Patrick Graham – October 22, 2019
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Tuesday, October 22, 2019
Defensive Coordinator Patrick Graham
(If I could ask you a housekeeping question in regards to what you saw in the first week of practice with CB Cordrea Tankersley and DT Robert Nkemdiche?) – “With Robert and ‘Tank’ (Cordrea Tankersley) – with guys that are injured and coming back and stuff like that, I really defer that stuff to ‘Flo’ (Head Coach Brian Flores) to talk about that staff; but the guys are working hard in the meeting room and stuff. They all have been. It’s been positive in terms of what I’ve been exposed to with them.”
(This LB Vince Biegel guy – I know he’s got a motor and he’s got enthusiasm and he makes everybody happy and that’s awesome. He’s got an infectious thing going and he’s good, but I’m curious from a pure football talent perspective – not just “oh he works hard and he tries hard” – what is something you’ve learned about him that’s maybe surprising?) – “Aside from ‘go hard,’ his beard is pretty strong, too. (laughter) Like I told you last week – I believe it was last week – he plays with extension. Like if you watch the play from this past weekend when he broke through for the sack, it was blocked at first, but then the hands – he remained active with his hands – he kept pushing and clawing through. Again, is it something you put on a drill tape in terms of, ‘okay this is the perfect way to break through for a pass rush?’ No, but he understood, ‘if I want to rush these guys correctly’ – (It’s) no different than what we’re dealing with this week with Pittsburgh because they’re bigger bodies, long guys who get their hands on you. You have to play with extension and continually use your hands. If you watch that clip, that’s what he does. He’s a long body who plays with his hands. That’s going to aid in the pass rush. That’s going to aid in the run game. I think that’s – if you go back and revisit that play – that’s a perfect example of his physical tools that aside from the motor and all that stuff like that, the physical tools of playing with your hands, playing with extension and being violent and working you throughout the down will help him out.”
(Linebackers Coach Rob Leonard told us a couple weeks back that he actually had talked to LB Vince Biegel about “not killing the quarterback on scout team.” Is that an experience that you’ve had to have as well?) – “With him or just?”
(Yeah, LB Vince Biegel.) – “Everybody practices hard. We just as a group, we’ve just got to learn how to practice together. That’s always a process. Any football season you’re dealing with in the beginning of the year, especially when you have transition with new guys, how does this team practice? How do we practice well together? How do we get better where we’re being competitive but we’re also being safe? That’s just something normal that takes place between coaches, players – no matter what team it is – early in the season.”
(I guess the broader question is that kind of speaks to the level of intensity and focus LB Vince Biegel brings to the unit?) – “Whenever we practice, it’s the most important thing we do during the week. Period. The meetings, I get the meetings; I love getting up there and talking to them and getting the information to them, but the practice is the most important thing we do during the week leading into the game, so everybody’s intensity is up for practice. The thing is, does Biegel work hard at practice? Yeah, but there’s a bunch of a guys working hard at practice because it’s the most important thing we do on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. That’s the most important thing that we do when we go out to the field, because it’s the most similar to the game. That’s the only way we can improve. That’s the only way we can build confidence with one another between the coaches, the players, the players with each other; so everybody’s intensity level is up. My intensity level is up for practice because it’s the most important thing. All the preparation that goes in from a 24-hour work day – well, not 24-hour work day. Sorry. Sometimes it feels like that; (laughter) but an 18-hour work day, it’s to get ready for those two hours of practice. That’s why it’s so important. That’s why the intensity is up.”
(In the last two weeks – especially on the third down, there seem to have been some play calls that have gone really well. What do you like about your play-calling in the last two weeks?) – “Very few times in the history of football does that have anything with the play calls. It’s about the players out there. It’s them executing what we’re asking them to do. Again, any success we’ve had on third down has been because of what they’ve done out there. I have very little to do with that and aside from that, it’s a collaborative effort. Thankfully for me, I’ve got a good resource with our head coach, (Defensive Pass Game Coordinator/Cornerbacks Coach) Josh Boyer, (Safeties Coach) Tony Oden, (Linebackers Coach) Robbie Leonard, (Defensive Line Coach) Marion Hobby, those guys all help with the input on the play-calling in terms of defensive calls; but it comes back to the guys executing, the guys believing in the call and guys executing their assignment. Whenever you’re talking about third down, it’s an awareness thing because it could be different from third-and-1 to third-and-20 obviously. Secondly, I think once you realize it’s run, you’ve got to set the edge and play with power inside. Once you realize it’s pass, you’ve got to play proper leverage and you can’t give the quarterback clear throwing lanes. All that stuff combined together, what the call is – does it matter? I don’t know. It matters how the guys do executing those tasks.”
(CB Ryan Lewis wound up starting a few days after you guys picked him up. What goes into the process of getting somebody ready that quickly and how would you say he did?) – “I think – and I’ve talked about it before – that’s our job. Whoever we get and if we’re telling them they’re going to play, that’s our job to get them ready. The process of that is extra time – when permitted, we get extra time with them – and it’s about how much work they put into it, because they’ve got to get caught up. It’s definitely a challenging task, I would say for the player more so than the coach. I’m used to doing it, but that’s a lot of credit to him in terms of getting ready to go, playing in a competitive game, a great environment like Buffalo. Now it’s a process of getting ready for Pittsburgh right now because we’ve got a huge challenge there. A huge challenge there with – I know I’m sure (Ryan Lewis) is studying now their receiving corps. Their quarterbacks are playing well. I know it’s different without Ben (Roethlisberger) there, but these guys are playing well. They’re running the offense. As usual, Pittsburgh provides a challenge in the passing game and in the running game. I’m sure that’s what they’re focused on now.”
(How would you assess how CB Ryan Lewis did?) – “He competed. He competed. He did what we asked him to do. He was playing the way we wanted him to play. I thought he did a good job. We’ve all got to do a better job and improve because we’ve got to do enough to win the game.”
(I noticed that you guys have been playing CB Eric Rowe a little bit more in a safety/linebacker hybrid role. What about his skillset has allowed him to transition into more of that role?) – “The funny thing is for me – because I have to keep things simple because I’m not that smart – but the roles in football are in terms of, ‘Are you physical? Are you tough? ‘Okay, so there, he can do that. He can tackle. Right now, because he’s physical, tough and he’s smart (and) he can tackle, now we can maneuver him throughout the defense. If we need him to play d-end in a certain role, (he could). Because of those attributes, he’s able to play different spots. On top of that, he plays with extension; he has length. So now, moving him down closer to the box is not as much of an issue as it could be with some other players. All of the physical tools there – extension, playing with some toughness, can he tackle, the intelligence there, the length – that all plays into it. Now it provides us with an opportunity to have some flexibility.”
(CB Eric Rowe’s kind of switch is more about him rather than you guys needing help at certain other positions?) – “I don’t know if it’s a switch because if you just take a look at it from game to game, everything changes and we’re game plan-specific. If Eric or whoever it may be, they could be playing a different spot or how you see the spot. We might still be calling it whatever spot it is. It’s not necessarily like where – it’s based on where we need them to play and then his skillset fits that mold.”
(DT Davon Godchaux has emerged on this defense. What do you see from him on a week-to-week basis?) – “It’s funny. We talked about that. I remember the first time I met him in the cafeteria and he was talking about his stance and how it was going to be different and all that stuff like that and I remember – I won’t use the language I used – I said, ‘no.’ Obviously there was something before that, I was like, ‘_______ no, we’re not doing that.’ (laughter) To his credit, I really enjoy being around him and coaching him. He’s worked his butt off to improve and do the things we’re asking. He comes in every day. He goes to work. He’s in good shape. He’s playing with better pad level. He’s playing with his hands in front of his eyes. He’s playing violently with his lock out and shed and getting rid of blockers. I couldn’t be more pleased with him. Obviously, he has still stuff he can improve upon and we’re working on that; but in terms of him as a worker along with the other guys on the defense, I’ve been pleased with that.”
(What went through your mind when they announced DT Christian Wilkins disqualified?) – “I’m calling the defense. (It was) just: next play. Next play. That’s what ends up happening. You’ve got to move on and just move onto the next play and just keep rolling.”
(I wanted to ask you about the run defense. You guys are no longer the last in the league, but you are allowing 160 rushing yards allowed per game. When we talked to you back in the spring, you said that is your top priority. What is it going to take for this defense to get better when it comes to containing the run?) – “The run game again, to me, it starts with the mentality, I think in this league. I think our focus on that is starting to improve. It starts with mentality. Then after that, just in terms of understanding how we have to defend the run in this league to be successful. Then after that, it goes back to the fundamentals: set the edge, play with power inside and proper pursuit angles to the ball. All things that I think we’re working to get improved upon. Honestly, what we’re doing is we’re starting in practice trying to work it. Whether it’s individual drills, whether it’s extra 9-on-7; whatever it may be, we’re doing what we have to do to improve that. Any improvement we’ve seen is because of practice. Now what’ll happen this week is the challenge – you’ve got (Steelers James) Conner back there. It doesn’t matter what you work on, you’ve got to tackle that guy. (laughter) You’ve got to defeat the blocks of this offensive line who is probably one of the bigger offensive lines in the league and they have tight ends that are willing to block. It all comes back to we’re trying to improve it in practice and then what we do on Monday, we’ll see, because it’s definitely a challenge with Pittsburgh. They’ve been violent with their double teams. You’ve got (Steelers G David) DeCastro pulling. You’ve got all this stuff going on. These guys are again, a very good up-front offensive line. (They are) strong guys, big guys and they’ve got good backs.”
(How do you explain the two takeaways in the season and how do you get more of those?) – “Again, to me, what we’re going to try to do is, it starts with practice. Not to sound cliché, but we’re practicing to get the turnovers. The thing that’ll happen, usually a lot of times they come in bunches. We’ve got to get our hands on more balls. We’ve got to force some more turnovers, but we’re working to improve that. There are teams that are a little bit more prone to ball disruption and some that aren’t, but we’ve got to find ways to get the ball off of them.”
(Are you surprised that by only two takeaways at this point in the season?) – “Surprised? We need more. Let me just put it that way. We need more, so that’s what we’re working on.”
(You’ve used a formation from time to time with one lineman and whole bunch of linebackers and DBs. What needs to happen with that formation to make it work?) – “Well, just in the NFL in general, you want to try to be multiple out of whatever you do. Here’s the thing I’ll explain to some of my friends. I’m like, all I do is football aside from my family. That’s all I do. If you stay in one thing the whole time, people will figure it out, so that’s a part of it. You’ve just got to keep growing it and then again, you start getting input from the players, input from the other coaches. Then it just starts to grow and you see where it goes from there. Again, if it’s not going to work for that week, we won’t use it. So for this week, who knows? I don’t know. We’re not even there yet, to be honest with you. We’re still focused on the people and the early-down stuff right now, but it’s all based on what we think is going to be best for this week.”
(It seems like you got a pretty good result with it, though, does it not?) – “Yeah, I think it’s been – again, we’ve got to get the win. That’s the main result I’m more concerned with, but we’ve gotten some pressure. We’ve forced them not to convert on third down. We’ve had some success with it; but again, whether it’s going to be a viable option for this week or not, we’ll see when we get to the point studying it.”
(You mentioned earlier how Head Coach Brian Flores of course has an input on play-calling, the game plan and everything. I was trying to think about what that’d be like because you’re the guy that makes the calls. I was thinking maybe it’d be like I’m cooking dinner and my wife is making suggestions all the time. “How about adding some mushrooms? You need some more salt and pepper.” What’s it like?) – “(laughter) Well, you know (Brian Flores and I) shared a office together for like four or five years. I’m not saying we’re completing each other’s sentences, but we go into it as he’s the head coach, (and the) coordinators and assistant coaches being on the same page. That’s in terms of the input there. Whatever Coach (Flores) wants to input during the game, he can; but we spend a lot of time together. (laughter) I don’t know if it’s like cooking dinner. I don’t want to go that for. You come up with whatever you want to come up with on that one. (laughter)”
