ASSISTANT HEAD COACH/SPECIAL TEAMS COORDINATOR DAVE TOUB
Q: It seemed like the Bills were trying to get you to return a kickoff, why didn’t you?
TOUB: “Like I said before, during the week, they were probably the best kickoff team that I’ve seen. They take pride in pinning people deep. They have a lot of players. We just felt gameplan wise it felt like if we return four of them and two of them were inside the 20 then it’s not worth it for our offense. So, we just took the ball at the 25.”
Q: So the decision to fair catch was predetermined?
TOUB: “Yeah, we decided it before. There were certain kicks that if obviously if we would have got them we would have took them out but they just kept giving us the same type of kick and it just was not something we wanted to do in that game.”
Q: When do your returners identify when to fair catch versus when to return it?
TOUB: “It’s really hangtime and placement. You know where it’s going to be, what we have called, you know you don’t want to return a ball that’s away from your call, that type of stuff without getting too detailed of it.”
Q: Chamarri Conner is getting more defensive reps, does this mean he’ll have less reps on special teams?
TOUB: “I hope I get him (Chamarri Conner) for the rest of the season. I hope that’s the case. He’s a good football player. He’s going to get more and more on defense. In fact, he got 62 plays last game if you add up everything because I have to look at that all the time, how much is a guy getting, he was the most. If that continues, I’m going to have to pull him back because right now he’s a four-phase guy. He plays on everything right now for me, and that may be something I have to do.”
DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR STEVE SPAGNUOLO
Q: What do you see in Patriots QB Bailey Zappe?
SPAGNUOLO: “I tell you what, I see a really good, efficient football player that can move the ball. I was watching one of the TV games – sometimes I put the TV games on to hear the – he’s won football games for them; I think they’re doing the right things with him. To me when they’ve got either of those running backs going, I think their quarterback becomes really pretty good. I know they’ve had injuries at wide out, but those two tight ends now that they are both healthy, I think they can be a little bit of a stress on us, we’ve got to be cautious of that. We probably haven’t played – I’d have to think back to teams we’ve played – but these two tight ends as pass catchers are as good of a twosome as I think we’ve faced.”
Q: The Patriots play old school physical football, is that different for you to prepare for?
SPAGNUOLO: “Well it’s not a difference in emphasis because I’m always talking about that. When teams can be two dimensional it makes it tough on us. We’re always talking about killing the engine. The engine to us is the running back. We’ve got to make sure they don’t get him going. They won’t give up on trying to do that, we understand that. (Patriots Head) Coach (Bill) Belichick, best in the business, he understands it. Their defense is terrific – I told the guys the other day that we need to match or be better than their defense, to help our team win. A lot of that is early in the game because we just don’t want Patrick (Mahomes) having to go out in the middle of the second quarter down 14 points. That’s tough on any offense. They’re challenging because they play as a team, they win as a team, they find ways to win. You’re onto something, if we don’t bow up and play a physical game to match their physicality, they will make it tough.”
Q: How rare is it to have two corners as good as Trent McDuffie and L'Jarius Sneed with the versatility they give you?
SPAGNUOLO: “Pretty unique, that’s a credit to both of those guys. We haven’t had to play LJ (L'Jarius Sneed) inside as much – and you guys all know he can do that. As a matter of fact, he just walked through a couple of snaps with him in there just in case you get an injury situation. Trent (McDuffie) gives us a lot of flexibility, and you saw it last week, Chamarri Conner is coming on. We knew it was going to be a little bit of a slow process, but anytime we’re able to put him in there and keep those two guys outside is great for us. We don’t always do it because we like to get the other guys out there too. Having versatility, in any group but especially in the secondary is big.”
Q: What did you see on the play where Chamarri Conner got the interception?
SPAGNUOLO: “He was in man and one of the other defenders cut his man and he came off it, he was supposed to play with eyes, which he did, he found an available hole. I don’t think (Bills QB) Josh Allen saw him because he was coming from the back side. It was a really good play. It was where he was supposed to be eventually. At first it looked a little shaky but then he got there.”
OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR MATT NAGY
Q: There were a few plays where it seemed like some miscommunication occurred at the line of scrimmage. What happened there?
NAGY: “Yeah, you definitely want to get up to the line of scrimmage and play as fast as you can. You have those – sometimes when things happen in a game whether it’s over the course of time or you look back at different, you have different guys coming in at different times. You want to reduce those to a minimum or to nothing so we had a few of those. I think the biggest thing is making sure that we understand, ‘Ok listen if we’re going to have different guys coming in and out of the huddle each play, we want to make sure that we as coaches practice that as much as possible and those guys are doing it then on gameday.’ So, when we get up to the line of scrimmage, it’s clean, it’s sharp, there’s not confusion. You have that – being completely clear – you have that all the time, more than probably you think but you just don’t want to have the ones where you’re crossing the ball or you’re communicating and just the clock is ticking down and now you feel like you’re fast on the play. We had a few of those that we want to make sure and that’s my job is to make sure, ‘Hey whatever is going on communication wise, during the week in practice and then on gameday that that’s clean.’ We have to learn through that.”
Q: Are you stressing the details of lining up this week?
NAGY: “Yeah it was early on, and he (Kadarius Toney) knows it continues. I think it’s a good teaching moment for all of us, for me as a coordinator, for all of us as coaches, for KT. Obviously none of it was intentional. I think that’s the frustrating part for all of us is in a moment like that, you know KT didn’t do that maliciously or intentionally. It’s a big moment in the game, but it is what it is, and we’ve got to learn from that. If we don’t use this lesson to make us better – and it doesn't have to just be offsides on offense – it’s just in general the rules of the game and making sure we lock in on that and making sure we understand it and use it to our benefit. At the same point in time when the guys got back in the next day and we talked about it as a group and unit we’re in this together – this isn’t about one person winning and losing a game. I think that’s probably the biggest message is that when we have an opportunity to win a game – whether it’s in the first quarter or whether it’s in the fourth quarter to finish it. Whether it’s the four-minute or the two-minute, behind or winning. We need to do that; we need to finish it. We can get caught up in being offsides and the play that was taken back, but let’s not get caught up on second-and-15, third-and-15, and fourth-and-15. We have a chance with a 1:12, with two timeouts down three, we’re going to at worst tie the game we need to go down and win the game. We didn’t do that, that’s the thing we have to take from this. If we want to be a championship, Super Bowl level team there’s got to be a mindset of finishing. It’s not a criticism, it’s just where we’re at. We’ve been through this where we start fast, we get leads – (against the) Jets, Dolphins and then we don’t finish. Or we get behind – the last three weeks 14-0, 14-3, 14-0 we get behind and we don’t start fast, we had a chance to finish and we didn’t do it. Let’s dig into that, and let’s understand now that when we don’t have penalties, when we don’t have turnovers, when we execute like we did at the end of the first half and the start of the third quarter last week we’re a pretty good team offensively, we help our defense and special teams out. Let’s take that first part of the year, that second part where we’re at now. Let’s put it all together these next four games starting with New England and let’s get a win, everything else will take care of itself. We need to be hard on ourselves as coaches, players need to do it, this is where I think real leaders step up. This is where it’s about us, it’s not about anyone else. If you can’t be a professional about this as a coach or as a player you shouldn’t be in this profession.”
Q: The last three games having to play from behind, does that change your play calling?
NAGY: “Yeah, you’re down 14 to nothing in the first quarter last week – I think more than anything we keep going back to reducing penalties, reducing turnovers and watch what happens if you just do that. We had four penalties and a turnover in the first half last week. When we didn’t have a penalty, when we didn’t turn the ball over, we were pretty effective in the redzone, good things happened. We scored, we crept back in the game to the moment we talked about when we first started in here, to have a chance to finish. Are we starting games, are we finishing? We’ve been doing both. Let’s put it together like we did against the Chargers. Let’s put it together like we did against the Bears, and let’s see what happens when we do that. Complement it with the defense, complement it with special teams. The beauty is we are 8-5, we’ve built an opportunity for us to worry about New England right now and get back on the winning track. They are one great great defense; we haven’t even talked about them. This is a really really good defense; their numbers speak for themselves. We’ve got to lock in on that. I know we’re back here talking about all the KT (Kadarius Toney) stuff, but we have to teach that and move on. That’s where we’re at.”