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TRANSCRIPTS: Rams Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams (10-24-14)
Rams Head Coach Jeff Fisher – Post-Practice – October 24, 2014
(On missed tackles that have sprung receivers)
“They do a good job of getting the ball out on time and we need to get them down. We had a couple third-down situations last week where we make a tackle, we’re off the field. So, that’s been a huge emphasis this week especially our third-down defense. We got to do much better in the third-down area, and go figure we’re playing team’s third in the league in converting third downs on offense. It’s going to be a big challenge for us.”
(On how you get the Chiefs’ offense off the field)
“You get them into third-down and execute on third down, alright. We’ve had some difficulty on second-and-longs as well. We’ve addressed that and we’ll look at doing some, maybe, possibly some different things. ”
(On his level of concern about the secondary)
“We got plenty of them. We’re going to line them up and play. I can’t tell you exactly whose going to play right now, but they’re going to play. We’ve got plenty of them.”
(On if CB Janoris Jenkins will play)
“He’ll be questionable for the game.”
(On how the Chiefs have overcome the losses of DL Mike DeVito and LB Derrick Johnson)
“They’re rolling right now. As I said all week, it’s a very well-coached team. A lot of talent in all three phases. They made the playoffs for a reason last year. It’s a good football team.”
(On if it seems like they don’t make many offensive mistakes)
“Very few penalties, they’re well-coached. (Chiefs QB) Alex (Smith) is getting rid of the football, really quick. It’s what he does. He’s making good decisions, getting rid of the ball. He’s getting to people, that have, as I said, have a chance to do some big things after the catch. They all do, the tight ends run after catch. We know what (Chiefs RB) Jamaal (Charles) can do. We got to be in the right place and have our best tackling day of the year. ”
(On how the young players will adjust to the Kansas City atmosphere)
“Right and it’s going to be a challenge for them. We don’t make a big deal over noise. I think the guys are excited to get an opportunity to go play out on an October Sunday afternoon outside. We’re going to play hard.”
(On if the noise is worse than Seattle)
“Well they compete, Kansas City and Seattle. Seems like they’re trading places every year with who’s the loudest.”
(On when it gets that loud does it matter)
“No. You just can’t here. You just accept the fact that you can’t hear.”
(On if the new Bose headsets are the best he’s used)
“The issues aren’t necessarily the headphones. But, yes these are effective.”
(On if the new Bose headsets are noise canceling)
“They’re not going to cancel that noise. You could appreciate the difficulty that (QB) Austin’s (Davis) going to have listening to (Offensive Coordinator Brian) ‘Shotty’ (Schottenheimer) that’s where the issues are. Then communicating on the line of scrimmage. Defense there’s no issues obviously.”
(On if it was a good week of practice for CB Trumain Johnson)
“He did a lot more today. It’s good to see him move around the way he did. He’ll be questionable for the game.”
(On if he sees the Chiefs getting more out of their young players like RB De’Anthony Thomas and TE Travis Kelce)
“Kelce’s doing a really nice job. They’re getting the ball to him. We knew he had that potential, didn’t expect to see it this soon. They do a good job coaching their players.”
(On if he gets a kick out of CB E.J. Gaines playing in his home town)
“We don’t pay much attention to that. This is a business trip and I’m sure he’s excited. He’ll probably have to buy a few extra tickets this week. This is about going in there and beating the Chiefs.”
(On CB Brandon McGee and if he had a set-back)
“Yes, Brandon McGee injured his foot yesterday. We’re doing tests. It doesn’t look good.”
(On if it’s the same foot re-injured)
“Re-injured the foot. Yeah, the plantar fascia.”
Rams Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams – Post Practice – October 24, 2014
(On what challenges Chiefs QB Alex Smith presents)
“He’s improved each and every year. From a quarterback standpoint there’s a lot of things about saying, getting used to playing to the speed of the game. He’s matured very well. I think he has really bonded well with (Chiefs Head Coach) Andy Reid. I had a chance to go against those guys last year when I was at Tennessee, Andy’s first year there. Obviously, my familiarity with Andy being in the NFC East for all those years. I have tremendous respect for him as a football coach and what he’s able to do offensively and how he’s been able to adjust to the personnel that he has got. They’ve got a lot of personnel packages. They do a lot of substituted people in and out of the ball game. Stays within their system but he’s also adapted to the game as the game has changed. You’ll see him do some things with (Team Consultant) Chris Ault there now on the staff with some of the college stuff that’s been going in there, some of the things that’s in our division. So, they’ve done very well. They’re very multiple on offense. Alex has done a very good job of being able to manage all that stuff and he does very well with it. He’s a real smart quarterback that’s playing well. He’s playing sound in Andy’s system.”
(On what challenges Chiefs RB Jamaal Charles presents)
“Every week we’ve got one that’s one of the tops in the business. He presents a lot of things. He’s a combination of…he can get into space like (Eagles RB Darren) Sproles and (Eagles RB Lesean) McCoy could at Philadelphia. He can put his head down and get the tough yards like (Cowboys RB DeMarco) Murray and all the other guys that we’ve faced. So yeah, we’ve got a tough job right there on how they’ve committed to the run. I think Andy’s done a real good job of identifying that as something that settles those guys down. It’s something that they’re very accomplished with. They do a lot of different kind of things in the run game. From stretching you out making you play space and then loading you up inside and running the traditional downhill, off-tackle, power runs and that kind of stuff. He utilizes his personnel. He utilizes his backs very well on what kind of run game he does. We’re going to have to do a good job again as we have and we continue to improve. Play the run game and then don’t let one of those sneaked up, kind of big plays come up on us on an extended play. From a coaching point of view, the things that frustrates you as a coach, is when you take away what they want to do and then the athletes in this league can improvise and can do something that they want to do. We’ve been hit with those a couple times where an athlete in space has been able to improvise and create a big play for them when we’ve shut down what they want to do. How we see this getting ready to happen, we’ve just got to do a better job of minimizing those explosive gains when they get out into space.”
(On if there is anything that he’s seen that allow the explosive plays to happen)
“One of the things that happens is anytime offensive people try to explore or get after your force points of your defense, what we’d like to do is keep everything inside the tackles. But, offenses don’t cooperate. What they do is, is they try to create formations and create space plays to get outside there. Then when the quarterback scrambles, even if we have a person that’s assigned to that scramble is he good enough to get him down? There was a couple times last week when we had guys assigned to him and still weren’t good enough to get him down. Those are the things that we’ve got to continue to try to do to minimize gains. We took away the concepts that they wanted to do and now can you take away what they actually are going to do when it becomes an improv game. Those are the things that keeps away from being just dominant and we’ve got to continue to pound on those things. I like our attitude. I like our efforts. I like our awareness of how to adjust to those kinds of things. Now we’ve just got turn those things into some big plays of our own.”
(On how the secondary is playing through the injuries)
“We’ll be fine with that. We’re not going to change anything we’re doing there. We’ve got to adapt to the personnel and try to get them in some longer down and distances hopefully. That helps us that way. All those guys understand how we want to play. They’ve gotten a lot of reps throughout the whole season because we mix and match so many of those guys anyways. So, the playing time has been good for those guys. Feel real good about whoever we have to play back there. We’ll be fine.”
(On his confidence in CB Marcus Roberson if he’s thrust into a starting role)
“Good kid, I’ve got no problem with him. He’s a sharp kid. The things you guys don’t see is how much he works behind the scenes. One of the things we do here is that we do a good job on, next man up philosophy. When I say that, that’s easier said than done. But, do you give time in practice for that? Do you give time in meetings for that? We specialize individual meeting time above and beyond the normal day. He’s in here and we’ve got three secondary coaches, two of those three guys played for me. What we do is we meet off the side with those guys. Do individual things there. Create the space. Create the time and the rep in practice. Then (Head Coach) Jeff (Fisher) does a good job and so does (Offensive Coordinator) Brian Schottenheimer is that when we are given the picture to our offense we put it in our terms so they are getting reps that way also. So, got no problem with that. He’s a good kid, smart, tough. Played at a high level and has played very well for us throughout the whole preseason. Played very well for us every single day in practice. He’ll be fine.”
(On if CB Trumaine Johnson has shown any ‘rust’ since returning to the practice field)
“He’s fine. There’s no problem.”
(On what Chiefs RB/WR De’Anthony Thomas can do in space)
“Good kid. Obviously, puts a space play on you. What you try to do is surround that. You try not to have very many one-on-ones in that way. But when that happens, where is your leverage and how we get guys pursuing and swarming that way to try to knock him back to help. We preach all the time that nobody’s on the field by themselves. You have to understand when a space play is created the leverage point of the boundary and if the boundary’s not your friend, where are the rest of your friends. There’s 10 other guys, that has the pursuit of the ball and you’ve got to play to that help. So our guys will have to do that against him quite a bit.”
(On what problems Chiefs TE Travis Kelce presents)
“We’ve played against some pretty good tight ends this year too. So, here’s another one that comes up. We actually talked about that in our meetings today. Part of our meetings today was how these certain personnel match-ups this week, how they complement some of the match-ups we’ve seen. We don’t want repeat mistakes on any of those match-ups. We’ve played against some pretty good tight ends. In our division, we’ve already played against some good ones. Already some good ones in some of the non-conference games we’ve had. So, it’s another formidable challenge. One that we feel we’re OK with. We’re alright.”
(On if the Chiefs success on third-down changes his approach to third-down situations)
“They do a great job. What they do is maxing up and paying extra pretension in the pass rush. You’ll see them do things when they’re putting seven and eight guys involved. Most of the times just seven guys involved in pass protection. They’re OK with individualizing the route concept and forcing the route runner and the quarterback to be spot on, on a direct throw. But what they’ll do is they’ll max up. All of us in the league defensively many, many, many years ago kind of termed the protections you get against Andy Reid as ‘Philly protections.’ He was doing that at Philadelphia. He was one of the first ones that started doing that many years ago. We see a lot of those Philly protections on third-and-long where he’s letting guys go down the field have to individualize on a particular spot. It’s a timing play between the quarterback and the receiver. And can you defend it? So, we’re going to have to do a good job with those concepts, yes.”
(On the game they were playing at the start of practice)
“We do camaraderie things. I’m pretty intense on them, most of the time. One of the things we try to do on Fridays is make sure they’re smiling. We do some things in the meeting room where we laugh and joke and have some fun in the meeting room. We just did a little competition, open field tackling drill that we do. We’re emphasizing the ability to be good open field tacklers this week, as we do every week. But we’ve had a competition going on, so it came down to the D-lineman and the linebackers today in the open field drill and the linebackers won. So, that’ll be a little smack talking in the classrooms for the next few days. It’s just good camaraderie.”
Rams Head Coach Jeff Fisher – Post-Practice – October 24, 2014
(On missed tackles that have sprung receivers)
“They do a good job of getting the ball out on time and we need to get them down. We had a couple third-down situations last week where we make a tackle, we’re off the field. So, that’s been a huge emphasis this week especially our third-down defense. We got to do much better in the third-down area, and go figure we’re playing team’s third in the league in converting third downs on offense. It’s going to be a big challenge for us.”
(On how you get the Chiefs’ offense off the field)
“You get them into third-down and execute on third down, alright. We’ve had some difficulty on second-and-longs as well. We’ve addressed that and we’ll look at doing some, maybe, possibly some different things. ”
(On his level of concern about the secondary)
“We got plenty of them. We’re going to line them up and play. I can’t tell you exactly whose going to play right now, but they’re going to play. We’ve got plenty of them.”
(On if CB Janoris Jenkins will play)
“He’ll be questionable for the game.”
(On how the Chiefs have overcome the losses of DL Mike DeVito and LB Derrick Johnson)
“They’re rolling right now. As I said all week, it’s a very well-coached team. A lot of talent in all three phases. They made the playoffs for a reason last year. It’s a good football team.”
(On if it seems like they don’t make many offensive mistakes)
“Very few penalties, they’re well-coached. (Chiefs QB) Alex (Smith) is getting rid of the football, really quick. It’s what he does. He’s making good decisions, getting rid of the ball. He’s getting to people, that have, as I said, have a chance to do some big things after the catch. They all do, the tight ends run after catch. We know what (Chiefs RB) Jamaal (Charles) can do. We got to be in the right place and have our best tackling day of the year. ”
(On how the young players will adjust to the Kansas City atmosphere)
“Right and it’s going to be a challenge for them. We don’t make a big deal over noise. I think the guys are excited to get an opportunity to go play out on an October Sunday afternoon outside. We’re going to play hard.”
(On if the noise is worse than Seattle)
“Well they compete, Kansas City and Seattle. Seems like they’re trading places every year with who’s the loudest.”
(On when it gets that loud does it matter)
“No. You just can’t here. You just accept the fact that you can’t hear.”
(On if the new Bose headsets are the best he’s used)
“The issues aren’t necessarily the headphones. But, yes these are effective.”
(On if the new Bose headsets are noise canceling)
“They’re not going to cancel that noise. You could appreciate the difficulty that (QB) Austin’s (Davis) going to have listening to (Offensive Coordinator Brian) ‘Shotty’ (Schottenheimer) that’s where the issues are. Then communicating on the line of scrimmage. Defense there’s no issues obviously.”
(On if it was a good week of practice for CB Trumain Johnson)
“He did a lot more today. It’s good to see him move around the way he did. He’ll be questionable for the game.”
(On if he sees the Chiefs getting more out of their young players like RB De’Anthony Thomas and TE Travis Kelce)
“Kelce’s doing a really nice job. They’re getting the ball to him. We knew he had that potential, didn’t expect to see it this soon. They do a good job coaching their players.”
(On if he gets a kick out of CB E.J. Gaines playing in his home town)
“We don’t pay much attention to that. This is a business trip and I’m sure he’s excited. He’ll probably have to buy a few extra tickets this week. This is about going in there and beating the Chiefs.”
(On CB Brandon McGee and if he had a set-back)
“Yes, Brandon McGee injured his foot yesterday. We’re doing tests. It doesn’t look good.”
(On if it’s the same foot re-injured)
“Re-injured the foot. Yeah, the plantar fascia.”
Rams Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams – Post Practice – October 24, 2014
(On what challenges Chiefs QB Alex Smith presents)
“He’s improved each and every year. From a quarterback standpoint there’s a lot of things about saying, getting used to playing to the speed of the game. He’s matured very well. I think he has really bonded well with (Chiefs Head Coach) Andy Reid. I had a chance to go against those guys last year when I was at Tennessee, Andy’s first year there. Obviously, my familiarity with Andy being in the NFC East for all those years. I have tremendous respect for him as a football coach and what he’s able to do offensively and how he’s been able to adjust to the personnel that he has got. They’ve got a lot of personnel packages. They do a lot of substituted people in and out of the ball game. Stays within their system but he’s also adapted to the game as the game has changed. You’ll see him do some things with (Team Consultant) Chris Ault there now on the staff with some of the college stuff that’s been going in there, some of the things that’s in our division. So, they’ve done very well. They’re very multiple on offense. Alex has done a very good job of being able to manage all that stuff and he does very well with it. He’s a real smart quarterback that’s playing well. He’s playing sound in Andy’s system.”
(On what challenges Chiefs RB Jamaal Charles presents)
“Every week we’ve got one that’s one of the tops in the business. He presents a lot of things. He’s a combination of…he can get into space like (Eagles RB Darren) Sproles and (Eagles RB Lesean) McCoy could at Philadelphia. He can put his head down and get the tough yards like (Cowboys RB DeMarco) Murray and all the other guys that we’ve faced. So yeah, we’ve got a tough job right there on how they’ve committed to the run. I think Andy’s done a real good job of identifying that as something that settles those guys down. It’s something that they’re very accomplished with. They do a lot of different kind of things in the run game. From stretching you out making you play space and then loading you up inside and running the traditional downhill, off-tackle, power runs and that kind of stuff. He utilizes his personnel. He utilizes his backs very well on what kind of run game he does. We’re going to have to do a good job again as we have and we continue to improve. Play the run game and then don’t let one of those sneaked up, kind of big plays come up on us on an extended play. From a coaching point of view, the things that frustrates you as a coach, is when you take away what they want to do and then the athletes in this league can improvise and can do something that they want to do. We’ve been hit with those a couple times where an athlete in space has been able to improvise and create a big play for them when we’ve shut down what they want to do. How we see this getting ready to happen, we’ve just got to do a better job of minimizing those explosive gains when they get out into space.”
(On if there is anything that he’s seen that allow the explosive plays to happen)
“One of the things that happens is anytime offensive people try to explore or get after your force points of your defense, what we’d like to do is keep everything inside the tackles. But, offenses don’t cooperate. What they do is, is they try to create formations and create space plays to get outside there. Then when the quarterback scrambles, even if we have a person that’s assigned to that scramble is he good enough to get him down? There was a couple times last week when we had guys assigned to him and still weren’t good enough to get him down. Those are the things that we’ve got to continue to try to do to minimize gains. We took away the concepts that they wanted to do and now can you take away what they actually are going to do when it becomes an improv game. Those are the things that keeps away from being just dominant and we’ve got to continue to pound on those things. I like our attitude. I like our efforts. I like our awareness of how to adjust to those kinds of things. Now we’ve just got turn those things into some big plays of our own.”
(On how the secondary is playing through the injuries)
“We’ll be fine with that. We’re not going to change anything we’re doing there. We’ve got to adapt to the personnel and try to get them in some longer down and distances hopefully. That helps us that way. All those guys understand how we want to play. They’ve gotten a lot of reps throughout the whole season because we mix and match so many of those guys anyways. So, the playing time has been good for those guys. Feel real good about whoever we have to play back there. We’ll be fine.”
(On his confidence in CB Marcus Roberson if he’s thrust into a starting role)
“Good kid, I’ve got no problem with him. He’s a sharp kid. The things you guys don’t see is how much he works behind the scenes. One of the things we do here is that we do a good job on, next man up philosophy. When I say that, that’s easier said than done. But, do you give time in practice for that? Do you give time in meetings for that? We specialize individual meeting time above and beyond the normal day. He’s in here and we’ve got three secondary coaches, two of those three guys played for me. What we do is we meet off the side with those guys. Do individual things there. Create the space. Create the time and the rep in practice. Then (Head Coach) Jeff (Fisher) does a good job and so does (Offensive Coordinator) Brian Schottenheimer is that when we are given the picture to our offense we put it in our terms so they are getting reps that way also. So, got no problem with that. He’s a good kid, smart, tough. Played at a high level and has played very well for us throughout the whole preseason. Played very well for us every single day in practice. He’ll be fine.”
(On if CB Trumaine Johnson has shown any ‘rust’ since returning to the practice field)
“He’s fine. There’s no problem.”
(On what Chiefs RB/WR De’Anthony Thomas can do in space)
“Good kid. Obviously, puts a space play on you. What you try to do is surround that. You try not to have very many one-on-ones in that way. But when that happens, where is your leverage and how we get guys pursuing and swarming that way to try to knock him back to help. We preach all the time that nobody’s on the field by themselves. You have to understand when a space play is created the leverage point of the boundary and if the boundary’s not your friend, where are the rest of your friends. There’s 10 other guys, that has the pursuit of the ball and you’ve got to play to that help. So our guys will have to do that against him quite a bit.”
(On what problems Chiefs TE Travis Kelce presents)
“We’ve played against some pretty good tight ends this year too. So, here’s another one that comes up. We actually talked about that in our meetings today. Part of our meetings today was how these certain personnel match-ups this week, how they complement some of the match-ups we’ve seen. We don’t want repeat mistakes on any of those match-ups. We’ve played against some pretty good tight ends. In our division, we’ve already played against some good ones. Already some good ones in some of the non-conference games we’ve had. So, it’s another formidable challenge. One that we feel we’re OK with. We’re alright.”
(On if the Chiefs success on third-down changes his approach to third-down situations)
“They do a great job. What they do is maxing up and paying extra pretension in the pass rush. You’ll see them do things when they’re putting seven and eight guys involved. Most of the times just seven guys involved in pass protection. They’re OK with individualizing the route concept and forcing the route runner and the quarterback to be spot on, on a direct throw. But what they’ll do is they’ll max up. All of us in the league defensively many, many, many years ago kind of termed the protections you get against Andy Reid as ‘Philly protections.’ He was doing that at Philadelphia. He was one of the first ones that started doing that many years ago. We see a lot of those Philly protections on third-and-long where he’s letting guys go down the field have to individualize on a particular spot. It’s a timing play between the quarterback and the receiver. And can you defend it? So, we’re going to have to do a good job with those concepts, yes.”
(On the game they were playing at the start of practice)
“We do camaraderie things. I’m pretty intense on them, most of the time. One of the things we try to do on Fridays is make sure they’re smiling. We do some things in the meeting room where we laugh and joke and have some fun in the meeting room. We just did a little competition, open field tackling drill that we do. We’re emphasizing the ability to be good open field tacklers this week, as we do every week. But we’ve had a competition going on, so it came down to the D-lineman and the linebackers today in the open field drill and the linebackers won. So, that’ll be a little smack talking in the classrooms for the next few days. It’s just good camaraderie.”
