Andy Reid talked about Donovan McNabb, his injuries and whether or not he's going to be able to play on Sunday night against the Patriots. Andy talked about McNabb's poor performance and the play of A.J. Feeley.
Head Coach Andy Reid Press Conference
11/19/07
Injuries:
“[WR] Jason Avant has a groin strain. It acted up a bit on him out there. [FS] Brian Dawkins has a thigh contusion. [LB] Omar Gaither has lower back spasms. [G] Todd Heremanns had the knee bursitis, which swelled up on him. So, he’s coming down today. [QB] Donovan [McNabb] has an ankle sprain. [He] had an MRI on it which shows that he has some swelling in there. You can kind of pinpoint the tender spots on it and work on those. He also has a swollen thumb. We x-rayed that and it is not broken. But, it is quite swollen. [S] Quintin [Mikell] has the MCL sprain. We’ll just take that day by day and see how he does here this next week.”
Opening Remarks:
“I thought it was a good win overall, like any win in the National Football League. I thought it was a good one. Defensively, I thought we did a good job starting with the d-line. I thought they came out and did a good job of dominating that front. [CB] Sheldon Brown, I thought, had a nice day. Offensively, obviously [RB] Brian Westbrook put together a career day on both carries and yards. Like I said, he’s playing great football right now. [RB Correll Buckhalter] Buck had a nice TD run. I thought [T] Jon Runyan and [T William] Thomas played as good of football as they’ve played this year. Then, [QB] A.J. [Feeley] stepping in for Don, that’s not an easy thing to do. A.J. did it well, was efficient, and did a good job of commanding the offense. Special teams, like I mentioned yesterday, I thought [P] Sav Rocca did a nice job punting the football.”
On where McNabb stands with his ankle sprain:
“It’s not a high ankle sprain, that’s not what it is. Those are the ones that take a lot of time. We’ll see how he does this week and take it day by day. I’m as worried about the thumb as I am about the ankle, maybe a little bit more because that’s what he’s gripping the football with. But, both of them are day-to-day situations.”
On when McNabb hurt his thumb:
“He actually hurt it fairly early in the first half. I want to say it was late first quarter. But, it really didn’t start to swell on him until later.”
On whether Feeley will practice with the one’s this week:
“Well, it depends on what Don can do. If he can go, then he goes, if not then A.J. takes his [place]. It’s fairly simple.”
On whether the fact that they are playing the Patriots next week plays into the decision of the starting quarterback:
“I appreciate you giving them that credit. We play with who we play with out there. That’s all we can do. If Donovan’s there, then Donovan plays. If A.J.’s there, then A.J. plays.”
On whether the quarterback needs to practice and prepare this week to play effectively on Sunday:
“I think Donovan’s far enough along in his career where you can get away with it, more so than one of the younger guys. So, would you like him to be there for the preparation? Absolutely, but if he can’t physically then that’s the way we go.”
On whether it affects his game planning not knowing who the starting quarterback will be:
“Not much. Both of those guys have strong arms. So you can do all the things you do down the field with them, all the short games. We haven’t been doing a lot of an overabundance of rolling out or boot action.”
On whether the Patriots create a unique challenge for them:
“They’re a heck of a football team right now. [Patriots head coach] Bill’s [Bellichick] done a nice job, [VP of Player Personnel] Scott Pioli’s done a nice job settling in the team. They do a lot of things. They’ve got some players, a core group of players that have been around for a while, so they can do a few different things. Right now, they’re the best team in the National Football League and it’s well deserved.”
On how long McNabb spent in the training room with ice or heat on his ankle during the game:
“He didn’t have any swelling so that wasn’t needed at that time. If he needed all of that he would’ve stayed [inside]. But, at that time there wasn’t anything that really needed to be done for that. Had they noticed the swelling on it as he went on through the game, we would’ve taken him right in. But, there wasn’t any.”
On why he mentioned there was swelling on McNabb’s ankle yesterday:
“I told you I needed to check him out, I hadn’t seen him. There really wasn’t much at all.”
On whether there is swelling on his ankle today:
“Very little. There’s a little pocket on the back, but very little.”
On whether they will know by Wednesday who the starting quarterback will be:
“We’ll see. I’m not going to put a date on it like that, but it’s possible. We’ll see how things go.”
On whether this could be a game-time decision:
“It could. I’ve got to see how he’s doing as we go through. We’ve got two things that we’re dealing with, we’ll see how it works out.”
On whether it presents problems for the opposing team not knowing who the starting quarterback is:
“It might. I don’t know how they perceive him. It depends if the styles are completely different. Donovan adds a little bit more of a run threat, obviously. I don’t know how they perceive it.”
On how he makes his team not be intimidated by the Patriots:
“You’ve got to want to go in there, that’s what it is for coaches and players. We’ve been on the other end of that where we’ve been considered the best football team, and I know other teams have wanted to come play us and have that challenge. So, it’s a big challenge playing the New England Patriots and you’ve got to want to do that. I don’t think there’s much that a coach is going to convince you of, other than your want to play.”
On whether he admires the Patriots more because they like to pass the ball:
“They’re throwing the ball around. They spread you out and they’re throwing it. They’re doing a nice job of it.”
On whether the Patriots are the best team he’s seen operate in his years in the NFL:
“Yeah, they’re doing a pretty good job of it. They’re doing it as well as anyone I’ve seen, right now.”
On whether he expects the other injured players to play on Sunday:
“I think so. Again, the one’s I’ve mentioned, Q [Mikell] is a day-by-day situation, so we’ll have to see. Both he and Donovan are kind of in the same boat. The other guys I think will be okay.”
On McNabb’s performance before he got hurt:
“There were two throws he’d like to have back, one of which he was under pressure and he had to get rid of the thing. So, the receiver could have done a better job on that. Then, the other one he probably shouldn’t have thrown that one. But the one, he didn’t have a lot of choice. That was his quick throw and he threw it to where he thought the receiver was going to be, and the receiver wasn’t there.”
On whether he is optimistic about Mikell playing on Sunday:
“We’ll see how it goes. I’d like to tell you yes and I’d like to tell you no. But, it’s not the deal right now.”
On whether Mikell had an MRI:
“Yeah.”
On whether they found anything from the MRI:
“No, it’s kind of right in the middle. That’s what I’m telling you guys. It’s right in the middle of this thing.”
On whether they will make a roster move for the safety position:
“I don’t think so, no.”
On what execution is needed for Sunday to keep their momentum going:
“You’ve got to worry about taking care of your own business first. I told you this last week against the Dolphins, I’ll tell you it again this week, if we get caught up in all the other stuff then you’re going to be in trouble. You better focus on getting yourself better as an individual then as a football team. If you do that then you’ll be okay.”
On whether he felt they turned a corner now that they won back-to-back games:
“We need to do it, we did that part. I’m going to tell you again, we’ve got to keep it going. There’s still a lot of season left and you’ve got to make sure you keep pushing through the season.”
On whether he is concerned about the lack of turnovers:
“We’d like to get more turnovers, we would. I tell you this every week, in this league you’ve got to continue to put pressure on the quarterback and we’re getting close. We’re around the quarterback, we’re making the quarterback move, we’re hitting the quarterback after the throw to get some sacks in there. Our linebackers, they need to get a couple along with those d-linemen. When you have opportunities to blitz, you’ve got to get in there and make tackles.”
On the four defensive end set:
“I thought it was good. We’ve done that in the past. I thought it was a good thing.”
On whether McNabb was upset about his injury:
“He wanted to be back out there. I think he wanted to be back out on the field and he wanted to be playing. So, if he couldn’t play he’d be back out there cheering on his teammates. It wasn’t something we had to force him into, to get out there and do what he did. As far as going on the field, I wanted to make sure that he could run. I don’t want to put a guy out there that can’t run, and he didn’t feel like he could push off well enough to run. So, I thought it was best that we just kept him out of there.”
On how Westbrook’s knee is:
“He’s okay today. We’ll see how he feels in the next couple of days, but he’s okay today.”
On how important it is to focus on one game at a time now that they are back in the playoff mix:
“We’ve been hammering that and we’ve got to keep hammering it. When I say ‘We’re hammering it,’ I’m talking about the coaches and I’m also talking about the veteran players. They understand that, they’ve been around here. So, you want to make sure the new guys that are on the football team, that includes the free-agents and the rookies, understand.”
On whether the days are gone when he was careful to run Westbrook too much:
“I’m not real worried about that right now. As long as he can handle it, he’ll let you know during the game. He’s got a pretty good feel on whether he wants to be in there or not.”
On whether anything will change this week because they are playing in a prime-time game:
“No.”
On whether he needs to see McNabb throw the ball on Wednesday before they make a decision at quarterback:
“I’ll get a feel on it. I’ve been around him long enough to know when he’s ready to go and when he’s not. So, I’ll get a feel as time goes on here and see how he does.”
On whether the condition of the field had anything to do with the decision to keep McNabb out:
“No, that had nothing to do with it. The field was fine to play on.”
On whether they need more from the passing game in the first half:
“Yeah, you need to score as many times as you can score. You’d like to do it in the first half as much as you possibly can. The pass game’s a big part of that, so to say we’d like more of that then absolutely. We want more points on the board.”
