COURTESY OF NEW YORK JETS COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT
Opening Statement…
Alright injuries: (Lawrence Cager) was out with the knee, (Denzel) Mims with the hamstring, (Breshad) Perriman with the knee, I thought he’d be back today, he just needed more time, just need his swelling to go down, (Conor) McDermott with the knee, (Josh) Adams with the hamstring, (Pierre) Desir with the hamstring. I think (Brian) Poole, we’re in that last phase where we’re about to get him working in individual, so we’re progressing the right way, (Matthias) Farley with the hamstring, Tarell (Basham) with the ankle, Jabari (Zuniga) with the quad and then today Jeff Smith went down with the shoulder, we got to evaluate him later today, and just kind of see where we’re at with that.
I mean you guys were here the other day, we decided as a as an organization that practicing really wasn’t going to happen for us. We spent a lot of time discussing with our team, things that we want to do moving forward to do our part. I think our players have done a phenomenal job of working as group. Those guys, it’s a tight group and it’s good to see all those guys trying to try to do the right things. And, I think I’ve seen some guys really step up in leadership roles that aren’t guys that you normally hear that speak a lot and to see these guys step up it’s been impressive to watch how these guys are moving us forward.
Rich Cimini, ESPN: On Jeff Smith, it looked like it was kind of serious, I mean we saw him in a lot of pain there. Is that an MRI later today?
Yes.
Rich Cimini, ESPN: What’s the early indication?
I mean, I’m not sure, I don’t want to speak out of turn, I’m not good with the medical jargon.
Brian Costello, New York Post: Adam, after the scrimmage on Wednesday, after we talked to you, Le’Veon (Bell) went on Twitter and seemed to take issue with the idea that he had anyone wrong with his hamstrings. Have you cleared the air with Le’Veon and just kind of can you tell us what happened there?
We talked for a long time the other day. We’re in the middle of that scrimmage, I’m calling plays nonstop and when somebody comes up and tells me, “Hey a guy is out, there’s an issue there,” my answers going to be like, ‘Got it’, and it’s like a game, that’s kind of what happens during a game. You know I was caught off guard a little bit, but we had a good talk. I told him I felt like our relationship was way better than him going on social media and him being able to just come talk to me. We talked about a lot of stuff. We talked about some things that maybe we can do a little different. He understood kind of how I was trying to do some things in practice. For me it’s, he’s a veteran player that’s been around for a while. He knows what I explained some things to him, he understood what I’ve been trying to do in practice. He knows we’re kind of trying to thread the needle on quite a few things with reps, making sure that we’re doing a good job of getting guys in the right shape, heading into week one. This is unfamiliar territory to all of us, we’re just trying to find the best way to get ourselves ready for the first year.
Brian Costello, New York Post: Adam when we talked to you, you even said, he’s a guy you have to like grab and pull out of practice, he does not want to come off the field. Do you think that’s where his frustration came from, it’s he doesn’t want to come out?
That’s what I’ve been impressed with him since day one is, if the ones had 12 reps, he’s willing to stay in 12 reps. I guess I always look at it as a coaching staff, we’re trying to look from 50,000 feet, there’s a long season. I felt like one of the things that I did a poor job of last year was, that first month of the year, just grinding him to the point of he couldn’t have felt great that back half of the season, so just trying to do the right thing to make sure that we’re ready to go Week One and that we can go 16+ (games).
Rich Cimini, ESPN: How do you feel about (Bell) going on Twitter and openly contradicting what you said?
Yeah, I told him exactly what happened and what I was told. To me, I was like we talk almost every day, whether it’s in the building or outside the building and you’re able to come to me with anything, and he understood where I was coming from.
Brian Costello, New York Post: Adam, how tough is this wide receiver situation for you now with Jeff Smith, you lose another one, your offense kind of looks like it’s having a hard time finding a rhythm, getting in sync because there’s so many moving parts right now? How difficult is this situation weeks away from the season?
I mean, we’re down to six in practice, it’s hard to get guys in here, it takes what four days with the COVID testing and physicals and let alone a guy being in shape, and then knowing what to do. We just need guys to get healthy, get back, we just have to adjust, you got to find ways to not hurt our practice by just doing nothing. So, I mean it’s not going to be easy but we got to find a way to manage this
Connor Hughes, The Athletic: Adam regarding Breshad, I mean I know this was kind of an injury that you guys had had implied that it was going to be a quick one, a quick turnaround, thought he was going to practice today, is this more serious than you originally anticipated?
I don’t know if it’s serious, I think it’s just the way that his body is reacting, I guess is the best way to put it. Just trying to get the swelling down, trying to get him comfortable to run without any pain or anything that he feels like that’s holding them back. He might come in one day and feel a lot better than he did the day before. We just got to keep trying to find a way to make him progress and feel better.
Rich Cimini, ESPN: It looked like (Greg) Van Roten was out later in practice?
Yeah, he was limited, he kind of, in the scrimmage just kind of had an oblique. I don’t know the exact, I don’t think it was a strain or anything, but just something with his oblique and he did individual and then, if he didn’t feel right, we have other guys that we can put in there to just kind of, that need the reps, that could work with that first group.
Connor Hughes, The Athletic: Can you talk a little bit about what you guys like in (Donte) Moncrief to add him?
It’s hard for me to go that far ahead right now just because we’ve got to get through the COVID testing and the physical aspect of it, but I mean you’re looking at a guy that, especially coming out, I remember evaluating him. You’re looking at a guy that’s able to move pretty good and he has experienced in league and he shouldn’t have a problem picking up the offensive, I think that it will probably happen pretty quick for him. It’s hard, when you haven’t seen a guy a lot, sometimes it’s hard to say what a guy is going to be in this offense.
Connor Hughes, The Athletic: You kind of mentioned a couple times about the challenges you guys are facing with getting players acclimated and having to bring guys in, then they have to learn the offense. Demaryius (Thomas) is still obviously out there, he’s had some success with you guys. Is that something you’d explore, especially now with Jeff (Smith) going down?
I think Joe (Douglas) and the guys are looking at everything right now. We’ll just keep trying to figure out a way to get the best guys out there that we can, that can help us in Week One.
Al Iannazzone, Newsday: How do you think Sam (Darnold) has looked and do you think he’s been affected at all by all these different number one receivers coming in, first-team receivers coming in and out?
I don’t know if he’s been affected too much by it. I think he’s getting a lot of different looks. I look at it as really, it’s good for his brain really at the end of the day, just the variety that he’s seeing, the adjustments that he has to go through from practice to practice. It’s different, there’s different themes going on with what the defense is doing. I think we’re getting a lot of great work in that aspect of it. When we’re doing the routes versus air, I don’t see him having an issue throwing it to whoever he’s throwing to. I don’t see a timing issue there. It’s always going to come down to – he’s going to find a couple dudes that we all know he’s going to go to when it’s crunch time, whether it’s (Chris) Herndon or (Jamison) Crowder, those two guys seem to show up a lot of time. I think Lev (Le’Veon Bell) and Frank (Gore) and (La’Mical) Perine, those guys are kind of working some different routes, we’re trying to expand that kind of library there with the receivers going down. Hey, maybe we’ve got to focus on throwing more to the tight ends or throwing more to the backs. So, we’re just going to keep trying to open it up for him and see what we can get, what’s our best combination heading into the season.
Brian Costello, New York Post: What’s your plan for tomorrow for the stadium practice?
It’s going to be more of a practice than a scrimmage, and really what we’re trying to do is just get guys used to hey, this is what our stadium is going to be, how it’s going to be set up. There are some different things that we’ve got to go through, just with the social distancing, just kind of how we’re going to do everything from getting there, getting ready, coming out. We’ll try to give the guys a little feel of what halftime is going to be like. I mean we got a bunch of rookies that have never been through an NFL halftime, and you guys know as well as I do, that’s a quick turnaround. By the time you get in, you’ve got about four minutes to make adjustments, talk to the team, alright, deal with all the things you’ve got to deal with whether it be getting re-taped, fix something equipment wise, have a discussion with your position coach, there’s just a lot of things that happen in a short period of time and I just want our guys to kind of go through that.
Charles McDonald, New York Daily News: I was curious, now that you’ve had a couple days of talking about social justice issues and stuff like that, what are some things that you’ve learned and that you’ve taken away from the talks with your team?
I think the experiences that when I was with Miami being with Kenny Stills was probably something that was very valuable to me because I was with a guy that was very involved very early on in my coaching career, and the education I received from him was unbelievable. I mean his involvement, and what he did down there in South Florida, for that community was – no one ever advertised it because he didn’t. He just did everything he possibly could to help as many people as possible. And, now when I’m with this group, I see these guys as a group, I mean I can’t state it enough where they try to do everything together and they’re all talking and discussing and yeah there’s some back and forth going on. When you’re in that room, Joe and myself when they called us in there, it’s a humbling experience to sit there and listen to these guys and be educated by our players. This group is very impressive.
Connor Hughes, The Athletic: Adam, just a quick kind of note, you said tomorrow’s stadium practice is going to be more practice than scrimmage. Is that a result of some of these latest injuries that have kind of happened to you guys?
No, it’s just the flow, just want to get some situational stuff in there, kind of want to get that halftime deal going, still want to be able to do some redzone stuff. We’ll still do some kind of ones versus twos towards the end, just trying to maybe just change it up a little bit and then at the same time give a little different feel, being in the stadium.
Brian Costello, New York Post:Adam, just on (Kalen) Ballage, obviously he’s a guy you had in Miami. What kind of role do you envision for him here?
We’ll see kind of how it turns out. I mean obviously you guys saw we’ve only got three running backs out there right now, Josh (Adams) is still down. But he has a lot of ability obviously, just from playing running back but the guy played a lot of special teams for me in the past, has done gunner work, has done return work. He can give (Brant) Boyer some help in some of those spots where he’s kind of down guys or he’s missing a piece. He might be able to contribute in those areas.
