Chiefs Head Coach Andy Reid
Press Conference Quotes
September 9, 2013
OPENING STATEMENT:
"Alright, I'll give you the injuries real quick. Jamaal (Charles) has a quad contusion. He does have a range of motion, but we'll just see how he does here, over this week. He is moving around today, he's ok. Team victory. I was proud of the guys for that. It was nice to see the offense and the defense supporting each other along with the guys supporting the special teams, coaches and everyone seemed to be into it. Then they, like you should in the National Football League, cherished the victory. It's great to see how many Chiefs fans we had in Jacksonville. By the end of the game, that whole lower bowl area was all red. Our players, I know, appreciate that.
I thought defensively, the defense came out and played very good football. You take those first 13 drives and anytime you can hold a team to 70 yards total offense, is an achievement. You know pressuring the quarterback is a big thing in the National Football League, really able to do that and accumulating six sacks is a big thing. That's a large number, by any means and Justin (Houston) had three of those. I thought he did a nice job there. I thought offensively, we did some good things. It's tough to score in the red zone in the National Football League and when we were in the red zone, we took full advantage of that. I thought Alex (Smith) had a good day. His quarterback rating showed that he was somewhere 94-and-above. I thought he handled the situation of managing the offense very well. He made some nice throws, some nice check-downs. In order to do that, that means the other guys have to be doing their job, too. I thought the big guys did a good job of protecting him. We did some good things early in the run game.
Special teams, I thought both of them, Dustin (Colquitt) and Ryan (Succop) did a nice job with getting Jacksonville in a field position bind, so whether it was on kickoffs or whether it was on the punts, we were able to make field position an advantage for the Chiefs. Dexter (McCluster), I thought in the return game did a nice job of getting it on the plus side of the field and gave us the opportunity to work a short field."
As far as the running game—would you like to see more than you were able to accomplish?
"They loaded the box up, which you expect them to do (being) down by what they were down. We just have to do a better job there. I could help them out a little bit with some of the calls. If we need to get some different personnel groups, we can do that too."
Putting Cyrus Gray in for the majority of the snaps over Knile Davis when Jamaal Charles went out—is that a veteran thing? Are you confident in Knile?
"We mixed it up a bit. You saw Knile in there; he was in for a few snaps. We're using Cyrus in some third-down situations. We're trying to use all of them the best we could, so that's what we did. You could say he's a veteran. He hasn't been at it that long, but he's been at it longer than Knile."
*There were nine receivers that Alex Smith threw passes to; how important is that, to spread it around? *
"I think the more guys you can utilize, the more pressure it puts on a defense. If you have to cover everybody, you can't favor one guy and that's always been part of this offense. Move it around and give everybody an opportunity. You want to make sure, and John (Dorsey) has done a nice job, making sure that the players have that flexibility within the offense to make plays. In this day and age in football, you don't see fullbacks do what our fullback did yesterday and that's (because) some of those guys are glorified guards. So, it gives you that flexibility. You have to cover them or he's going to do some damage and that's important."
What you guys did defensively, is that a snapshot of the disruptive nature of this defense?
"It's our type of defense, yes. Using everybody, yes. We played a lot of players. Bob (Sutton) put different guys in different positions, where they all had an opportunity to be in the box and rush; whether you're playing outside corner, whether you're playing the inside nickel positions or safety positions, everybody had that opportunity—linebackers (too). I think that's important that you can give an offense different looks, so they can't key in on where people are coming from. I think the players enjoy that. That's something that they'd buy into and enjoy doing. You give them that opportunity."
We saw a fair amount of attack defense; do you see kind of a perk, when everyone knows they're going to get a chance to blitz or attack?
"You preach attack when you're a defensive coach. You're not doing it every snap; you're picking and choosing through your scouting process of the team throughout the week. You're going to pick and choose when you're going to do those things. Then you're going to let guys have that opportunity to do it. Guys love blitzing; that's the nature of the game here. So, at least on the defensive side, they love the chance to be a part of it."
What's the philosophy behind the up-tempo offense?
"It's two-fold. We mix the tempo; there are times when we huddle, there are times when we go fast, there are times when we go at a normal rate, and really it's just a balance. You want to try to keep the defense as much out of balance as possible. Within that, if they (the other team) get tired, we're okay with that."
Justin Houston felt some of his sacks were coverage sacks; can you talk about the defensive secondary?
"That's like what I said about offensive and defensive lineman, it's hard to get a sack unless you have blocking and the secondary doing a nice job. He's right when he says that. The other thing was, they were rally sacks, where Justin (Houston) was right there and another guy right behind him. That part is encouraging. They were swarming to the quarterback the best they could, not that they weren't blocking, there were guys being blocked, but they were working fast to get to the quarterback aggressively."
Do you have a good handle of what went wrong with the punt block?
"We do. I was asked this before and we have no excuses, but we do have some new people coming in who are busting their tail and working their tail off, but sometimes there are some protections or looks that you haven't gone over. And they got us; it's that simple. Maybe in another week, communication will be better; guys will be on the same page. But they ended up doing that; they worked that out and finished it up strong. But they got us, and they did a good job of it."
Was it validating for you to win your first game as Chiefs head coach?
"There's a lot of emphasis put on the first game within the league. I keep in perspective that it's one out of 16 games and hopefully more that you have an opportunity to play, so I understand that. On the other hand, I'll always tell you that you work your tail off to win every game and that's what you do. So every victory you get, you're going to cherish and enjoy it for that small window that you get to enjoy it. To have won the first one of the year, it's great. I think as I was saying in the opening statement, it was neat to see the offense and the defense and the coaches; they were very excited. We also know that we enjoyed it and now, we're moving on and getting ready for the Cowboys."
What did it mean to you when Clark Hunt gave you the game ball?
"I appreciated it; that was very kind of him. When he gives it to me, he's really giving it to the team and that really means more than the individual. I know it's not a one-man sport, I know that, and the guys, we were all able to gather around the ball and break down the team with it. Everybody has a little piece of that ball."
It was almost like a competition with the number one and number two picks playing against each other in the first game, how did Eric Fisher do?
"Well Jason (Babin) got him on the first one, on the first pass rush, Jason is one of the better pass rushers in the National Football League, but then he just settled down after that. I thought he did a good job after that. But the first one he got a little taste of it and then he did a nice job. I thought Luke (Joeckel) did a nice job, too. I think they both played a respectable game."
With all of the new elements with this team leading into this game, how would you characterize how this team molded together?
"I thought for the most part it was pretty smoothly executed on both sides of the ball and on special teams. When I say the communication, we brought in seven new guys, so we've incorporated them into the special teams part of it, so they're catching up on all the terminology and everything; that's understandable and I've got it. I thought overall, I would tell you that things ran fairy smooth. Are there things we need to get better at? Absolutely. There are a ton of things that we need to work on and get better at, but these guys have the right mentality. When they come to work, they work. I've appreciated that from day one, so I wouldn't expect that to change."
