HEAD COACH DICK JAURON
NIGHT PRACTICE – July 29, 2008
On tonight's first night practice
As almost always here in our camp the weather is unbelievable and tonight was just a great night for football. And a great night for our fans too and of course we like the good weather to practice in. But I like it too because it gives our fans a chance to come out and be comfortable and watch, and they were great tonight. It really does help our players to push through it and it adds a lot more excitement. The practice, like a lot of early practices, there's errors out there and we've got to correct them, and we're working at it, but their effort is good and they're into it right now, and they better be into it all year.
On Ko Simpson
Ko [Simpson] talked to Bud [Carpenter] and he jammed his ankle in a drill. Bud said it was just kind of pins and needles and they were waiting for it to clear up and I guess it just didn't clear up enough that Bud wanted him to go anymore.
On it being the same ankle that Ko injured last year
I believe it was. Bud doesn't think it's anything but we'll have to wait and see.
On JP's status after jamming his thumb
He jammed his thumb. He hit his thumb on a helmet in practice yesterday and it swelled up and it was still swollen. They came out early and he tried to throw and it just wasn't working. Again, Bud doesn't think it's real bad. It may keep him out for another day and it may not. He may be back tomorrow.
On Angelo Crowell
Angelo's knee is a little bit sore. It's almost the same thing as about a year ago. Again, we're going try to get it early so it doesn't linger. We do think he'll be back pretty quickly too.
On Trent Edwards' frustration tonight
I do think about it. I don't worry too much about Trent [Edwards] in that regard. He's just working through it. He puts in a lot of time and when it's not timed up he figures out why. He spends a good deal of time talking with the receivers. You can always see that on the field too. You'd rather have it go perfect all the time, but you know it's not going to. He'll work through it.
On new plays being the possibility of Trent's frustrations
No, I think that's usually it in training camp particularly early on because you haven't had a lot of time to work through things. A lot of repetitions are on things over a long period of time. You're not as sharp as you've got to be and then practicing at night is different. It's different seeing the ball and it's different throwing the ball, so that has something to do with it. And you don't have a great day everyday. It's different every day when an athlete goes and you've just got to find a way to succeed with what you have that day. A lot of things go on in every practice and certainly in every game.
On hitting in practice now that the players are in pads
No, we're not wrapping up. We don't live tackle our own people except very rarely. And generally, when we do it is a short yardage or goal line, so it's all in a very small area. We do thud you know so we are baring some contact. We want our offensive team to finish with the ball though, and get used to finishing down the field with the ball. And we want our defensive team to get in the position to make the play, but we're not tackling and obviously we're not cutting each other. We're trying to come off and come off hard, but everyone is staying up and off the ground, so it's definitely a learning process out of practice, too.
On Jabari Greer breaking up some passes tonight
Jabari [Greer] has done a terrific job in whatever we've asked him to do, certainly since I've been here and probably before that. He's got some things that you can't teach: the speed, you can't teach that speed. He's just been gifted with it and he keeps himself in top condition. He's very quick and he's got experience. When you have that speed in your back pocket you're not fearful of receivers; you're fearful of getting run by and you can challenge them and he does.
On Greer coming in as a free agent and if his accomplishments have amazed him
He's just performed exceptionally well in every area we've asked him to perform. When he was primarily a special teamer, he was really good and I mean very, very good. And when he became the starter he just kept playing and making plays. Not just in the passing game either. In the run game, he was effective, so I'm very pleased with Jabari.
On Leodis McKelvin
It's just so early and there are just so many things that he's got to learn. And so many things going through his mind now it'll be a struggle for a little while because he's fighting to catch up. And then he's fighting the expectations and he wants to show what he can do. He's a very competitive guy, so it's going to be a struggle for awhile.
On the grind of camp and possibly thoughts of scrimmaging another team like the Giants
No, I've never been an advocate of it myself. I understand that people really like it and I can see why. I would change my mind if we could get somebody to come to us every year. But I don't want to go anywhere else. I love this training camp and I like this set up. I like the fact that you have the team together. You really only have them for three weeks. And I'm really not ready to give up three or four days to travel somewhere else and somebody else's camp to do it. I don't buy it. We have four exhibitions that we've got to play. I believe we have time and I like it right here. I like all of our guys together.
On having rookies go live
Right now, we believe that we will. We believe that we will in some way and we've just got to plan it. And we won't be able to plan it until the week kind of plays out so we know who's available and how we want to do it.
