Transcript Of Andy Reid’s Monday News Conference

Eagles head coach Andy Reid had his weekly session with the media today and as expected there were quite a few questions regarding his job security.  He was also asked about the willingness of his team to prepare and compete on a high level.  Here’s the transcript of the media conference.

Injury Report:

“[WR] Riley Cooper has a little bit of knee inflammation. He should be okay. [DT] Cullen Jenkins has a foot sprain. He should be okay. [RB] LeSean McCoy has a concussion, and he is in stage one. We’ll just take it day by day here so he has a bit of headache right now. Again, it’s a day by day situation. [WR] Jason Avant has a hamstring strain. [RB] Chris Polk has a toe sprain. [QB] Michael [Vick] is improving with a concussion. He took the impact test but he’s still not at baseline, so he would be considered in stage one.”

Opening Remarks:

“As far as the game goes, obviously that’s not good enough the way that we’re playing. I take full responsibility for that. I know we’re letting the fans down and the city down. I completely understand that. I completely understand how they feel on this. I feel it from the football team, our coaches and players. There are no excuses for it. We have to continue to get better, and that’s eliminating the mistakes, and as coaches making sure that we are putting guys in the right position, and when we’re in the right position, that we are making plays. Again, that’s my responsibility to get that done. Again, the turnovers hurt us yesterday, the early turnovers. The penalties keep adding up. You can’t play consistent football by taking one step forward and 10 steps back. You can’t do that. The big plays over the last few weeks. If you had to pinpoint one thing that’s different in the last few weeks on the defensive side, it’s the big plays. We have to eliminate those and we have to increase the big plays on the offensive side. Then, make the easy plays. The ones that are possession throws in the short and intermediate range. Again, we need to make sure that we’re putting guys in a position to do that.”

 

On how he keeps the team focused amidst all of the talk of his tenure coming to an end:

“You control what you can control. That’s getting better as a football team so that’s where my emphasis is. To become a better coach, making sure I’m putting guys in the right position to make plays, make sure that my staff is doing the right things there, and that’s where all of my emphasis is. I don’t look at anything past that.”

 

On whether the team’s situation is fixable:

“I believe it’s fixable. We’ve got to eliminate the mistakes. It’s not an effort or a want-to [situation]. I don’t see that. I’ve said before, sometimes I see guys are pressing a bit when they don’t need to press. Guys that have been very consistent players for us in the past, [those] guys are pressing just a bit. They want to do so well, they want to be that guy that makes the play, and you’ve just got to back up and do what you do the best. Relax, play the game and play the way you know how to play.”

 

On whether the coaching staff is also pressing to try to make things better:

“When things aren’t going well you have a tendency to try to find ways of making it better. You want to make sure you’re doing it the right way. There’s ways of doing things the right way so I look at all of that.”

 

On whether he now regrets leaving RB LeSean McCoy in the game when the score was seemingly out of reach:

“There are a few things that you wish wouldn’t happen. That obviously would be one of them. These kids want to play. There are two sides of this. There’s the side that you ask me, ‘Did you feel like they quit?’ Well no these guys want to play, they want to win the game, they want to get better, they want to show that they’re all in, and so there’s a fine line there that [you have to navigate]. And then as coaches you want to make sure the guys know that you’re all in too. With that, I don’t regret it. It happened. Do I wish he wouldn’t have been hurt? Yeah I do wish he wouldn’t have been hurt but I don’t regret that.”

 

On whether it is his job as the head coach to tell players sometimes it is better not to be in the game:

“It’s my job to weigh that out. If you want to put that on me [then] I fully take that. But I also have a pretty good feel of our football team.”

 

On whether he would classify McCoy’s concussion as significant:

“I don’t think it’s quite as [severe as Vick’s] but who I am to judge it? We’ll know over time here. It didn’t seem to be quite as bad just from where he was after the game and his response. He took a good lick there and we’ve got to make sure we go through the protocol. We’ll see how things go.”

 

On whether he still feels that the talent on this team is adequate enough to win games:

“I think we do [have the talent to win games]. Listen, we’re into some positions of depth but that’s not an excuse. That’s not how we go.”

 

On whether he believes the talent on this team is on par with the opposing teams each week:

“I do.”

 

On whether the offense is truly in the best position to succeed if WR Jeremy Maclin, WR DeSean Jackson, and McCoy are off of the field on third down like they were in the second quarter against Washington:

“We had a couple little personnel things. Somewhere in there you rest your players so we had a couple different personnel groups where we could do that. We weren’t successful on it but we had kids on there that we thought we had good matchups with and what we wanted to do with the play.”

 

On whether he sees the team getting worse since the margin of defeat seems to grow each week:

“I can’t sit here and tell you things are great when you come off a loss like that. I think everybody is searching right now and looking for answers. That can be a healthy thing. It’s the things that I mentioned to you, the turnovers, the penalties and the big plays. You just can’t give those things up and win football games. Things snowball on you at times and you just have to back up and fix the problems here and that’s what we have to do.”

 

On whether the coaches are over-thinking when creating the game plan by making so many offensive subsitutions:

“When they don’t work, yeah, that can be questioned, I’m sure. But we felt that was the right thing to do. I don’t think we were over-thinking it. It didn’t work out.”

 

On whether he feels his leadership is still effective and whether or not there is a point where he can deem himself ineffective:

“Listen, I look at everything. I’m not telling you I don’t look at that. I think we’re not winning football games, so I take that responsibility and since I’m in that leadership spot, then my leadership right now isn’t good enough. I’ve got to do a better job there and make sure that we play better.”

 

On whether it is possible that some of the leaders in the locker room haven’t been with the team long enough to be effective:

“I don’t think so. I think they’re trying their best to lead the best way they know how. I don’t think that. No, I don’t think that.”

 

On whether he believes they have enough leaders in the locker room:

“I think we do, yeah.”

 

On how the six-game losing streak has affected him:

“I can’t tell you I’m the happiest guy. I don’t like to lose and that’s an understatement. We’re in this thing to win football games, but at the same time, I’m going to make sure that I continue to teach the fundamentals and try to do the things the right way, that I think are the right way.”

 

On whether there is a scenario where he would consider stepping down:

“I’m standing in front of the team and telling them these are the things we need to do, one of which is to continue to battle. So, I think that’d be a cop-out. That’s not how I see things. That’s not the way I’m wired. We’re going to keep battling and do it as a team. I’m not going to tell the guys one thing and then do the other.”

 

On Chairman and CEO Jeffrey Lurie’s reaction to the six-game losing streak:

“He’s a competitive guy and nobody wants to win more than Jeffrey. I would tell you he’s disappointed. I would tell you rightly so. He feels the same way we do that we’re letting people down in this city and so on. So, that’s what I can tell you.”

 

On whether coverage was blown by CB Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie or CB Nnamdi Asomugha on the long touchdown pass to WR Aldrick Robinson:

“Well, that was one of the big plays and a couple of the guys you mentioned there are responsible for that. They know that. They stand up and take responsibility for that. They did that on the sideline when we tried to fix the problem and make sure that it didn’t happen again.”

On whether there was a lack of focus on the Robinson touchdown:

“I’ll tell you that it was a broken play.”

On whether QB Michael Vick is the starting quarterback when he returns to full health:

“Well, we’ll see how he does this week, but yes.”

On the play of QB Nick Foles on Sunday:

“I thought there were some good things that he did and then there are some things that he can definitely learn from. But he made a couple of nice throws, tight throws early that I thought were some pretty good plays. Again, there are some things that he can work on. He’s a young guy; a rookie, so there were a couple of rookie mistakes, but there were some positive things too.”