BB: Good morning. Watching the Jets against Tennessee, seeing the tape of that game, it was a
very good win for the Jets. I thought they did a lot of things well in that
game, [defensively] they turned the ball over three times. They played very
well in the kicking game. That was a big return by [Justin] Miller that kind of set up the last game-winning drive. And they had a very
productive day offensively -- [Chad] Pennington, [Laveranues] Coles -- and they moved the ball, and they did it when it counted. So
it's a team that, really in the first week of the season, did things better
than a lot of other teams did in terms of turning the ball over, special
teams, total offense, those type of things. It doesn't really surprise me.
There's a lot of talent on the team. They did a good job and they played
very well down there in Tennessee. My big focus is getting our team to
improve. There are certainly a lot of things that we can do better starting
with the coaching. We just want to do a better job this week of getting our
team ready to play and hopefully we can play better than we did last week.
We're going to go on the road and that's a big challenge for us, it always
is down there. It's a tough stadium to play in, so there will be a lot of
energy, a home-opening game for them, and we'll have to bring our energy
level to match what's going to be down there in Giants Stadium.
That's our challenge this week, that's what we're going to be working on.
Q: Can you kind of see Eric [Mangini's]
stamp on the team already?
BB: I don't know. I'm sure there's a
lot of people, a lot of forces that work down there. They have a big staff.
They have a lot of people. They're going to develop their own style,
whatever that is. So far, it looks pretty good.
Q: Was there a point when you thought
that Eric could be a head coach?
BB: I don't know. That's not any kind
of decision that I have to make. I don't own a team so I don't know what
owners, or sometimes general managers, whoever is making the decisions, are
looking for in their specific situations. I don't know. Each franchise is
different. Each franchise makes their own independent decisions in whatever
form or fashion they make them in. I try not to get too concerned or worry
about all of that. I'm just trying to coach this team.
Q: When he worked for you did you see
him as a head coach one day?
BB: Again, that's not my decision to
make. I see coaches as coaches. I ask them to do things in our organization
that help us win. What the outside world, how they view things or what their
decisions are, whether it's Eric or Romeo [Crennel] or Charlie [Weis] or Pat Hill or Kirk Ferentz or Al Groh or Nick Saban or whoever they are. Those aren't my
decisions. They're somebody else's. When those organizations or schools or
teams make them, then they make them. It's not anything I have any control
over. So I don't really worry about it.
Q: Are there things in particular
that were special about Eric when he worked for you?
BB: He worked hard. He worked hard.
He had a lot of different responsibilities. He started back in Cleveland,
really, with no responsibility at all, and worked his way up to a
coordinator position. There's a lot of steps along the way.
Q: Are there similarities here that
you see in the Jets system?
BB: I don't know. I'm sure there's
similarities to every system. There are some things that, maybe, are similar
to the way we do them. I'm not really worried about that. I'm worried about
how we match up against them and how we're going to compete against them. I
don't think they're trying to replicate anything down there. I wouldn't say
that, no.
Q: What are the pros and cons of
rotating running backs in and out of the game?
BB: I don't have any idea. All I can
comment on is our situation. We're trying to do what's best for our football
team and utilize the players at our positions in a way that we feel they can
be productive. What somebody else is doing, why they're doing it, you'd have
to ask them. I really don't know.
Q: Are there any pros and cons to
using two backs?
BB: I think whatever you decide to do
as a coach is what you think is best for your football team. If that's one
guy running certain plays and another guy running different plays, guys
splitting carries, one guy having all of the carries, one guy blocking, the
other guy running, whatever you decide to do, it's because you feel that's
what's going to make your football team the most productive within your
system. Each system is different. Each player or players that are involved
in it are different. I'm not sure that one necessarily is right for somebody
else. It could be, but I don't think that's necessarily the case.
Q: Coach [Brian] Schottenheimer is there now. Is there a lot more carryover? Is there a
difference in their offense?
BB: Again, I don't know. I don't know
what percentage is who and what percentage is somebody else. I think you
just look at the team and try to defend what their threats are and figure
out where you think they're going to attack you and try to make sure that
you're ready for those points of attack. I'm sure there are a lot of people
that have input in their program. I don't know exactly who decides what or
what percentage of what is who's. I really don't know. I'm not sure I really
care. I just know what we see and what we have to deal with. I don't really
know who's idea it was or what the genesis of it was.
Q: Does Pennington look better
than he has over the last few years?
BB: Well, he didn't play last year.
He played well. He had over 300 yards passing. He had some big plays. He
didn't really have any bad throws. He took care of the ball. They moved the
ball efficiently. He did a good job. He looked good in preseason. They've
looked good in preseason. The Jets have looked in preseason period.
He's part of that. He has a good receiving corps, a good offensive line,
tight end, the backs run hard. They have a good offensive unit. They were
productive.
Q: Are your personal feelings for Eric different now that he's the head coach of the Jets?
BB: No, but professionally we're
competing on the same field. We're on the opposite sides of it.
Q: Is one of Pennington's
strengths is he takes care of the ball?
BB: I think that's a key to any good
quarterback. That's the most important thing, is to come away with
possession at the end of the play. There's nothing worse than losing
possession of the ball. You can't score that way and you end up giving up a
lot more points in the long run. It's just hard to overcome those turnovers.
I think he does a good job of that. I think if any good quarterback that you
talk about, you'd have to put in that category, that they don't give the
ball up too easily.
Q: How would you evaluate your
receivers and the separation they had from the Buffalo defenders?
BB: I think that we can improve in
every aspect of the game, every aspect -- offense, defense, special teams,
every aspect of the passing game. We can block better. We can coach better,
let's start with that. We can coach better. We can block better. We can
throw better. We can catch better. We can run routes better. We can do all
of those things better. We can improve in every area, that includes
everybody, all 11 players that are out there, every coach on the offensive
staff, the head coach, everybody that is involved in the passing game,
everybody that is involved in this football can do better than what we did
last week. There's room for improvement from everybody and that's what we're
going to work on.
Q: They have a couple of new guys on
the offensive line. Has their style of play changed at all?
BB: They have a couple of young
players there. [Nick] Mangold has been very impressive. I
think he looks very good in there at center. He's a strong, powerful guy.
[He has] good movement in the running game. He really gives them a good
solid level of play in there. He's been very impressive. They've pretty much
rotated three tackles in preseason and three guards. Those guys have all
played and they've all done a solid job. Sometimes it's sort of hard to tell
who is in there and who isn't. It's not that noticeable. Mangold pretty much
has gone all the way to center. Like I said, he's been very impressive.
Q: Have they changed their running
game at all without [Kevin] Mawae in there?
BB: It's a new staff. It's different
than it was last year, that's for sure. He was out quite a bit last year
anyway. He only played, I don't know, three or four games. Whatever it was,
it wasn't very many. He wasn't there last year either.
Q: Can you talk about the special
challenges that you and your team face this week preparing for a team whose
head coach was one of your coordinators last year?
BB: I think that's really all in the
past. The thing we have to focus on is how we can, number one, improve and
number two how we match up against the Jets. That's really what it's about.
Every week we play somebody that had a player on their team or a coach that
was on our team and that kind of thing. This is about the hundredth time
that that has happened. I don't think that's anything that is that
extraordinary. I think probably pretty much every team to the league goes
through it. Last week it was Jonathan Smith and André Davis.
It's every week. I'm not too worried about that. I'm a lot more concerned
about us improving as a football team and us being ready to specifically go
up against the challenges of the Jets personnel and their schemes.
Q: With only one regular season game
to go on, do you still put stock in the preseason games?
BB: I think you have to look at the
whole body of work. That's five games, but there's no question that the Tennessee game was I think more indicative of really what they want to
be than what preseason was. Some of the things they did in preseason just
set up things they did in the Tennessee game. I think it probably caught
Tennessee a little bit off-balance on some of those. We'll look at it. We'll
take it into consideration. I think we're going to have to be ready for
everything and that's really about the way this game is shaping up. It's not
any straight line course. They're going to give us some things that we
haven't seen and some things that we're going to have to adjust to. We're
going to have to be ready for them.
Q: How concerned, if at all, are you
about the "Deion Branch Hangover"?
BB: I don't know. We're trying to get
ready for the Jets. That's what I'm concerned about, is getting ready
for the Jets, so that's what we're going to try to do.
Q: They like to rotate their running
backs in there. What challenges do they bring, individually and
collectively?
BB: They're all tough. They all have
pretty good size, [Derrick] Blaylock and [Kevan] Barlow and [Cedric] Houston. [Rashad] Washington is a little bit smaller, but he's strong for his size. He really has pretty
good playing strength even though he is kind of a Kevin Faulk size-ish
kind of guy, but he's a strong player. He runs hard. They're all tough.
They're all hard to tackle. They're physical players, again, even Washington
in spite of his size. He kind of has a physical presence to his game,
believe it or not. They all can pass protect. They all can catch the ball
and they all run hard. Even though they're all different, I think the
similarities are that they're tough, hard-nosed runners that break tackles.
Q: How has Jonathan Vilma adjusted from the Tampa-two system to this new two-gap system?
BB: Well they played quite a bit of
3-4 last year too. So we've seen him in there before. He's a good football
player. You could probably pretty much put him at any spot that you wanted
to and I think he would still be a good football player. He'd be productive.
They've played some elements of 3-4 last year, quite a bit actually, using [John] Abraham as an outside linebacker, stand up defensive end, whatever
you want to call it, he was in there on a guard level or uncovered against
the guard. We've seen him in those situations before. He can handle himself
in there. He's a good football player.
Q: What is the biggest challenge of
defending the no-huddle?
BB: Communication, whichever side of
it you are on. If you were running it or you were defending against it,
everything goes a little bit quicker. You just have to have communication
with all 11 players, however that is done. When you huddle, it's a little
bit easier because you have them all right there, although a lot of times
that changes after the huddle breaks anyway based on if the offense is
audibling, if the defense is checking a coverage or whatever. I think the
big thing is communication.
Q: Is substituting harder on defense?
BB: It depends on what they do. If
they don't sub, then it's harder for you to sub. If they sub, then you can
sub. If they want to keep the same personnel on the field, then you're
pretty much locked into that personnel, unless you can find the right time
to substitute based on the ball running out of bounds or it being a deep
pass or that type of thing.
Q: What are the challenges for
defenses against a team who uses multiple backs?
BB: I think you have to be aware of
who is in there. I think you definitely have to be aware of who is in there
if they have different running styles, especially if they're dramatically
different, then you need to have an idea of that player's running style,
both in the way that they attack the line of scrimmage, but also if you're
tackling them, some guys have different methods of trying to break tackles.
Guys will lower their shoulders, some guys will stiff-arm, some guys try to
stop and cut back, spin, that type of thing. So I think it's just something,
that as a defensive player, that you want to have an awareness of what the
runner's favorite moves are, what type of things you need to be ready for.
Sometimes if you're not really on top of it, and you get surprised and you
get beat on a move that you might not have gotten beat on if you really were
focused on, 'Well, this is the guy with the ball and this is what he likes
to do.'
Q: How about the challenges for a
rookie left tackle?
BB: We've seen that before and we've
played with rookie left tackles, rookie right tackles. A football player is
a football player. There's on-the-job training, but if the player has enough
talent and he's smart and he works hard and the guy has been on the field
the whole training camp and gotten all the reps and everything, then this is
his sixth game and we've had tackles in that situation. We've had them there
last year. We've had them here in previous years. It depends on the player.
It depends on how he responds to those challenges. I think the Jets have plenty of talent on their offensive line. I don't think that's a
problem.
Q: With Brad Smith, do you
have to pay special attention to him when he's in the game just because of
the trick plays they use him on?
BB: Absolutely, and they've used him
as part of their offensive package gadget plays and things like that.
They've also used him as a decoy. He had a 60-something yard reverse against Washington for a touchdown. He had a big play last week. Obviously he
can throw the ball. He ran plays at quarterback in preseason, where he was
actually under center taking the snaps. There's a variety of things that
they can do with him. I'm sure that they have some plays that are designed
for him to run when he's in there, either under the center or not under the
center in the backfield or out of the backfield as a receiver, half back
passes, reverse passes, stuff like that. I'm sure that those types of plays
are in their repertoire somewhere and I think we just have to be alert.
We're not going to know which one it is. We probably haven't seen the play
run. I'm sure that they have those types of plays available to them and
we're just going to have to be alert and carry out our responsibilities so
that we're able to defend them.
Q: Obviously, the emphasis each week
is to coach better and play better. Is that more the case this week because
it means you could go 2-0 in the division? It's pretty big.
BB: Well, sure, it's an opportunity
down there. We're playing another game in the division on the road, which
makes it a big game and we're playing for first place. I don't think you can
get a more important scenario than that, especially this early in the
season. It's the position that you'd like to be in. I think that adds a
little bit of extra importance to it, just like it did last week opening in
the division at home. That being said though our focus still has to be, and
the only way we're going to get a positive out of that, to practice better,
coach better, play better and improve our performance over last week. That's
where it really needs to be. Sure it's an important game. Every division
game is and I know it's early in the season and nobody is going to clinch
anything here, but you always want to get off to a good start and get out on
top and so that's an opportunity here. One of these two teams is going to be
in first place on Sunday night and one of them isn't.
Q: With the Brad Smith thing,
is it fair to say that Kordell Stewart was the first player that was
kind of the first one used the way that guys are traditionally used now,
like [Antwaan] Randle-El?
BB: We did that with [Ray] Lucas a little bit here, but I guess that was after Stewart. He
probably would have been one of the first. I'm trying to think back. There
were some other quarterbacks that played other positions, but that probably
ended up being their primary position as opposed to quarterback/something
else and go back to quarterback.
Q: The Steelers kind of
pioneered that a little bit using a quarterback that way, right?
BB: Yeah, '94, '95 whenever it was.
That added an element to it because he was a college quarterback yet he was
athletic enough to play on the perimeter and could run and catch and carry
the ball and then eventually come back under center. They split [Neil] O'Donnell out. They had a significant package of stuff with him in
there.
Q: Do you want to see Eric do
well in his career, except this week against you?
BB: I'm more concerned about us doing
well. Really, I don't sit around the league cheering for everybody else. I
cheer for the Patriots. That's my team. I want to see us do well and
I want to do everything I can to help us do well and that's really where my
focus is. Everybody else is on their own, just like I'm sure we're on our
own. It's one thing to cheer for Charlie, it's another thing to cheer
for Pat Hill, but in this league, I'm worried about the New
England Patriots and that's it.
Q: You'll cheer for Pat Hill and Charlie Weis?
BB: Sure. We're not in competition
with them. I hope they all do well. When they play each other, like Virginia/Fresno a couple years ago, then that's a tough one. In
this league, they're not tough. I root for the Patriots every Sunday,
like a lot of other people around here do, I might add.
Q: How is Doug Gabriel progressing?
BB: Good. I think Doug is
coming along well. He's a smart guy. He's spent a lot of time with our
offensive coaches, especially Coach [Brian] Daboll, the wide
receivers coach. I think that he is getting a good understanding of his
assignments. It's always the execution and timing and all of that at that
position. It's an important element of it, but in terms of learning it and
understanding it, what we do is quite a bit different and it's called a lot
differently than they way they did in Oakland, but that being said, I
think the mental part of the game for him is coming pretty good and again he
is a smart guy. He understands concepts and he understands how to get open
and I think that's important for a receiver. I think that part of it is
good. |
