Skins Quotes 10/2/19: Jay Gruden

[Boone]

October 2, 2019

Head Coach Jay Gruden

Opening Statement:
"Did not participate: [TE] Vernon Davis, concussion; [TE] Jordan Reed, concussion; [QB] Case Keenum, foot; [G Brandon] Scherff, ankle; [LB] Josh Harvey-Clemons, hamstring. Limited were: [C Chase] Roullier, knee, [WR Terry] McLaurin, hamstring; [CB Josh] Norman, knee.”

On how QB Colt McCoy did in practice today:
“We did a limited day today, just a little seven-on-seven, a lot of walkthrough, but he got a lot of the reps. He looked fine.”

On whether McCoy looked closer to where he needs to be:
“Well, he practiced last week and I thought he had a good week of practice. The thing was, we weren't going to allow him back to practice until he felt 100 percent. So, last week he felt 100 percent and was cleared to go through practice and got a few reps last week, and we'll probably add to it this week.”

On whether McCoy and QB Dwayne Haskins Jr. are splitting first-team reps:
“We'll see tomorrow. Today, like I said, we did mainly seven-on-seven, a little bit of walkthrough. We'll see tomorrow.”

On when Davis started to feel concussion symptoms:
“He reported them after the game.”

On what it means to be down two tight ends:
“He's in a protocol, Jordan's in a protocol and [TE Jeremy] Sprinkle and [TE Jerome] Cunningham are going to get the majority of the work, unless we bring somebody else in.”

On confusion on offense and whether changes need to be made:
“I don't know if it's confusion or execution. A lot of times there's 10 guys on the same page, running the right route and protecting right. Sometimes it's the quarterback and sometimes it's the receiver lining up wrong. I wouldn't say it's too hard, our offense isn't very hard. The execution wasn't very good and we didn't make any plays – we had some guys open, missed some guys – a combination of a lot of things. We've been teaching this thing for a while. We've just got a lot of young guys playing it. You know, [G] Wes Martin played for his first time, we had a couple receivers playing in their first significant minutes, quarterback, obviously his first time at the end of the first half, second quarter. So there will be some indecision, not so much confusion.”

On what he means by not having a QB right now:
“I said I'm not going to name one right now. We have three, actually. But I said I'm not going to name one right now. It's early in the week, Case is still in a boot right now and obviously, Colt, I need to see what he can do as far as getting a little bit more reps in his repertoire and Dwayne, as well.”

On Keenum's injury:
“He's still in, pretty much, discomfort. It's just a matter of what he can tolerate or not. I thought he looked good enough in Friday's practice that he could tolerate it, but he's still in a lot of pain. He was on game day, that's part of the reason I made the change when I did. He's had some progress, made some progress, thought it'd be smart to take it easy on him today and see where he's at tomorrow.”

On when to expect a QB decision:
“Yeah, I'll make it. We'll announce it or I'll announce it to them eventually. We'll get the guys ready to go.”

On what he needs to see to make a QB decision:
“I have to see some things for me to make the decision and that'll come out here at practice tomorrow. Hopefully, after tomorrow's practice I'll have a good indication of who I want to play. So, yeah, in my mind I have a pretty good plan, contrary to belief.”

On the challenge of keeping morale high:
“It's not easy. These guys put a lot of work into it from OTAs to training camp to now. Everybody's a little bit disappointed in the outcomes of these football games, the way we've played, the way we've performed, the way we've coached, we're all surprised by it without a doubt. But this is pro football and you're going to have a lot of rocky times from time to time when you have a lot of new guys playing. We have not performed up to par and that's a reflection of me as a coach, and it's my job to get these guys ready to play and it's their job to get ready to play and to play. It's a combination of things. I expect the guys in the locker room to come out fighting, I know the coaches will come out working hard like we have yesterday, today, the day before, the day before that, the day after that. We're going to continue to work hard and get these ready to go the best way we can.”

On whether he's made a decision privately:
“Well, it is the most important position in pro sports, without a doubt. You would love to have some continuity there, some consistency there. Unfortunately, we have not had that luxury here in awhile. Until we get that luxury, until we start to have that, that's probably when you'll see some different results. I feel good about all three quarterbacks and they all bring something different to the table. We've just got to settle on one and get him ready to go. When that guy gets his opportunity they have to take advantage of it and dominate the position and never look back.”

On where the lack of confidence most hurts the team:
“Well it's everywhere, really. It's the leader of the team. The offensive line, they've got to have confidence in the quarterback. Running backs, receivers, defense – you know, turning the ball over nine times in two games hurts the defense a lot, hurts the special teams. So, we've got to get better there.”

On what to make of the number of penalties in the last game:
“I'm just disappointed in the way it's all panned out so far. We're seeing similar types of things on the other side of the ball and some of them aren't getting called, and we're getting called on a lot of them. It's disappointing, it's hard to explain to your guys, why Landon Collins is sitting at the point, a guy runs into him and they call illegal contact. Then the same thing happens on the other side of the ball and there's no call. We're teaching the right thing. It's a matter of sometimes the referees see it differently, and we just continue to coach our hand usage and do the best we can.”

On how to get more consistent at limiting penalties:
“Well, we can't bring the referees that are going to do our game to practice. I wish we could, but we can't do that. I think we just have to continue to understand. We show clips every week of penalties that were called, we show the referees that are going to do our game what they've called and we try to give them an understanding of what type of guy – last week we had the referee crew that throws the most flags and we knew that going in. Unfortunately, we had some calls that were arguable, but they were called. We've got to do a better job, I've been saying it for 15, 20, 30 weeks now. We're getting called a lot.”

On what Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick does well:
“He's got a smart football team, for sure. He's able to do a lot of things on defense: line up personnel groups, stunts on the inside, they line up in different fronts, different coverages, they play tight man-to-man. He's a very good defensive coach, fundamental coach and scheme coach. He can take your best player out of the game, whoever he thinks that is, and make other guys beat you and they can cover the heck out of them. They change up their coverages and give you different blitz patterns and stunts. It's a disruptive defense, it really is, and you never know what exactly you're going to get. You go through these walk-throughs and you line guys up where you think they're going to be and on gameday it's going to be totally different. You have to adjust, so your rules have to be sound on offense. Then offensively, 12 [QB Tom Brady] runs the show. [Offensive Coordinator] Josh McDaniels does a great job calling plays for them and Tom does a great job executing.”

On whether Davis's injury impacts whether Reed will go on IR:
“No."

On whether the QB controversy will impact Haskins' development:
"I don't think so, not his first year. I think different quarterbacks throughout the history of the NFL, there are guys that are more ready to play early and there are guys that may need a year or two. It's really depending on the player. It should not hinder his development whether or not he gets thrown out and doesn't perform up to speed, or whether he sits for a year and learns a systems and continues to see how to prepare. It's not the end of the world if he doesn't play another snap. If he starts every game and doesn't do very well, it's good experience for him. You can argue both sides of the coin right here. No matter what we do with him, we're going to be wrong, so it doesn't really matter. My view is that I've got to do what's best for him and what's best for this football team and what I think is best. We'll decide that here shortly."

On roster moves after Davis' injury:
"Yeah, we'll probably make a move here this afternoon after practice, probably move one of our guys up from practice squad. Get him activated, get another body on the roster."




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk