GREEN BAY – The Packers' coordinators met with the media Friday. Here's a sampling of their key comments.
Special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia
On having confidence in K Brandon McManus:
Why not the confidence in Brandon? People miss kicks, people miss tackles, people miss throws, people miss catches, people miss blocks. He missed a kick in the game. He's kicking off really well. He's getting healthier and healthier by the day. Had a helluva set yesterday in practice, anticipate him having a really good day tomorrow.
He's got to get his groove back, and really the only way to do that is in practice. We're dealing with the elements all the time, which is a good thing for him, and he's conquering that in practice. Again, we're going to lean on a guy that's had a tremendous performance up to this point, and we expect him to keep performing at a higher level as we get going. There's still a lotta football left.
On facing the Eagles:
The challenge when you watch the tape is I don't see any holes. I don't see any flaws on the entire roster when you watch all three phases but certainly in our phase. They've got a good kicker, they've got a good punter, they've got multiple return guys. Shipley's been outstanding on the back end on kickoff returns; he's also the personal protector. Makes tackles, he's hard to block on their kickoff team. They've got a tremendous coverage unit on kickoff. They've played well.
They're a helluva group to play against and it'll be a good challenge, just like most weeks but this one in particular because of coming out of the playoff game and the way we performed in the first two plays – the first kickoff return we fumbled, the second kickoff return we got a hold. After that, I thought we got our grip back a little bit and played pretty good – had a good punt return – but I'm kind of banking on us being (ticked) off about how the playoff game went and how we're going to respond to that going into this game, how we're going to respond to what happened last week going into this game. So it'll be an interesting contest playing against a group like this that covers like this and is a physical, physical unit.
Defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley
On the run defense struggles vs. Carolina:
'The General' (Colby Wooden) went out early in that game, and we had to move some pieces around. D-Wyatt (was) just coming back from his injury, and we were a little off. I felt we were a little bit off in our details. And obviously, that starts with coaching. When other players have to go in, it's our job to make sure that we don't have a drop off, and I don't think we did a very good job there in that game, truthfully. So we need to do a better job there, and then we need to execute better. I think it showed you how much of an impact player Colby is, and I certainly expect him to be ready to go again. And I think D-Wy just getting back into the swing of things, I anticipate him taking a big step this week. He's had a really good week of practice. But then at the same time, whether it's Stackhouse or Karl or Brinson, we've got to do a good job on the inside.
On preparing to stop the tush push:
When you start to see crossover tape, and you see other people (against) it, you start to save those clips and try to figure out who's doing it best, and are there ways that people have stopped it? And then, are there other things you can think of outside the box to stop it? Right? Which is really hard to do. I mean, I think the success rate is incredible, and they've done such a good job mastering it. But you certainly you can't just go into the game and say, 'We don't have a plan,' so we have to have a plan. Looking at other ways that teams have tried to defend it, we've gotten other ideas, and we have some outside-the-box ideas, and we're going to try our best to stay out of that situation, but if we get into it, we have a plan, and we'll try to execute it. We stopped it one time last year, but then it was third down, so we had to stop it again on the fourth down. And then last year in the playoff game, they lined up in it, and they tried to take a deep shot, and we stopped that, and they came back on the next play, and they ran it again. So we've got to coach it, got to find a way to stop it, and our players have got to execute it.
On knowing whether you're good or not at this point:
Based on the personnel that we have in right now and who's available, I think we're figuring it out. I have an idea of what we're really good at, what our strengths are, strengths and weaknesses are, and what I think we still need to work on. I do think, though, that it's our job to evolve as we go and by the end of the year be playing our best ball. You kind of consolidate as you add and subtract. Do I think we're there yet? No, I don't. Do I think we're playing our best football yet? No, I don't. We need to be more consistent. We have times when we are playing at a really, really high level. Our guys are playing really hard. Fundamentally, they're playing really well. I think we're playing clean for the most part. Knock on wood, there's not a lot of busts and just free guys running all over the place. But I think that's the beautiful thing about playing defense. You just keep getting better and evolving and hopefully you're peaking at the right time. And I don't think we're there yet.
On facing RB Saquon Barkley:
It's going to take our whole team … You have to take away space and to do that guys got to play square and they got to use their hands and they got to stay in their gaps, and at the same time they got to be ready to tear off blocks together and make plays. You want to make the running back stutter his feet and not just give him a vertical charge. You want to make him hesitate a little bit so then we can use our speed and go after him and go get him. And that's hard to do every play because they're so big and strong up front, where it's going to take phenomenal effort and technique and fundamentals and the details. Which I thought we were kind of off a little bit last week, maybe woke us up a little bit to how detailed we're going to have to be in this game to play against them, this back, and this offensive line. Because if this back does get an edge and you don't make him stop his feet, he's gone. He's the premier running back in this league. So it's going to take a team effort, detail, good coaching, but what an awesome challenge ahead of us to try to do it again against the Super Bowl champs.
On getting takeaways:
We've had three takeaways in the last three games, so we're trending in the right direction. We had the one that went under review (in Arizona), so we were closer there, the one on Keisean when he almost took the ball away. Then last week X had the sack fumble and they recovered it for a 6-yard gain. So we're getting closer and I can look you in the eye and tell you that we are getting closer. We've had a takeaway in the last three games and that's the step in the right direction and I think if we continue to do that and hit 'em at the right time, it's going to help us out a lot. The impressive part is last year at this time I thought we were playing good defense and I think we relied a lot on takeaways to hold people under 20 points or however many we were doing. This year, we're doing that and probably playing better defense and we're not getting as many takeaways, so if we can continue and climb and get better just fundamentally playing defense and add those takeaways, I think you're going to see a really dominant defense as we go and that's the plan. So I am encouraged. I'm not happy with the number at all, but I'm encouraged in the way we're trending.
Offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich
On how WR Matthew Golden is doing:
That's going to be one of those things, for him, just trust the process and keep working. He's trying to do all the little things that we ask our wide receivers to do without the ball, with the blocking and everything else. It's only a matter of time for him before he has one of those games where you're like, 'Oh, wow, that's why he's here,' you know?
On what TE Luke Musgrave can bring to the offense:
I think he's a different kind of player than Tucker in the pass game. He provides a really good down-the-field threat. He's got really good speed. He's long, good range when he catches the ball. That'll just kind of put him in the forefront of our offense as far as getting him more targets, to take over that role. It will be interesting to see just how the rest of this thing goes with him. He may surprise us in other ways, too. That's kind of the interesting thing about how just our entire offense right now is different guys got to step up, and we'll see kind of how it goes. But I'm excited about that.
On the Eagles' defense:
It's a big challenge. Obviously extremely talented. They just added Jaelen Phillips. They're getting Brandon Graham back and we'll see what happens with Nolan Smith. They have a really physical front, big guys, they can rush the passer, they can play the run. I think their linebackers are excellent, so yeah, they're a really good defense. It's going to be a great matchup. I'm excited about it just to see how we respond. Playing against a defense like that, that's going to be very telling.
