stevewin Posted July 31, 2019 Share Posted July 31, 2019 Pat Kirwin and Jim Miller (from TC) Note: There is no available link to the interview - We had a ball this AM watching your group go at it - It was a good practice - intense, spirited. Kind of what you expect this time of camp - early in the 2nd week here. I thought we did some good things - it was good to get some rain too, have our guys feel the elements a little bit - just in terms of the weather we get in Buffalo from time to time - and execute at a high level - Where are you in your messaging to your team compared to previous years. do you feel like you have to go back to page 1 , or do you feel like most of the ears have heard it and your moving on to the next thing - I believe on really doubling down on the message. It starts with a vision of where we want to go and then the plan of how we are trying to get there. I don't think you can hear that message enough - so in this case, fundamental football wins - and we have to continue to stress fundamentals. Not beating ourselves, situational football, over and over and over again - For new veterans before you signed them did you spell out what this is all about, what is a Buffalo Bill, what your going to do here, not do here - For the most part. FA is kind of a different animal these days where it's almost a race to get the guys that you want. With that said there certainly was conversation with each and every one of them early in the process, this is what we're all about, this is what it means to be a Buffalo Bill, this is what this football team means to this city and the people of Buffalo. - Incremental improvement looking to see in QB - That's the key, the incremental piece of it. I think a lot of times people want to put the responsibility for wins and losses squarely on the shoulders of the QB, and in this case a young QB. We have to develop as a football team around our young QB for him to continue to develop and have the success he needs to have - You changed to drastically different defensive scheme - how do you make that change - It's what we believe in number 1, you have a vision for what you want it to look like and fit the pieces to what you've got in terms of you fit the scheme to match the personnel you have. As you look at what we were able to do early on, with the tools and the weapons that we had - it was different. It was a 3-4 multiple defense, it did some different things, pressured quite a bit. At the end of the day I believe that players like to play in a system where they can play fast and play with a lot of freedom - within the system of course. I think you find over the course of the years players like to play in this system - Murphy and Kevin Johnson healthy - We added some quality football players this offseason. Health and availability is important. We've got to do the best we can do to keep players available. That will be key in the success our football team has this season - 2018 guys - if you study the NFL, maybe the same in college, what jumps out to us is when some guys have success their first season they don't always have success their second year. Or vice versa - if they don't experience the success they wanted to the first year a lot of times those guys go back and reset and work their tails off then all of a sudden they have a better sophomore season. That was part of our message - hey if you think you've arrived, you haven't. If you are worrying whether you can play in this league you can, just go home and work hard. There's story after story of guys who do that in the their 2nd season. So the guys who did play and have some success - it's important they go back and double down on their hard work in the offseason, and that's what we've seen. - How do you manage so many new guys - It's tough - the challenge of bringing a team, a cohesive unit, together. And in this case the OL together. People overlook continuity quite a bit. We've got to build it from the ground up and that's a challenge - How does it affect your installation - We started in the Spring then restarted it in TC. I'm a big stickler for fundamentals, and to me the important piece is establishing a good solid floor, and then go from there. If we try to walk before w can crawl, you don't get that second chance to have TC. That true for establishing our toughness in training camp, our identity of our football team, the attitude of our football team, the fundamentals. Let's make sure we crawl before we walk - Impressions of Ed Oliver, DTs - With respect to Ed he has a lot of work to do, he's a rookie - he's experiencing everything that comes with rookie training camp. With other guys we've got the pieces, now it's how it all fits together. If you look at last year we were able to affect the QB, we just felt as a staff we didn't finish enough on the QB. You've got to be able to do that - particularly in this division. You've got to be able to get there with your front 4 - Frank Gore - It's interesting to be around him. It's a different perspective when he's on your side. He came in and we talked about some of the matchups when I was at Carolina and he was with the 49ers and what he thought of our dfense and I shared what I thought of his offense. Now the thing I appreciate most about Frank is that he's a professional. He just loves football. He's passionate about it, he thinks, talks sleeps eats - football 24 hrs a day. And that rubs off on our football team - that passion. I'm grateful not just to coach this football team but be around a player like that - I rubs off on the coaches - Absolutely it does - It's everybody. Everyone thinks oh he's mentoring the young guys - I don't care who you are - Frank's out there running like he's 2- rs old - The other day someone was telling a story about Frank and they said coach you should have heard him - he's going through some of our terminology on offense - some guys might just be doing their thing and not really focusing when we're going through things - and here's pro, going through the terms over and over again. I just love that. He'll facetime us a random times hey coach what do you think about this, what do you think about that. He just loves football - Thoughts on building toughness - Very important - we believe in building on LOS back - LOS out. You have to be able to run the football and stop the run. Have to be able to protect the QB and get to the QB. That starts up front on both sides of the ball. That's where the toughness of the unit really begins. The identity and toughness of the football team to me is built with the offensive line , defensive line, OL coach, DL coach and your coverage units on STs. We take a lot of pride in those units - Important to get offense more together - We have more continuity on defensive side. We have a challenge on offensive side. want to develop continuity as fast as we can - that being said we also have position battles going on. So from a personnel standpoint let's make sure we're moving pieces around before we say this is what we have. at some point you get the pieces set so we can get the continuity we need 1 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr. Who Posted July 31, 2019 Share Posted July 31, 2019 Thanks much, stevewin. You do a great job with these. Really like the direction of this team. Gore is going to make everyone better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
machine gun kelly Posted July 31, 2019 Share Posted July 31, 2019 Good job Steve. I’m going to listen to the parts I missed yesterday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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