BB: I think we have the same feeling
today that we left Buffalo with last night, which was it's good to win a
division game on the road. There were a lot of things in the game that I
think are positives that I think we can build off of. I think there were
also a number of things in the game that we need to do a better job of and
we, as usual, addressed those today. [We'll] try to continue to work some
improvements in all three phases of the game. The players are trying and
we're trying to head in the right direction and I think we are taking steps
to get better. We still have a long way to go. We have us real strong test
this week in Minnesota. The Vikings are really good football team. They're
very good on defense. They're good in all three phases of the game. They can
run it. They have some good skill players. They're tough at home, so we know
we'll have a tough challenge Monday night in Minneapolis. It's a team that
we don't know very well, so there'll be a lot of work this week to get in
tune and get prepared for them. But at the same time, we're excited about
the opportunity. So we'll try to put this one behind us as quickly as we can
and move on to Minnesota.
Q: Is it gratifying to see a point of emphasis from the week come to pass
in the actual game?
BB: Yes, it always is. We identify things like that every week and it's
always good to see those things take place, particularly when they help you
win. That was great.
Q: Did you ever say to yourself, "I should have said this three weeks
ago?"
BB: Believe me, it wasn't the first time we talked about it. We said it
the first time we played Buffalo. We were down 7-0, 12 seconds into the
game. The players did a good job. That was a good drive, I don't know, what
was it 13 or 14 plays? Whatever it was. A few third down conversions.
Finished the drive in the red area. It was a really nice job offensively.
That's the way you want to start. Then after they scored [Laurence] Maroney's kickoff return really answered that score and put us in good field
position to at least answer the Buffalo points. There were a number of
things there early in the game that were well done by the players and that
really put us in good position for the remainder of the game.
Q: Were all those first 14 plays on the first drive all on a script?
BB: No, not really. We have plays that we want to start the game with.
Some are ahead of others. Depending on down and distance, especially in a
game like that where there were some field conditions involved. We had some
multiple receiver groups. You don't know whether they are going to put in
their nickel or not put in their nickel or things like that. We have some
plays that we are more interested in than others to start the game. But we
don't necessarily follow a detailed script on it. A lot of it depends on the
down a distance, field position, what they do, maybe what we called the time
before, too.
Q: Could you tell that Buffalo had a point of emphasis on stopping the
run?
BB: Well, they did a good job. They're quick upfront. A couple of times
we couldn't get them at the point of attack. Then a couple of times we got
them at the point of attack, we couldn't get them off the backside. Their
secondary supported well. Give them credit. They did a good job. There are
things that I think we can do better and we'll continue to work on those
because we have a string here of seeing defenses that kind of run an
overall, general, similar style. I'm sure that we'll get some of the same
things from our future opponents that we saw yesterday. Hopefully we can do
a better job with them.
Q: Is that to say that Minnesota and Indianapolis maybe are a little bit
like what Buffalo did with the Tampa-two?
BB: I would say that they are generally in the same family. Maybe cousins
or second or third cousins. They're certainly not identical, but there are
elements that will carry over in several of the next games.
Q: The passes to [Doug] Gabriel and [Chad] Jackson, were those especially
nice to see?
BB: I think those plays ended up going where they did because of the way
the defense played and what happened on those plays. Had they played it
differently, then the ball probably would've gone somewhere else. Like I
said, I don't want to see him and I don't want to encourage him to just
throw it down there to throw it down there. The play to Gabriel off the
quick screen to [Kevin] Faulk. Gabriel was able to get a step on [Jabari] Greer and Tom [Brady] put it up there. It was a nice play. Jackson the same
thing. The corner kind of squatted there on [Benjamin] Watson and Jackson
got behind him. Had they played it differently, the ball could have easily
gone to Watson or it could have gone out in the flat to Faulk.
Q: Was the play to Gabriel, was that intended to be a fake or could Tom have thrown to Faulk?
BB: Well, you're going to read the coverage, so if they laid back there,
then you throw it to the guy in the flat.
Q: Benjamin had a productive game. How much of his opportunities are
related to the receivers?
BB: I don't know. You run the pattern and throw the ball to the guy
that's open.
Q: Are there things where if the receivers don't do certain things, then
he's less likely to be open than another guy?
BB: Well, you need good distribution on a pass pattern. You want the
receivers spaced properly, depending on what type of coverage they're in and
what the pattern is and how the pattern is designed. You want things spaced
so the quarterback has a clear view of the coverage and where to go with the
ball. Certainly everybody is a function of that, the backs, the tight ends,
the receivers. That's flare-control. All of that is important. How the
defense covers the pattern, that's not in our control. We have to read that
and get the ball to the guy that has the least coverage on him. If it's zone
coverage, the guy who has the most space. So that's what we do.
Q: Is it an incorrect assumption to think that the more opportunities you
complete down field the more opportunities that's going to open for him
maybe underneath?
BB: Possibly. That would be kind of a normal conclusion, but again you
can't control how the defense plays. There are some defenses sometimes they
just accept that there's going to be a couple of balls down the field and
they're going to live with those, but they're going to continue to take away
the short and intermediate passes and figure that the lower percentage
throws are down the field. Yeah, you might hit a couple of them, but you're
not going to hit a high percentage of them. They're going to keep coming.
Again, that's not in your control offensively. You have to react to that.
Q: Do you get a sense that there is more of a comfort level now in the
passing game?
BB: Yes, I think we've improved in the passing game over the last several
weeks. I hope we have, with the meetings and practices and walkthroughs and
everything that we've had. I think we're executing some things better in the
passing game than we did two weeks ago, three weeks ago, the last time we
played Buffalo. That being said, I still think that there's a lot of room
for growth and there's still a lot of things that we need to work on. No, I
think we're heading in the right direction. We've made progress.
Q: So you've played six games now. I think this was sort of the point
where you said in the preseason that you'd kind of have a good sense of what
kind of team you have.
BB: I said that? I think you know a lot more than you know going into
opening day. There's no question about that.
Q: What pleases you the most from what you've seen so far?
BB: I think we have a good, competitive football team. I feel like if we
go out there and play well that we can be competitive on a week-to-week
basis. Now our job is to continue to strive for that level of execution and
coaching and playing and do it against good competition, which we'll see
plenty of that in Minnesota. I think we can be competitive.
Q: Would you have not said that last year at this time?
BB: Defensively, last year at this point in the season, we were giving up
40 points a couple of games. Almost 50 percent third down conversions. I
don't know, 70-something percent in the red area. It didn't look like it was
heading that way probably a third of the way into last year's season.
Eventually that kind of turned around for the better last year. Again, I
think we still obviously have a long way to go. We have 10 regular season
games, so I hope we can improve and continue to improve in these next 10
weeks. We'll certainly work hard at it and like I said try to do the things
better that aren't being done as well as I think we are capable of doing
them and be more consistent.
Q: How much does Chad Scott's versatility help you guys with the injuries
you've had in the secondary?
BB: I think you try to build as much flexibility and versatility onto
your team as you can without not being able to do the things fundamentally
well that you need to do at your position. So there's a fine line there. Chad is an experienced player. He's very smart. He's been in the system now
for a second year. He's worked with Rodney [Harrison] and Eugene [Wilson]
and Artrell [Hawkins] and all of those guys, Asante [Samuel], they've all
worked together more. I think that helps us. Again, Chad is a smart guy. He
has a lot of playing experience. He's adept at making those types of
adjustments. We have worked him at safety. He's played safety a good part of
the year in preseason and in some of the early games. He has good position
versatility. I think that helps us overall defensively because as you
alluded to, there are times where he can either play safety responsibilities
as a corner or line up in safety alignments and either play safety
responsibilities or corner responsibilities. That makes it harder for the
quarterback and it gives you more defensive flexibility. It's great to have
that. It's great to have it.
Q: Is that rare?
BB: I think some players are more versatile than others. It's good to
have it. Some guys are very good at the position they play and doing their
job well. I don't think you're going to see [Dan] Koppen lining up at tight
end or back in the backfield or split out or anything, but he's a good
center. That's okay, too.
Q: I meant for a defensive back.
BB: Well, I'm just saying, there's guys that I think play pretty much one
position, but if they can play it well, that's good. I think you need both.
You don't want to be moving 11 guys all around at the same time. Sometimes
you need a few guys who are flexible and you can move depending on offensive
sets and different coverages that you run and so forth. I don't think you
need 11 guys on offense or on defense who have to be all things to all
people. They can just do their job and be solid in that role. I think it's
good to have a few guys that either have versatility that you can do some
different things with and then that keeps you from either getting trapped
into not doing anything or having to substitute somebody else in every time
you want a change.
Q: What kind of improvement have you seen from Junior Seau from Week One
to now?
BB: I think Junior has improved every week and he started off at a high
level. He's gaining comfort with Vince [Wilfork], and Ty [Warren], and Richard [Seymour], and Jarvis [Green], and Tedy [Bruschi], and Mike [Wright], and Rosey [Colvin], and Tully [Banta-Cain], just the more you play
together, the more you see those plays, the more consistent you can fit on
them and have the proper run responsibilities. I thought he played very well
yesterday. I think he's gotten better every…Junior works hard at it, and I
think he gets better every day and I think he gets better every week. I
think that has a lot to do with his work and his diligence, but also the
whole group functioning together and being more consistent as well. As we
talked about before, it's hard when you have people playing in front of you,
if they're not consistent, it's hard for you to be in the consistent spot.
Whereas if they're always in the same spot, then it makes it a lot easier
for you to fit off of them. I think a lot of the improvement in his play
also is related to Vince and Ty and Mike Wright and Richard and Jarvis and
those guys that are playing in front of him.
Q: Does Junior have maybe a little bit of an uncommonly high football IQ?
BB: Yes, he's very instinctive. Again, he played in a similar defense
last year in Miami. A lot of the things that we do I think are similar to
what he was doing down there. He didn't play a full season, but there are
differences too and we've talked about that. But Junior is a very
instinctive player. There are certain things defensively that, I don't care
what system you're in, at some point it's you, a blocker and a ball carrier
and a sideline. Whatever those spatial relationships are. That comes back
down to instinctive defensive football – about leverage and angles and using
your hands and tackling and all of those things. That's not really scheme
related. That's just defensive football.
Q: Didn't he play a little bit more on the line than off the line for Nick [Saban] though?
BB: When he got hurt then [Channing] Crowder really came in to play for
him fulltime. He's been more of an off the line player through his career,
although he has played both, but he's been more of an off the line player.
Q: I just though last year was maybe a little more.
BB: I think he did both. Again, there are a very multiple defense. I'm
sure he did more than one thing down there, just like he does more than one
thing here.
Q: On the injury front...
BB: We'll have one on Wednesday. You'll be one of the first ones to get
it.
Q: You cut me off before I could get it out. I was curious how you were
doing?
BB: I think I'm probable. Day-to-day.
Q: Are you more or less concerned about Richard a day later?
BB: We'll issue the report on Wednesday. I don't know. We don't have a
game today. If we were playing today, then that would be different. There's
no game scheduled today – not here.
Q: He said last night he was having more x-rays. It's the question
everyone is wondering about.
BB: And I have the answer for it – we'll give an injury report on
Wednesday. That's what it is. I'm not going to make up something and then
you come back and throw it back at me on Wednesday when it's not 100 percent
accurate. I don't know. We'll give it on Wednesday.
Q: Surely that's a factor in the game planning though, whether he plays.
BB: Look, you saw what happened yesterday. It can happen on the first
play of the game. There's no guarantee that anybody is going to be in there
for every single play of the game. I don't care what position they play.
That's true for all 11 on offense, 11 on defense and 11 on special teams,
which is really 66 on special teams because there are six teams. You have to
have people ready to fill in at different spots. It doesn't make any
difference how healthy anybody is on the first play of the game or who is
active or anything else. You have depth at every position on the field.
That's just the way it is. That won't change. It won't make any difference
what player we talk about, what position we talk about. That's true for
every single position on our team and everybody else's team. We won't
approach next week any different than we approached last week or the week
after that. We'll try to get everybody ready to go.
Q: How did you feel about your special teams' performance yesterday?
BB: I thought it was competitive. I thought we had our moments on kickoff
coverage. [Terrence] McGee hit us on another one and I didn't think we
played that one particularly well. That's obvious. They got it back to
midfield. Our punting game was good. We made some plays on punt coverage,
but it was close. [Roscoe] Parrish almost got there a couple of times. Their
punt return was okay and kickoff return. I don't think the blocking was the
greatest, but Laurence made a couple of nice runs and added some yardage to
after first contact type of things. We took advantage of our scoring
opportunities, so did they, so that was pretty much a wash. There were some
things that were good. It's good to see the ball come back on the returns.
You don't like to see those penalties on returns. You're never going to have
a good return if you have a penalty. That's something we want to eliminate.
But we haven't had very many penalties. We didn't have very many yesterday.
I hope we keep can keep making that number go down and down. That's always a
factor in the kicking game.
Q: Do you think that Laurence's size and strength is an advantage on
special teams?
BB: Well, yes, all of the skill players that handle the ball have
different strengths and weaknesses and I think that whatever those are, if
they got to this level, they have something going for themselves, whether
it's speed, quickness, strength, instincts, run vision, some combination of
those things. Yes, certainly Laurence is a strong runner and that helps him.
We've all seen him break tackles and run through arm tackles and stuff like
that. He's fast and he has good vision. He has some quickness. I think he
has a lot of things going for him.
Q: Was that return a boost for the special teams unit as a whole, even
though Larry Izzo said maybe it wasn't blocked perfectly? Was that good?
BB: Yes, absolutely. Very few are block perfectly. Even on McGee's run,
which was back at midfield there. I'm sure that's not exactly the way that
was drawn up either. He came and kind of broke a tackle there around the 20
or 25 yard line, whatever it was. That's part of it. Part of it is just
getting enough space so the returner can make a guy miss. If he gets one guy
in the open field then most returners are going to have a chance to get by
that guy. The problem is when four or five guys have him penned in, it's
hard to get out of those. I think it's definitely better. I think we can
still make that a positive for us for ourselves, if we can create field
position in the return game and give our offense, put them closer to the
goal line. We've done a pretty good job offensively of taking advantage of
good field position. The more we can do that then the better off we can be.
That goes for the whole unit.
Q: Might we see Chad Jackson more on punt returns?
BB: Maybe. I think he has some return skills. So we'll put out there who
we think is the best person or combination of people for that situation,
what we're doing, which again there's a lot of things to take into
consideration for that. Yes, he is in the mix.
Q: There was a play late in the Eagles/Buccaneers game yesterday where Brian Westbrook scored a touchdown with 34 seconds left. There were no
defenders near him, but is it asking too much of a player to see the big
picture and ask him to stop there and milk the clock?
BB: It's an interesting question. I think sitting here after the game, or
the next day or whatever, it's a great thing to talk about. Sometimes it's
kind of hard to really go through all of that when it happens that fast. You
certainly don't want to get any type of taunting penalty by not...but I know
what you're saying. I think there's a merit to that line of thinking,
actually getting it done and not having it backfire on you in some way is
another part of it.
Q: The guys were walking off the sideline thinking the game was over.
BB: There are a number of things that
could come up on that, but I definitely understand the line of thinking and
I think that there is some merit to it. I think there are also some other things that would go along with
that where I don't know if you get it all done without, like you said,
either you running on the field or you definitely don't want it to be
taunting because then that puts 15 yards on the kickoff and stuff like that.
You want to make sure that you see everybody. Sometimes you think you're
there, but then there's somebody somewhere else. Again, it's a lot easier
sometimes from when you can look at it from the press box than when you're
actually down there doing it. I still think back to the Lawrence Taylor play
in '82 against Detroit. It was on Thanksgiving Day. They were down on the
goal line on about our two or three yard line and they threw the ball out in
the flat and he intercepted. The guy who he was throwing it to who was
behind him, down on the play. So when Taylor intercepted it and the guy who
was out there fell down, there was literally nobody…once he started running,
there was nobody within 50 yards of him. He was running down the sideline
and he looked over his shoulder and he saw the shadow. Of course it was his
shadow, but he thought there was the guy right there, so he kept running and
he looked and he kept running. He's literally running as fast as he could
run and there's nobody within 50 yards of him. As he gets to the end, like
about the 20 and the 10, and then he dives and loses his balance kind of
going into the end zone and half of their team was walking off the field
like, 'Okay, he's going to score,' and they're kind of walking off the
field. Honest to God, he thought there was a guy like two feet away from
him. So it was a pretty comical play, but when you're out there and it's
happening, sometimes it's a lot different than what it looks like to us on
the sideline or if you're up in the press box where it's so obvious. We
looked at the play on film the next day. The team was rolling on the floor.
It was ridiculous. He really thought they were breathing down his neck.
Q: So he was literally running away from his own shadow?
BB: He was running away from his own shadow and I'm telling you, there
wasn't anybody within 50 yards of him. Maybe more than that. I don't even
think they were at midfield because they saw they had no chance. He was
already way out there, but he never even slowed down at all. It was truly
the 100-yard dash. |
