Q. Jalen had mentioned about the great moments you guys had together during the bye week. Went into a little bit of detail; not much. From your vantage point, how productive were those interactions?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, very. Just having conversations about the team, having conversations about just everything that involves the team, long conversations.
Just got a lot of work done.
Always appreciate when guys work as hard as he did over the bye week. Just that's what my mind was on and his mind was on. We had a lot of good talks. Obviously I'll keep all those private.
And I said this the other day, I just admire how guys worked during the bye week to keep going and just keep getting better.
He spent so much time working at his game, resting his body, but working at his game, and I admire that.
Q. How do they come about? Are they organized? Organically they happen? You're set to be in the same...
NICK SIRIANNI: Yes to both. You start with the conversations, and that's kind of how it goes in the coaching world, too. You're watching something and you're like, hey, let's look at this. Are we as productive as we need to be in this particular case?
No, so then you're kind of going down this path.
Like I'm saying, this is a coaching way and then this is just how it kind of went, too. You're going down this path, hey, let's venture here and see what's going on there.
Then you get back and venture somewhere else. So you have some things planned out but then also conversations and studies take to you different places.
Q. How do you feel like the insights that you discovered reflected on the bye week manifested themselves this week?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, a lot of different things. You know, like I said to you guys, the way we drill things was a little different this week. You know, had some different ways we practiced a couple things.
Obviously you guys don't get to stay out there and watch all of practice, but that showed up throughout practice. I mean, without giving some stuff that to answer your question and help you do your job, but also keeping stuff inside. We video taped things a slightly different way. Everything is on the table.
You know, the way we video taped and audio taped and just everything. Like anything that you think that you have an opportunity to take another step on is what we did.
So that happened and that's meetings and that is -- again your core values are who you are and your habits are who you are and what your identity is.
All these other things can change the way you prepare just in attempts to get better. Like I said, there were things in meetings, things in practice, there were things in the way we taped practice. Shoot, there was a different things with the crowd noise we practiced, too. Bunch of different stuff.
Q. You had some things we talked about you need to work on, turnovers, slow starts. How do you balance wanting to make some changes and also the reality that if you played one game with your full offense, how do you balance that?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, again, only thing you're ever trying to do is focus on how do we improve, how do we improve, how do we improve. So that takes discernment to say this may show as a problem, but is it? You got to go through and study that and say, you know, this is an issue, but then you study it and you're like, maybe it's not as big as we think or this and that.
But like I said, everything you're trying to do is just to improve, and just got to have wisdom of what truly needs -- when we say improve, it's not go get better. There are paths to it. You focus your time on what you think are the big things, just like you spend more time practicing first and second down. I'm trying to make an analogy here.
You spend more time practicing first and second down, then third down and red zone because there is more opportunities there. So it's the same thing there where you're trying to focus on the big things and still focused on the little things. Just give the things the amount of time, attention that it deserves.
Q. The idea of turnover luck. You still feel that way, that it's not a product of the ball bouncing here and there, but it's coaching?
NICK SIRIANNI: I do. Yeah, I do. And I'll stay firm to that. Now, Zach, right, there is always a bounce of the ball. It's an imperfect game. There is mistakes. No one comes off a football game like that was a perfect game. You have that in baseball sometimes. That's not a perfect game.
None of these games are perfect. But that ball bounces differently, so there are times where you're like, we did not get on the ball -- we fumbled, but didn't get on the ball. The act of the fumble itself is what we're talking about. The way the ball came out is a product of coaching, of playing, right, the details of how you play.
That's everything. You name it. Like whether it's somebody that's punching the ball out talking as an offense and you weren't protecting it good enough. Communication problems on a snap. Ball handling issue where you catch the ball and you're in between the mesh and the back.
Those are all things we practice and preach and talk and detail out a ton.
And so like, yeah, I definitely push back on that. The element of like I said, the ball going -- I count any time which fumble as a fumble. I'm treating that in my mind as a turnover because you could have, right?
The ball can bounce weird ways and that's going to happen but that happens to everybody. Oh, the ball didn't bounce our way this way. Those happen throughout the league. So it's the act in itself of protecting it.
And vice versa, the act of coming after the ball. When you close in on a guy and one guy has a shot at the ball and the other guy has a tackle secured, are you getting that shot? Are you taking your attempts? That's what we talk about when we take it away. Are you getting your attempts?
The guy that shoots 25 shots is going to shoot a heck of a lot more than the guy who shoots eight -- unless the guy that shoots 25 stinks.
So get your fundamentals and detail that go into that, because gosh, we work too hard at it to ever think this is luck. You make your own luck. You try your best to put yourself in the best position you possibly can do. That's turnovers, that's game management, that's the way you run a two-minute drill.
It's everything, right?
Yeah, these guys pour everything into this thing and they're so hungry to get better, and so those are things we feel like we can control.
Q. (Regarding ball security.) You have like a third one for quarterbacks in the pocket?
NICK SIRIANNI: Like with two hands-on the ball?
Q. Yeah. You got the body ball boundary...
NICK SIRIANNI: We have our rules. There is a lot of different things that come off this. Again, this is for the team ball carriers. This is a good question. This is for the team ball carriers. Jalen having two hands on the ball in the pocket is a thing, but -- it is definitely a thing.
But the reason it's not up there is because that's not as -- that to me, to Dallas Goedert, he's not going to be passing the ball like that.
So those are the ones that are individualized for the position stays in the position. They don't make it to the post. But there is the back, too. Like the back gets the ball off the mesh, and so many times in this league we see the back do this and a defensive linemen get a hand on it.
What the back is taught to do here is and get to that right away. But something like that doesn't make the post. Also like a catch, tuck, right? That's specific to the quarterbacks not involved in that. So these are team -- does that make sense? These are team fundamentals where it applies to everybody.
Whereas the specific ones that apply to the position groups are handled in the team meetings, but also in the position groups and also in the offensive meetings.
Q. How did Cooper look in practice this week on defense?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I think the guy had a good week of practice. You know, they worked hard on think fundamentals. Worked hard on being on the same page. Playing good defensive football, is tackling well, coming after the football and creating some turnovers. Being good on defensive football is effort and energy to the football. Being good on defense is also everyone being on the same page.
I think our group as a whole had a really good week of practice of doing those things. If you don't do some of those things in defensive football you can't be a top tier defense.
Q. How was Sydney's first week back?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, he had a good week, too. Fun to have him out there. He's a good player. Great worker. Great teammate. You know, he's had so many plays where he just been standing back there and his mind has been so focused on, hey, I'm not in right now but my mind has to work in.
And I have admired watching him do that from afar. But, yeah, good to get him out there running around. I thought he had some good moments.
Q. Nick, how much is tackling fundamentals and how much of it is desire and effort?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I think -- and coaching, right? I look at it the exact same way as I look at the turnovers. What I know about our football team, and I said this to our football team, like I know that we are a tough, physical football team that plays with relentless, relentless effort.
We grade that. We talk about that every single day. I see our guys busting their ass to play hard, because we know when we play hard -- you know, I someone say this the other day. Your hustle and you energy gives you the right to make a play. I see our guys doing that.
I think so much with tackling comes down to the detail of how you approach the detail, how you rep, but sometimes it is just getting the dude down. It's like, all right, there was no detail there but he got him on the ground, or vice versa.
But it's always like, hey, you have all these rules. Like we can make a poster for the tackling. There is so many different rules with that, or details, pardon me, with that of how you go about your business of getting there and your track and you line and then your strike and everything, how you get off the block.
But sometimes it does come down to just get the dude down, right? Just get him down. One of the best coaching lines that Ronell Williams said is just grab a body part and get him down. Just get him down. Now you're there, you've made your hit, just grab a body part and get him down.
So I know we've done the right things to put ourselves in position this week. We'll keep tinkering with different things to try to put our guys in position. We did different drills. We had a couple different things with equipment out there.
Because all we care about is the product that we put on the field is a reflection of the things we do here. Our guys have worked really hard at it.
Q. Nick, your roster right now is at 52. Do you anticipate going to 53, and how do you think Pariss has performed?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah Pariss had some really good -- has done some really good things. I've season Pariss make plays for a long time in this league. You know, he plays with relentless effort, physical, tough. When he's got opportunities, I think he has eight targets and -- you guys would know that.
I thought I saw something like that with our stats that they give me. He has eight targets and eight catches, so he's taking advantage of the opportunities and he's fast, so he helps there.
We will see how that plays out, but I'm pleased with Pariss and the things he's done.
Q. (Indiscernible.)
NICK SIRIANNI: You'll get that. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know how to answer that.
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