Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald addressed the media before the team took to the practice field to prepare for Sunday’s game against the Pittsburgh Steelers.
(Opening Statement)
“Big Wednesday for us, had a great morning so far, and great meetings. The guys are locked in, so I’m looking forward to practice. Going to Pittsburgh, it’s our first 10 a.m. game of the year. We had a lot of experience with that last year, so in terms of the process, it’ll be more of the same rather than a bunch of change ups. Looking forward to playing in a great environment against a good football team that we respect a lot. Quite a few changes on their end from last year, in terms of roster. Just one game of exposure is a little interesting in terms of how we’re scouting and game planning. As usual, we’ll keep it in our wheelhouse, go have a heck of a week, and go play a great game.”
(On only having one game to work off in terms of game planning)
“The second game of the year is tricky, because the easy thing to do is put all your eggs in the first game basket, as we know, you can just hear it’s probably not the most sound thing to do, given that. You have to take the nuts and bolts of who they are and how they operate. They have a lot of history, how they work on defense, and offense. It seems like there’s a good bit of carry-over from last year. And then let’s go play our game.”
(On what discourages defenses from staying in eight-plus man boxes)
“Well, if you throw it over their head, that’s good. Sometimes, especially in a wide zone game, wide zone is built so you can have an eighth guy in the box, and you can still run the ball effectively because of the keeper game on the backside and that’s probably the biggest thing. There are the windows of being in single high, assuming you’re meaning single high, whether you’re in cover three or cover one are a little different, but the passes tend to be a little bit more explosive. Run game as well, if you can get in the alley, you’re on the post safety, that’s tough. If you put everybody in the middle, you’re light outside.”
(On what’s challenging about building a scheme against Aaron Rodgers)
“His arm talent, the quarterback ability is there, but Aaron Rodgers, the operator, is second to none. He’s on his game and he knows everything, so you have to assume that going in and not a lot of tricking going on. We’re going to have to win our one on ones to have a good game on defense. We’re going to have to play great run defense and in the pass game, we’re going to have to win our one-on-one battles.”
(On the added challenge when it’s a new quarterback and offensive coordinator)
“You can attribute some things that you’ve seen in the first game to all three buckets, some things from last year. Like I said, it’s tricky. If I want to start playing doctor and diagnosing everything, that’s not a smart thing to do. As a game unfolds, you’ll start to get some of those answers about how they’re trying to attack you. My situation and how they’re using their people, again, it’s a similar roster, obviously, DK’s (Metcalf) there now and they lost (George) Pickens, but a lot of the same core guys were playing last year, like the tight ends and the backs.”
(On how they have to adjust the pass rush to account for how Aaron Rodgers plays) “His operation is just really great, that includes throughout the play as well. I mean, it’s Aaron Rodgers for a reason, all those details add up, over such a long period of time.”
(On what he knows about how their defense plays)
“They’re an opportunistic group that play with a great spirit; they play with physicality. They’re different than us and how they’re built and how they play some of their coverages, so that’s going to be a big point of emphasis for our offense and our team to give a great look this week, so our guys have a good feeling going into the game.”
(On how they’re using DK Metcalf differently)
“It’s one game. You have one game of 50 something plays, the things that he does well are the things that they’re doing with him, which is great. It’s runaways, it’s outside lane throws, all the routes that he runs well. He’s running those routes. Frankly, it’s similar to the stuff we did with him last year. We have to be ready for everything, right? They’re allowed to put him anywhere they want. He’s allowed to run any route that they call for him.”
(On what he needs to see from the run game)
“Yeah, just stick with the process. There’s a handful of runs that didn’t go our way on Sunday, and a handful of runs went our way. Sometimes it goes like that, we want them to go more our favor than not. It’s not for a lack of effort, and we’ve done a lot of great things throughout the preseason, which you saw in all three games. Let’s stick with it, we’re doing a lot of great stuff. Let’s just keep getting better.”
(On why teams utilizing a quick passing game)
“You have to look at it in context, is it a quick passing game on third and short, that’s kind of expected. The unexpected thing is the balls downfield which (Aaron) Rodgers probably does better than anybody, and then some of those higher leverage throws that he throws so well. Is it a quick game on third and long, which you probably wouldn’t expect, which also they do. Context is probably the driver there, is it on first and 10, normally to get the quarterback going and get him in rhythm.”
(On Nick Emmanwori) “I said that we were going to have a decision here in the next day or two, I think we’re going to take it throughout the week to decide what we’re going to do.”
(On the guy’s energy this week)
“The guys are doing great. It’s a disappointing outcome what happened on Sunday, but we have to remind ourselves, we haven’t worked the last six or so months, the way they have for one game, you’re doing it for the long haul. It’s really important that we stick to our process that we were very bought into going into the game, that we’ve been doing a lot of great things, which I believe that we have, and the guys believe we have, and we’re going to stick to that, and trust that we’re going to keep getting better.”
(On balancing Sam Darnold’s quickness and pushing the ball down the field)
“It depends on the type of passes. What’s the timing of the play that we’re looking for? He’s executing that of what we’re asking him to do. If the players are called, where it’s a longer timing play, longer developing play, then Sam’s (Darnold) done that as well. If it’s more of a rhythm passing type play, then that’s what he’s actually doing on Sunday.”
(On whether they have a blanket benchmark of how many explosive passing plays they want done per game)
“Yeah, we have a number we’re shooting for on a per game basis of explosive plays that we want to get on offense. We didn’t hit that mark on Sunday.”
(On how many yards they define as explosive passing)
“You have a sweet play and it’s 15 yards and you’re not going to count it? I think that’s nitpicky, so it’s more like, you know it when you see it type of play.”
(On how things would have been different throughout the coordinator hiring process if the roster was constructed the way it is now)
“You always have to consider the guys, like the personnel on your team. When we were standing here last week we were talking about Kyle’s (Shanahan) system versus our system versus (Sean) McVay’s system. It’s all kind of built on the same nuts and bolts, but a common denominator that separates these trees of offense is how they use their personnel. It’s smart to include that in the conversation about what you’re looking for, but there’s principles too that are going to be consistent, there’s going to be things through the lens of how we’re going to run our offense, that we’re going to ask, but there’s also things that you want to ask in terms of the people that you want to bring into your team.”
(On Josh Jobe’s readiness)
“I love telling the story because this time last year, he wasn’t playing for us. This is a guy that has come in and really bought into the process, and the details matter for him, and he does it every day. There’s a consistency there that you respect, and he’s earned these opportunities, which is really cool. If you were the coach of the team, wouldn’t you want it to work like that? Guys coming in, earning their opportunities, developing, growing as players, as people, that’s what he’s done.”
(On Jaxon Smith-Njigba’s receptions)
“After looking back at it, that’s where the ball should have gone. We have plays designed for other people as well, but you’re looking at a combination of Jax (Jaxon Smith-Njigba) playing at a high level, being in a position where Sam (Darnold) can pull the trigger wherever he’s at at the progression. But the ball will find its way around. I’m convinced of that.”
(On calling more plays for the other guys)
“We were calling plays for other guys. Maybe he wasn’t the primary and that’s where Sam (Darnold) got to. You’re going to use your people in different ways and try to call plays to their strengths for sure.”
(On Cody White)
“We saw it in the Rams game last year. There’s definitely a record of this throughout the offseasons, and he’s another guy that’s earned his opportunity. It’s a great lesson for young guys how important special teams are to the equation. At the end of the day, you can’t dress everybody, and he’s earned that right to be a special teams stalwart for us and when asked upon on offense, he’s produced.”
(On defending tight ends without Nick Emmanwori) “
Not going to tell you how we’re going to match him this week, we’ll let them figure that out on Sunday. They do a great job with their personnel. They play a lot of their people, they play all their tight ends, including (Cameron) Heyward who is a good player. They mix and match receivers. They play a lot of guys, so it’s a little different than most teams that you play that have their crew and they stick with it. That’s how they choose to operate and it works for them.”
(On whether they’re waiting to see how Nick Emmanwori’s ankle is doing before making any decisions) “ That’s a big part of it, yeah.”
(On how Drake Thomas has earned the right to play)
“He has. I think you’d agree with me, he had a great training camp and when put in those positions in preseason games he produced, and I thought he did that on Sunday. We’re going to have competition on our team. If you start saying this guy’s the guy, you don’t want to operate like that, then you fall into the trap that you’ve made it, not saying our guys think that, but we want the sense of urgency that we’re competing all the time. I’m looking at Leo (Leonard Williams) right here, I’m putting him up against anybody else in the league, but he still knows when it’s time to rush he has to produce because we got guys that want opportunities too. It’s the same thing with the defensive line. It’s the same thing with our offensive line. Same thing at linebacker. We’re seeing the same thing right now with Riq (Woolen). It’s great, our guys are getting better. That just tells you, we have multiple people that have earned rights to play. That’s good for us, people are going to get better from the competition.”
(On rotating linebackers)
“I think you can. It depends on, we were in and out of different personnels, especially when Nick (Emmanwori) was available, we still got to three different subgroups on Sunday. We’ve always operated like that, we’ve always had that ability, moving and shifting everybody’s probably not the best thing. You’d like to have some consistency in the middle, especially with the green dot, prefer not to change the green dot. That’s best for us, I think that’s sustainable.”
(On Uchenna Nwosu)
“Talk about layup of the century. We know what he brings, he’s incredibly smart, tough as crap, great all-around football player, great game runner, and great intuition. He’s a leader for us. This is a guy that you haven’t felt it on the field as much in the last year, but he’s bringing it every day in the meeting, in the building for our football team. It’s going to be awesome, whenever he gets back, just to have him out there.”
(On whether Uchenna Nwosu will be practicing in full today) “I’m not sure. He’s not going to practice the whole practice, I don’t think, but he’ll be out there.”
(On Derion Kendrick and Chazz Surratt) “Two great competitors. Felt Chazz (Surratt) on special teams I thought he did a good job. DK (Derion Kendrick), is soaking it up right now but great competitor, great spirit, great energy about him. Smart guys.”
(On Riq Woolen starting this week) “We’ll see.”
(On how Riq Woolen has responded to Sunday’s game) “He’s great. We had a similar situation last year, and every person had a conversation about what their role is going to be. You need to operate like that as a coaching staff and keep it real with them. But they’ve been tremendous. Tell them with love, tell them the truth, and let’s go to work.”
- Cautious Return for Cal Raleigh After Injury Absence
- Dante Fowler Jr Joins Seahawks: A Veteran’s Role
- Mariners do right by Randy Johnson with statue to honor his legacy
- Cal Raleigh’s Injury: Latest News and Prognosis
- Seattle Sounders Struggle with Finishing in Draw
Discover more from Cascadiasports.net
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
