?) – “We wanted to watch that and feel that – feel that loss and feel that pain that we definitely could have gotten the job done if we would have just executed it. It’s as simple as that. It’s not like we don’t have the talent. It’s not like we don’t have any of that. We have everything we need. We just have to execute it. That film was really just the pill of it. You just swallow it and go onto the next week.”
(One of the messages that Head Coach Brian Flores said and I think most coaches do with players is to not worry about outside noise or the distractions or comments. You know that this team, given a loss like that, people are going to start saying things. How do you block that out?) – “To me, I kind of embrace it. I feed off of what everybody else says. ‘You can’t do this.’ That’s kind of been my whole career. ‘You can’t do this. You can’t do that.’ Also, I want to get this team like that. If they want to say whatever, ‘we can’t do this on defense,’ we have to feed off of that and embrace it. If we embrace it, we just take it and run with it.”
Brian Flores – September 9, 2019
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Monday, September 9, 2019
Head Coach Brian Flores
(After looking over the film from yesterday, what was your number one overriding concern?) – “There were a lot of concerns. I was disappointed in really all three phases. That starts with me. I didn’t think we coached well enough, we didn’t play well enough and we have a long way to go. The good thing is it’s one game, and that’s the approach we’re going to take. We’re going to come back to work, make the corrections today, make the corrections really all day today, and then we’ll get back to it. Tomorrow we’ll start preparing – tonight and tomorrow we’ll start preparing for our next opponent New England. Then the guys will be back in Wednesday ready to go.”
(From a coaching standpoint, what was one part of the game that maybe you – underestimated isn’t the right word – but you may have gotten wrong?) – “There were a lot of things that went wrong. We wanted to start fast, we didn’t do that. We did in the kicking game. We started fast that way. But defensively, we didn’t start fast. Offensively, we didn’t start fast. If anything, we went the other way. When you don’t play well against a good team, and you don’t execute, that’s what happens. We’ve got a lot of work to do and that’s what we’re going to do.”
(Was this an execution problem or was it a preparation problem? Or was it both?) – “Obviously I didn’t do a good enough job of getting this team prepared to play. There were definitely some things we could do better as a team in all three phases. We’ll be better. We’ll get better. (There are) a lot of corrections from that game and hopefully we can be better this week than we were last week. That’s the goal. That’s going to be the goal every week. I think the players understand that and I think they’ll work towards that.”
(What did you think about the defense’s tackling ability?) – “We didn’t tackle well at all. I think the things we talk about defensively – tackling is at the forefront. Setting the edge is at the forefront. Communication. We didn’t do those things well. Those will be things we harp on, that we have harped on, and we’ll continue to harp on, and harp on even more in the coming days.”
(There was a report last night that players after the game had contacted their representation requesting trades. Have you spoken to GM Chris Grier about the situation and does that report have any validity?) – “I can’t really speak to the accuracy of that one. We haven’t received any information like that. I think for us, we just need to focus on what’s going on inside of our building, and not worry about anything that’s going on outside. I think we have to get better from a fundamental standpoint, from a communication standpoint – really overall. That’s the goal right now. Everything else that’s going on outside, we just need to focus on what’s going on in our building.”
(What did you gather as the mood of the team as they came in today?) – “I think they were disappointed, as I was. At the same time, I think they are ready to get back to work and have a better performance next week. That’s the mood I felt today.”
(The bunch of guys that you brought in recently, were they ready to play on Sunday or was it maybe a little too soon for them?) – “We’ve got to do a better job of getting them ready to play as a coaching staff. That starts with me. Yeah, we had a lot of new faces; but again, we’re not going to make excuses, we’re not pointing fingers, we’re not going to feel sorry for ourselves. The situation is what the situation is. We’ve got to make the best of the situation. We’ve got to play better than we did yesterday.”
(On the topic of the new guys, you’ve had a lot of moving parts on the offensive line obviously, a big challenge there. How would you judge their performance?) – “I think we had some good spots and we had some not so good spots. I think we’ve got a lot of work to do there. I thought some of the communication was good, some of it wasn’t. Some of the play was good, some of it wasn’t. We’ve got a long ways to go. That group, I expect them to play better next week.”
(Some of the guys mentioned that you told them to let this sink in as part of your message after the game. What do you hope that does for the guys, kind of remembering what happened Sunday?) – “I think when you have a tough loss, I think sometimes you have to think about it, and thing about how that feels. You never want the feeling again. How do you – or how do we – not allow that to happen again? We go to work, we work hard, we do a better job with all of the fundamentals, the communication, we tackle better, we do a better job in the kicking game. I know no one wants to feel that way.”
(It seemed S Minkah Fitzpatrick came out of the game before most of the other defensive starters. Was he taken out for performance reasons?) – “We were rotating that group. Minkah was in, Reshad (Jones) was in there, we planned on getting Walt (Aikens) in there. We had issues really across the board. Minkah had some good plays, he had some bad plays. At the end of the day, we wanted to get some other guys in there. He’s a good player for us. We have a lot of confidence in him. Like all of us – players, coaches – he’s got to improve and perform better.”
(Looking ahead to this week, you have a team that you’re pretty familiar with you are playing. What sort of emotions do you have to deal with given all of the personal connections there?) – “My focus is on this team and getting this team to improve. New England is the next opponent. We have to prepare for those guys – that group. This is obviously the defending world champs. They are well coached; they have good players. We’ve got to prepare at a high level to go out here and compete and try to win this game. That’s where I’m at, and the personal connections are what they are. There are a lot of people within that organization that I know that I have great relationships with; but my focus right now is on the Miami Dolphins.”
(Given the 59 points yesterday by the Ravens and your defensive background, do you by any chance see yourself drifting over towards the defensive end more in practice this week?) – “We had issues offensively, defensively and in the kicking game. I’ll be drifting everywhere. Unfortunately, that’s the case. But yeah, obviously, being a defensive coach, you never want to see a performance like that. But as a total team, we’re not going to wallow in yesterday. We’ve got to turn this thing around. We’ve got a long season ahead of us. There’s a lot of football left – a lot of opportunity for us to get better, improve and play the game the way we want to play it. That wasn’t what we had yesterday. That’s not how we want to play, ever. That’s the goal right now. There’s a lot of season left. There’s a lot.”
(I thought I noticed DE Charles Harris as the only defensive lineman out there on one play. The rest were linebackers and DBs. From a scheme standpoint, were you guys able to do what you wanted to do, and did any of that throw Baltimore off-balance, even just a little bit?) – “We had a plan going in. That was one of them. We didn’t execute the way we wanted to, so at the end of the day, it wasn’t good enough. That’s just as honest as we can be as a team and as an organization. It wasn’t good enough, so we’ll go back to the drawing board. We’ll go back to work and try to improve this team and get better.”
(When you talk about going back to the drawing board, how much of it is – obviously there’s an execution issue – but how much of it is the game plan versus the personnel?) – “I think it is all-encompassing. You have to – when you reflect on the past week, you go through the game plan, you go through the personnel. How could we have done things better? That’s part of our evaluation as a staff, players, coaches, everyone. How much of it was game plan, how much of it was personnel? I would say it’s all of it. We’ve got to do a better job of game-planning with the personnel we have. Players have to play better and execute and do the fundamentals and technique that we talk about on a daily basis, so it’s all-encompassing. I wish it was as simple as one or the other, but it’s all-encompassing.”
(From a penalty standpoint, do you feel like you guys had a performance that met your standards or no?) – “No. Definitely not. We had way too many penalties. Way too many, and that’s something we talk about on a daily basis: playing penalty-free, playing turnover-free, tackling, field position. We didn’t do any of those things well.”
(What are some things that make you feel encouraged moving forward?) – “The O-line I thought played well in spurts. For a group that hasn’t worked that much together, I thought they played well in spurts. Preston (Williams) played well. He had the drop in the end zone, but he’s a young guy (in his) first game (and) I thought he made a couple plays. I thought ‘Fitz’ (Ryan Fitzpatrick) made some plays. He was under some duress and kind of spun out of a few plays and gave us an opportunity on a couple of those pass plays there. I thought Walt Aikens – he had energy and maximum effort the entire game, so I was pleased by him. There are a lot of things that happened in the game that are correctable. Looking back and watching the film, if we could correct those things, we’ll be in a lot better shape. There’s a lot there that’s correctable just from a pure fundamentals and technique standpoint. If we get that done, we’ll be better this week.”
(As far as DT Christian Wilkins, I think he was lined up across form Baltimore Ravens G Marshal Yanda for a large part of the game. How did you think Christian performed?) – “I thought he played okay. Again, we’ve got 11 guys. It’s hard to single one guy out. I thought he had a solid performance. He could get off blocks a little bit better, but I think you could say that for everyone. We didn’t do a good enough job of defeating blocks in this game. That’ll be the focus this week along with a myriad of other things. We’ll improve and get better.”
(Did you have any conversation with Stephen Ross after the game, and what were the nature of the conversations with General Manager Chris Grier afterwards?) – “Yeah, I talked to Steve. I talked to Steve after the game and Chris, as well. Those conversations are going to remain private, as they should; but yeah, I talked to both guys.”
(After a game like Sunday, do you feel like you have to give your guys positivity, or do you work them a little harder after what you saw?) – “I think there’s always, in coaching – it’s positive. You’ve got a critical tone and you’ve got a motivational tone. I think that’s coaching. You’ve got to find the right timing to use both. I think as a coach individually and as a staff, both tones are warranted. It’s a case-by-case situation.”
(When you took the job, did you anticipate the roster turnover like you saw just a week before the game in this team, in their efforts to be a younger team?) – “That’s something you think about when you take a job like this. You think about culture. You think about building fundamentals and technique and playing a certain way. You think about making an impact on guys. Those are things you think about. You know in this league, there’s turnover. Every team turns over every year. Guys are going to be – I don’t want to say in and out, but you’re going to have a different team every year. That you know. As far as the amount we had last week, it’s not something that crossed my mind. My thought process is always, ‘I’m going to coach the guys we have,’ period. I don’t care if you’ve been here a day, a week, 10 years. I’m going to coach the guys we have. That will always be my approach, and I don’t think that’s going to change.”
(When Stephen Ross made the coaching change, he mentioned there would be some pain in this process. Did you anticipate pain – initial pain – when you came in?) – “There’s pain every season for every team. When you go through an NFL season – which, this is my 16th – every team deal with adversity. Every one. There are 15 other teams that dealt with adversity yesterday. That’s part of an NFL season. We have to be able to endure that and stand up to it and not make excuses and not point fingers and not feel sorry for ourselves and get back up, go back to work and fight another day, try to improve, get better and help this team win. That’s the goal for every team, specifically ours, and that’s the message that I sent to the team today.”
Daniel Kilgore – September 8, 2019 (Postgame)
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Sunday, September 8, 2019
Postgame – Baltimore
C Daniel Kilgore (transcribed by Devin Davis)
(This was a tough one for you guys obviously the first game of the season. Just your thoughts on the game itself?) – “Obviously it’s a loss that you don’t want to experience, that you don’t want to be a part of. We’re going to be men and we’re going to take this, and we’re going to take ownership of it. We’re going to move on. We are going to come in tomorrow and watch film and see where we’ve got to be better, and work on getting better and get ready for the next week.”
(Where did this game get away from you guys so quickly in the first quarter?) – “I think it’s when you don’t move the ball, you don’t start drives and you don’t have positive plays early on, it puts you in a tough situation where its third-and-long. And with this defense, they are a good defense. When you put yourself in these tough situations early on, it makes things much harder for you. Positive plays first, starting a series would be more ideal and we didn’t have that.”
(We know you guys are professionals, you’re not going to make excuses over wins or losses. But with that being said, when you have a new group of guys put together with the offensive line does it make it that much difficult to go into a game?) – “Again, you hit it on the nail. We’re professionals. These guys have to come in and be ready to go and I felt that they did that during the week. It’s not just the new guys, it’s everybody. It’s all on us – all 53, 46 (players) on game day. We’re going to look at it tomorrow like I said. We’re going to be men, take ownership of it and get better from it.”
(Did the Ravens do anything that you guys didn’t expect?) – “No not at all. You know Baltimore, they’re a good defense, always have (been). They’re well coached, (have) big guys up front, speed and size on the edges. Nothing out of the ordinary. We just have to play better.”
(You guys want to be a running team – 21 yards against the Ravens. What was the issue?) – “Again, I think it’s when you don’t have those positive plays at the beginning of the series. Whether it’s a 3-yard run or a 4-yard run, we have to be able to build off that more consistently. The pass game feeds off the run game. The run game feeds off the pass game. When you’re able to do both things at one time, you’re going to experience more success and we weren’t able to do that.”
Davon Godchaux – September 8, 2019 (Postgame)
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Sunday, September 8, 2019
Postgame – Baltimore
DT Davon Godchaux (transcribed by Katharine Bohlmann)
(What was the main issue on defense today would you say?) – “We just didn’t execute. We just (have to) get back to the drawing board, figure some things out and keep working. I am not going to lay any excuse on nobody. As a team, we just didn’t execute, so we’re back to the drawing board on Monday, get back in the building, put this one behind us and get ready for New England.”
(Does the loss sting even more knowing you gave up 59 points or does it not matter?) – “It’s a marathon, not a sprint. This team is not going to hang their head on one game. It’s a long season. You guys have been around here a long time – it’s a long season, 16 games plus playoffs, so we’re not going to hang our head on one game.”
(They were going to run the ball. Everybody knew that’s what they wanted to do. What did you guys intend to keep that from happening? What was supposed to happen?) – “We wanted to keep – basically make Lamar (Jackson) throw the ball. Like I said, I give my hat off to the Baltimore Ravens. Lamar had a great game. He threw the ball, threw some touchdowns. I don’t know how many he threw, but (he) threw some touchdowns. Hats off to those guys. Those guys had a great game plan, great execution. They just flat out beat us, so we are going back to the drawing board on Monday, get things right and get ready for the New England Patriots, a division game.”
Jakeem Grant – September 8, 2019 (Postgame)
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Sunday, September 8, 2019
Postgame – Baltimore
WR Jakeem Grant (transcribed by Anthony Gutierrez)
(What was the message from Head Coach BRian Flores when you walk in here after a loss like that?) – “We’ve just got to let that sink in. We’ve got to play better than we did in all phases of the game. We’ve just got to go out there and play together and when one big play happens against us, we’ve got to stop it and change the momentum and get back on it and just play together. If we don’t play together, then stuff like that happens. I feel like we have a very talented team, but we’ve got to let this one sink in because this one hurts.”
(Did you feel like it just started to snowball there in the first quarter, and then there was no traction there from anyone going forward?) – “I mean yeah. They got out to a great start and they just kept their foot on the gas and we just couldn’t make it happen this game. Like I said, we just have to let this one sink in, and we have to play better next week.”
(Is there a moment of disbelief like when the game is going on like ‘What’s going on?’ Because it just seemed like one right after another?) – “I would say there’s a moment of disbelief. I feel like when a game is going like that, we just have to come together and say ‘Hey man, we have to stop the bleeding. Somebody has to make a play. Somebody has to do this and somebody has to change the momentum and put it on our side and get things going.’”
Raekwon McMillan – September 8, 2019 (Postgame)
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Sunday, September 8, 2019
Postgame – Baltimore
LB Raekwon McMillan (transcribed by Ken Mendonça)
(How did the defense allow Baltimore to get down the field early?) – “They came out ready to play and we came out a little sluggish at the beginning and they jumped out on us early. We just have to rally back together next weekend, and hopefully we can get a better outcome of the game.”
(Head Coach Brian Flores’ message to you after the game, what was it?) – “Stay together. This one game can’t break us for the whole season. It’s just one game on the road. We have to play 15 more. If we let this one game kill us for the next 15, then it’s going to be that.”
(Is a loss a loss, or does the point differential matter when you’re sitting here in the locker room a couple of minutes later?) – “It’s just one game out of 16. We can’t let one game dictate our whole season, regardless of what just happened. If we would have won by 60, we can’t let that win dictate the whole season. We’re going to be better, I can promise you that. We’re going to go to work, and we’ll see what happens.”
