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WFT Quotes 9/24/20: Ron Rivera

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September 24, 2020

Head Coach Ron Rivera

On T Saahdiq Charles’s progress:
“I would determine it as a little bit of a setback. His progress is he hasn’t had an opportunity to practice as much
as we’d like him to. Again, as soon as we can get this straightened out, get him healthy and out on the field,
we’ll see how he does.”

On T Geron Christian Sr.’s performance against the Cardinals:
“I think he’s improving. I think he’s getting better. Again, when you watch the first half or the first quarter and
a half of Week 1 one, he didn’t play as well as he has since. I think he’s getting stronger and stronger and better
and better. Again, a lot of these young guys have not played a lot of football. The only way they get better is to
play. That’s what we’re doing with Geron Christian. That’s what we’re doing with [G] Wes Martin. We’re
putting these young guys on the football field to give them an opportunity to show us that they can play, to
develop some experience, to get the reps that they need as we go through this. It’s the same thing with Troy
Apke on the defensive side. Here’s a guy that hasn’t played a lot of football. We’ve got to get him on the field
and give him an opportunity to show us what he can and can’t do. That’s really just where we are with that.”

On preparing for Cleveland’s run game:
“Well, it’s a different style. That’s one thing I will tell you. Obviously the personnel groupings are going to be
different. Instead of having the three wide receiver sets, you’re going to see three tight end sets. So, I agree with
you we’re going to have to get physical. We’re going to have to play a stout form of defense as well. We’re
going to have to set edges and, again, not let them stretch us out. We have to be downhill and physical with
these guys.”

On evaluating the defense against a different style of offense:
“That’s the one thing we’ve done. This will be the third different style of offense we’ve played, which will be
good for us to really kind of gauge where we are. It’s the same thing with the defense. This is a different type of
defense. Actually, this defense is a little bit similar to Arizona’s. So, hopefully we’ve got a little bit of a jump
on that as far as our offense is concerned. We’ll see how it goes. We’re playing some pretty talented teams right
now. This team’s got as much talent as anyone I’ve seen.”

On if the first two games have been barometers for the team’s progress:
“Those have been really good barometers for us in terms of where we are and what we need to do. I felt good
about what we did against Philadelphia. I really appreciated the way the guys came back and did some really
good things. I was disappointed the way we started against Arizona. We had the ball in a couple positions to
score points and we didn’t. As you look at it, it’s one of the things we have to improve on and one of the things
we have to get better at. I do like what we’ve learned from both of those games. Going forward, hopefully we
can implement those things we talked about as coaches and see if we have improved. That’s really where we are
right now. Each time we play, we should see improvement where we want to see improvement. That’s what was
so disappointing about last week. We made some pretty good gains by the end of the game against Philadelphia,
but then we turned around and regressed and didn’t play well for a half. So, again, we’ve got to start faster.
That’s one thing that we have most certainly talked about as a coaching staff in all three phases. Because again,
in all three phases in the first two games we started slow and hurt ourselves.”

On wearing a mask during games:
“Well, the one thing I will say is the challenge to me, personally, is remembering that I’m wearing a mask.
Every now and then I’ll pull it down so I can be heard better, and sometimes I’ll forget to pull it back up. I can
see that happening for some of the coaches. But I agree with what [Colts Head Coach Frank Reich] said and
that’s: we as head coaches, we’ve got to set the example and we’ve got to remember first of all we’re being
viewed by millions of people. We’ve got to remember the discipline of pulling the mask back up when we’re
not talking. I get it, some guys want to be heard so they pull the mask down. But again—and I’ve done it
myself—you’ve got to remember to pull it back up. We do have to be the example.”

On reading too much into the offensive line:
“You’re reading too much into it. You do certain things to help control the defensive line, and one thing that has
helped and we’ve seen is when you run the ball effectively, the play action gets a little better and you slow your
opponent down. There’s a lot more to it instead of just saying: ‘Oh, we’re going to have the backs chip their
way out.’ Or, ‘Oh, we’re going to keep the tight ends in.’ What is the plan behind it? That’s the thing we have
to do is continue to plan for it. I like the development of our offensive line. As I said, we have some guys that
haven’t played a lot of football right now. We’ve just got to continue to work with them and develop them. It’s
a part of the process of, again, trying to put together a football team that’s competitive.”

On what he sees from DE Chase Young:
“That’s exactly it. A lot of things won’t show up in the box score—his enthusiasm, his energy level, the way he
plays at such a high tempo. Also, he does impact the run game. He’s going to be a guy that’s going to make a
couple things happen because he gets up the field and he gets disruptive and he knocks the blocking off.
Because he’s knocking, blocking off, he’s forcing the runner to cut back inside. He gets up and he sets the edge
very stout and the ball cuts back immediately. Those are the things that you want to see, not just a guy that’s a
pass rusher hopefully getting a sack, but a guy that’s impacting every phase of the offense’s game. That’s what
he does. He impacts the passing game; he impacts the running game. You can argue that [DE] Montez Sweat
does some of those things on the other side. I think we’re in a pretty good position with these young players that
we’re working to develop.”

On developing QB Dwayne Haskins Jr.’s mechanical skills:
“It’s all about developing what the player needs to have. Again, right now with Dwayne—he didn’t play a lot of
football last year. He’s still developing and as far as we’re concerned in our system, he’s not even close to what
we’re looking for in terms of those mechanics. But he’s got the skillset. He’s got a quick trigger. He’s made
good decisions. So now it’s just a matter of putting it all together and again, getting the mechanics to work as
you’re reading through your progressions. That’s the thing that you want to see with his development as far as
that’s concerned because the young man’s got what you’re looking for. Now it’s a matter of being able to put it
all together. The only way to do that is by reps, reps, reps. The more he practices, the more he plays, the more
development we’re going to see. I get anxious every time we’re ready to play an opponent on Sundays to watch
him. I want to see how he’s grown. I want to see some good things in practice. I want to see those things taken
to the football field and watch him grow and develop. That was one of the exciting things about watching Cam
[Newton] for all those years. You watch each time where he’s gotten and the big steps he took. That’s what
we’re looking for from Dwayne.”

On if he will be more cautious with roster flexibility:
“I think the tendency might be you might be a little more cautious. But, there’s a lot of pluses to all the stuff you
can do in terms of bumping guys up to the roster and off the practice squad and everything, which kind of helps
because if something were to happen you’re in a good place. The big thing that I worry about more so than
anything else obviously is we’ve got a lot of young guys that we’ve got to play. You don’t want to see those
guys get nicked because you want to see them stay out there and develop. There’s a lot of young players that,
again, the more they play, the more we’re going to learn about him and find out if these are the guys going
forward. It would be great to see a guy like Wes Martin and Geron Christian earn those positions as we continue
to go forward and say: ‘Man, that’s something we don’t have to worry about for the next few years,’ and be able
to focus our attention later when we get into the draft and free agency to where we need to fill needs somewhere
else. That’s why it’s important that a guy like Troy Apke develops, that a guy like [LB] Kevin Pierre-Louis
develops because now that’s one less position you have to worry about going forward. That would be awesome.
That’s why playing young guys right now is important and really vital for us.”

On how they will start games faster:
“That’s what we’re working to see. You can try different things each week. You can come out and say we want
to run the ball three times in a row and see how that goes. We can say we want to throw the ball three times in a
row and see how that goes. Again, it’s really building on the success—and you guys have heard me say it—
you’ve got to sustain the success. You’ve got to build on it. We’ve got to have successful plays on first and
second down because that makes the third down more accessible. We’ve just got to continue to work on the
things that we need to do to give us a chance going forward.”

On QB Alex Smith’s progression:
“Alex has done very well. You begin to see the rust starting to come off. He’s taking reps on the show team.
We’re splitting them between him and [QB] Kyle [Allen]. Kyle’s got to get his work, so we’ll have Kyle start
off and then Alex comes in. The thing that’s been really neat to watch is you start to see the arm strength come
back. You start to see all of a sudden a fast twitch in decision making. The rust is really starting to come off the
guy. It’s been really exciting, it really has.”

On his concerns with the offensive line:
“Those are always concerns. I think the big thing that we have to do is whoever’s going to come in has to
develop a sort of rapport as they work together. Now, you guys know [G] Wes Schweitzer will be the right
guard. Even though [T] Morgan [Moses] isn’t getting a lot of reps in practice during all the walk-through stuff,
he’s in there. That’s why his status is limited. So, yesterday he got some work. Today he got some work. He
was able to get in there with Wes, work on their communication. We’re trying to, again, be very aware of that
because it is important that there is a rapport. I know that Morgan and [G] Brandon [Scherff] have a tremendous
rapport and things go unsaid. Well, that’s through working together. We’re trying to create that for these two—
for Wes [Schweitzer] and Moses—as much as we can during the walk-through and during the installation
periods.”

On the biggest thing Haskins Jr. needs to improve on:
“I wouldn’t say there is one specific thing. I think there’s a combination of things. Again, because footwork
works in unison with his eyes, footwork works as he goes through his progressions and decision making. I just
think sometimes he speeds up on his progression. Sometimes his eyes are in the wrong place. Sometimes his
mechanics aren’t where they need to be. But, when you see it all together, you see those things and you see
some really good things. Even though it was incomplete, the ball he threw to [WR] Terry [McLaurin] on the left
hash, the 9-route—that was pretty doggone thrown well. The ball he threw to [WR] Steven Sims [Jr.] on the
right hash, that was well thrown. You sit there and you look at his mechanics and you say: ‘You got your reads,
your body was in position, your shoulders, eyes, everything went through the flow. On this one, you went
through your progression. You went here to here and you threw the ball there as your eyes were taking you to
it.’ That’s what you want to see, but you also want to see it consistently. I get sometimes he’s going to have to
throw off balance. I get it, he’s not going to be able to get to his reads or he’ll have to get through his reads very
quickly. But when you get to the point where you’re doing things consistently, when you get to the snap and
you go bam, bam, bam—great. Then the eyes go and the body follows in unison. That’s what you’re looking for
and you want to see it consistently. That’s what we want to see from Dwayne. He’s a little bit—I don’t want to
say gunslinger—but every now and then you see him get out of his body and just kind of, the body is here and
the arms are there. I’ve seen that story. I saw it with Cam and I see it a little bit with Dwayne. Those guys are
guys that have work to do and develop. You see it, but as you see the progress and promise, it starts to get exciting.
So that’s what we’re looking for. We’re looking to see the promise and how exciting it can be.”
 
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