BB: How's it going today? [Chad] Pennington in the red area, so I'm not having a real good one. Watching him
down there is pretty impressive. He's done great down there his whole career
and that continues to be the case. A good third-down team offensively too.
Chad's really having an outstanding year coming back from the injury and all
he's had to go through the last couple of years have been pretty impressive.
He plays with a lot of courage and a lot of talent. He's done a good job for
them. He's having a really good year.
Q: Have the Jets shown much of a
spread offense with four receivers at all?
BB: Not too much. It's more of when they take [Chris] Baker and open him
up and flex him out in their three receiver sets. They run some empty too.
Q: When they go empty, would it be Baker, a running back and three
receivers?
BB: Whatever combinations are possible, that's what they run. Kind of
like in our first game, they run a lot of different people on and off the
field. They line them up everywhere. They line their wide receivers up in
the backfield. They're running backs up at wide receiver. They bring [Brad] Smith in and he lines up everywhere. They've lined Pennington up at wide
receiver. You could basically draw a bunch of circles up there, you could
put any number in there that you want. They could be anywhere. They could be
the way you described them. There could see five other combinations.
Q: When they do that, how much stress of that put on the defensive
backfield, when they go empty?
BB: Again, they haven't been empty all that much. They do it, but they're
not really too long in anything. They're kind of always on to something
else. It's probably more three open receivers than four or five I think.
It's a pretty good dose of three open. I would say in priority, it would be
two open receivers, then three, then four and one in five would be probably
the least, but they do do them. Any time they spread you out, it's just
fundamental on offense. Anytime you spread out, you have more opportunities
to attack the field. You have less space to defend the running game or the
quarterback, whatever is left inside there. You just have fewer people and
the edges are shorter and all that. You gain one thing in terms of spread
and then it's a question of whether you can hold up with the short corners
and fewer people inside. But that's what it comes down to.
Q: Do you have a specific coach who is assigned to keeping an eye on an
opponent's personnel changes on the sidelines?
BB: We specifically look for that.
Q: Is it one person's job?
BB: Well, one on offense and one on defense. Yes,
one on offense. It's not
too bad in our normal sets, but when you start getting into multiple
receivers sets, teams that run different nickel packages or different dime
packages or it could be nickel or dime, whether they're matching it or not
matching it. It's the same thing on defense. Who they're putting in the
game, two tight ends, one tight end, three receivers, two receivers, and
that can get a little confusing when teams set just substitute one for one.
You know, they send one tight on for another tight end or a receiver for a
receiver or a DB for a DB. You're not sure if that guy is coming on to add
to the package or whether it's just a one-for-one swap out and it's really
the same personnel group they just switched one guy. That's something that
you always want to try to stay on top of.
Q: Would you be giving away too much if you told me who those people are?
BB: Yeah, well I don't think it
really matters. But I think everybody has to have... every team that I've
been on, there's always been one coach on each side of the ball that's
responsible for identifying that and then communicating it to everybody
else. I don't think you want two or three people doing it because if for
whatever reason one guy sees it differently and then somebody else… I think
one person can do it. It makes it more defined. It's hard when you're in the
press box. You usually have two people up there – one who would write things down and then the other person really
can never take their eyes off the field as long as your side of the ball is
out there. So if you're a defensive coach in the press box and you're on
defense, you can really never take your eyes off the field because there's
always a substitution, a late substitution, or something could happen there
that while you're writing, you could miss. Whereas the person who's writing
needs to kind of record the information. They might be able to look up and
get down and distance or get the play that they were running, like the
defensive call that we made, you can write that down and kind of go
back-and-forth, but I think you need one person who always has their eyes on
the field and then for them to also try to keep a chart, you don't want to
be writing while something is happening. Then if you wait until it's all
over before you write then a lot of times you forget something or you don't
get it all down and so things fall through the gap that way. My experience
has been you want to have one person on offense and one person on defense
who always has their eyes on the field when that group is out there and then
another person who is doing the writing, the primary writing or note-taking
or charting or whatever you're doing.
Q: Do you think you focusing on this week and not looking at other things
outside of just the Jets has manifested itself in that streak you have of no
consecutive losses?
BB: I have no idea.
Q: Would you like to think that it is?
BB: I don't know. I really haven't given it any thought.
Q: Are you proud of that streak?
BB: I think there's a point in time, maybe at the end of the season or at
the end of whatever, we can look back and look at things and feel good about
them. But I think when you're right in the middle of something, the
situation we're in right now, we'll just take a look at what you can control
and what's at hand and that's where my focus is. Not three weeks from now,
not three weeks behind, certainly there are things that we've done this year
that we need to do better and we can improve on, so I'm not saying there's
no significance to them. But that's already been identified. That's already
been looked at and that's already been addressed. What really needs to be
addressed now is taking whatever that information is but applying it to this
particular game. That's what we try to do.
Q: In a way, when you look at [Terrence] Wilkins' punt returns last
[week], is maybe just having it as an example is a good thing for your
kick coverage units, just because you're going in and facing [Justin] Miller this week and you could show what they did wrong on the coverage?
BB: No, I don't think it's a good thing. I'd rather go out and play good.
We know Miller is a good kickoff returner. We know that they have a good
kickoff return unit. We know that they're very good on special teams. I
think [Mike] Westhoff is one of the best special teams coaches
in the league. Once again, they're up there pretty much at the top of
everything. They haven't given up any long returns this year and they've
had, I don't know, whatever it is, five long kickoff returns. They've rushed
kicks, they've blocked kicks and they've been close to blocking a couple
more. They're pretty good at everything. I don't think we would – regardless of what
happened last week, whether we had tackled him on the one-yard line or they
returned them like they did, or further – I think we'd be going into the Jets thinking that they're very good in the kicking units and they have a very
good return game, both punts and kickoffs – punts with Timmy [Dwight], who we
know well and how aggressive and fast he is, and they do a good job of
holding those guys up in the kickoff returns with Miller. I would hope that
we would, and should, be ready to go against the Jets, regardless of what had
happened last week.
Q: You look at guys like young guys like Miller and [Laurence] Maroney who are pretty good on kickoff returns. Is that something that is just very,
very instinctive and you almost don't teach kick return or is there a little
bit of a learning curve there?
BB: I think there's definitely a learning curve and it's certainly a
timing thing, particularly on kickoff returns because it's more of an
organized return. You usually get the ball in a more consistent manner and
then the timing of the wedge and the front line blocks and so forth whereas
on punts, because you're holding guys up on the line of scrimmage, some guys
get off quicker, some guys get off slower, the gunners sometimes they're
down there. Sometimes they're not. There's a lot more variables in the punt
return game, plus you have sometimes rushes or a combination of rushes and
returns, so the distribution of the coverage gets displaced a lot more than
it does on kickoffs. I think anytime you have a returner, it's like the
execution of any other play, the passing game or whatever, that a kickoff
return has a lot to do with timing and getting the right relationships
between the blockers and the runner and the runner reading the blocks and
the blockers understanding what can happen or what can't happen on a
particular return, where they really can't let their guy go, where if you're
going to get beat you have the get beat this way and not that way and that
type of thing. Again, it all has to do with the timing and the distribution
and the relationship with the blockers to the guy running the ball, both
vertically and horizontally on the field.
Q: Obviously, the Jets have done a good job with timing their coverage
up.
BB: Yes, their blocking is good. They change up their schemes. They have
good blocking and the returner is very good and the returner makes some
yards on his own. He breaks some tackles. A couple of his long returns, now
the guys have had a shot at him. It's not like it was just the Red Sea. They
had a shot at him and he usually breaks the tackle as opposed to dodging
guys, not that he can outrun them, because he's fast and he's quick, but
he's strong and he's a very powerful guy. So Miller would run through a lot
of tackles and guys bounce off of him and then he goes. I'm just saying a
lot of his long returns, a lot of guys have a shot at him and they just
couldn't get him down. The long return against Cleveland, he runs out of a
tackle. He takes them about five or six yards to actually run through it.
The guy has him and he's kind of dragging him and then finally Miller just
pulls out of it and it was all over. He has a bunch of runs like that. He's
a strong kid, but he's fast, too, and he reads his blocks well.
Q: You used the word courage to describe Pennington's comeback. Did you
think his career was over?
BB: I don't know. I had no idea.
Q: Why did you use that word?
BB: Well, just he's missed a couple of years. It's an injury to a part of
his body that's very significant to his performance. I've had quarterbacks
before with those kinds of injuries. It's hard to get back everything that
you had before and still play to that level. I just think he's done a good
job.
Q: What doesn't come back in your experience?
Bert Jones
BB: I think those injuries could affect anybody. I've seen plenty of guys
not come back from them or combination of things. Bert Jones. When I was in Baltimore, Bert Jones he look like as good a quarterback as there was going
to be in the National Football League, for two or three year player…whatever
it was at that point…like his first four or five years in the league, I
can't imagine a quarterback looking any better than him in those first five
years. They might've been one or two, but I can't imagine there being very
many. Once he hurt his shoulder in '78 or '79, whichever year it was, he was
never the same. That was pretty much it. He never really came back. I was
with him in…I guess it was his second year, but looking back on it I would
say, one on one guy, based on where Bert was his second or third year in the
league, I can't imagine you could take too many guys over him. He could do
it all. He was great. Once he got hurt, it was never the same.
Q: Could he really throw the ball over 100 yards?
BB: Bert Jones, he could do just about anything he wanted to do. I bet he
could throw it 100 yards. Yeah, I bet he could. It was like a slingshot. And
he had so much flexibility in his shoulder. He did what I've never seen
anybody do: when you were playing catch with him, he would be throwing
the ball like this [gestures with his hands]. Bert would release the ball back behind his head, like
this [gestures with his hands], and you'd catch it and kind of [say], 'Did he just throw that ball
behind his head?' Because it happened so fast and you'd [say], 'Hey, can you
do that again?'
Q: In a tight spiral?
BB: You couldn't tell the difference.
You're standing there playing catch with him and you're saying to yourself,
'[Man] he just threw that behind his head,' and you think you'd saw it
wrong. But he would do that everyday just when he was warming up playing
catch. Athletic. Could run. Tough. He was a
great competitor. Whatever you want a quarterback to do, I would say that
Bert could do it. Now he couldn't start at LSU, [but] other than that, he could do
it. They alternated him down there. He played, whatever, every other quarter
his senior year, whatever it was. Similar to the [Tom] Brady situation,
really, where he couldn't play in college but is one of the best quarterbacks
in the league.
Q: I read in the Miami papers today where Damon Huard said in '01 when Tom Brady got hurt in the Pittsburgh game, that he came to you and lobbied
to add Dan Marino to the roster so that he could be on a Super Bowl roster.
Do you recall that conversation? Does it ring a bell?
BB: No. I can't remember. Really, I can't remember. For who? I don't
know. When you are as old as I am, your memory is not what it used to be
either. I'm not saying he didn't say that, I'm just saying that there's some
things that I don't have a very good memory about.
Q: Are you even allowed to sign people during the playoffs like that?
BB: You're allowed to make one roster move in the playoffs. Yes. How does
that work? It's one per week, I think it's a maximum of two. I would have to
go back and check the rule. It's one per week, but I think it's a maximum of
two… one per game, a maximum of two. So if you made two the first week, you
couldn't make one the second week. I think it's something like that. You can
indefinitely make one, but you're limited. There's a limitation on that. You
couldn't make like six.
Q: Anyone ever put in a call to Barry Sanders?
BB: Well, first of all, if I'm not mistaken, Barry Sanders was on Detroit's reserve/retired list. I don't think he was a free agent. So
once you get past a certain point in the season, he wouldn't be eligible to
play for another team anyway. By the NFL rules, there's an encyclopedia of
rules, in terms of players, there are really only two classifications.
Either a player is active or he's on reserve. That's it. There's 50 reserve
categories – military, NFI, PUP, injured, etcetera, but if a player is
active then he counts on your roster, whether it's 80, 53, whatever it is.
If he's on reserve, then he's out and is in that reserve category. Like in a
PUP reserve, there is some shuffling that can go on, but again once he's on
that PUP reserve category, he's locked in there for a certain amount of time
even on that rule. You're never really in purgatory where you can go back
and forth. You're either on reserve or you're active and it's cut and dry.
Like I said, there's some classifications within those categories, so if you
are reserved/retired, that's it. You're not eligible to do anything but be
on reserve.
Q: How has Patrick Pass looked this week?
BB: Good. He's had a good week. It's good to him back out there. He's a
good football player. Smart. Can do a lot of different things. Run. Catch
the ball. Play on special teams. It's good to see him back out there. He's
had a good week.
Q: Does he look pretty healthy?
BB: Yes. He does. I think he's had a good week all the way around, moving
around, like I said doing a lot of different things. He has got involved in
everything. He spent some time after practice polishing up on some areas.
He's had a good week. |
