BB: It's nice to come in here after a game like that. Really good team win for us.
Start with the coaching staff, I thought they did a great job this week all the way across the board. The team was well prepared. I thought we did a good job. They did a good job all week with the kind of change in the practice schedule and just having the team ready to go today. Give those guys a lot of credit.
Obviously, defensively, top scoring team in the league, top everything in the league, yards, points, red area, you name it. To go out there and keep those guys off the board, whatever it was, five, six, fourth downs, and just a lot of good competitive defensive football. It was great. Really proud of that whole unit, the staff, the players, pass rush coverage, our tackling.
Obviously, Hockenson, one of the top tight ends in the league, really focused on him. It was really a strong effort there.
Offensively, moved the ball. Missed some opportunities in the red area, but in the end enough points to win. It was just a good solid effort.
Rhamondre was great with the ball. Our offensive line continues to be a strength. Good to get Jakobi back.
Bailey made a lot of good decisions, was accurate with the ball. Thought he showed some poise there at some pressure situations where he got out of it and found an open receiver, made good decision.
Hopefully we can just keep building as a team and continue to improve every week like we have if we work hard and really understand how we can play better, what we need to do to play better, coach better, communicate better.
I think we can keep getting better. That's what we're going to try to do.
Q. Bill, how much growth have you seen in Bailey from last week, obviously coming off the bench, and then this week having snaps in practice and full preparation into this week? How much growth did you see in him?
BB: I thought it was better definitely being able to get in the huddle every day, call a play, see it, execute it versus watching somebody else do it. That's always more beneficial.
But, he learns well whether he is in there or not. Yeah, it was good. There was definitely an element of that. I couldn't put a percentage on it or anything, but certainly it helped.
He was confident out there. He does a good job. He does a good job of seeing the game and can come off and identify and articulate what he saw, what happened. That's usually right. What he saw is usually what I saw or maybe when you look at the film, maybe there's something that's a little gray in there that his explanation is actually good. It was the way he saw it. Maybe he might not have done the right thing, but he saw the game.
That goes all the way back to preseason. He played a lot in preseason. I think those snaps were good for him. He learned a lot. We learned a lot. I think there's definitely some benefit to the playing time that he had in preseason in the games that he has played the last two weeks.
Q. You mentioned Rhamondre. Did you see him hit another gator after Damien went out, and just how impressive was it that he was able to finish the game in the fashion that he did?
BB: You have to give him a ton of credit. With Damien out, we only carried two backs for the game, and he put it all on his shoulders and finished with a couple of first downs there at the end of the game in the four-minute offense.
Yeah, he is always good. He does a great job with the ball in his hands. He is a strong runner, but he can make people miss. He is a really good football player. Really a good football player. So glad we have him.
Had a couple of blitz pickup plays right up the middle where he stepped up there. He is a good all-around back. Love him. Love him.
Q. The quality you describe with Bailey very often are qualities you describe in regard to veteran players. Is it rare to see a rookie go from his first NFL appearance to here his second and his first start, obviously, and have that type of growth from one week to the other?
BB: I mean, I don't know. I think you saw a similar thing with Mac last year. Same basic concept.
Play, see things, play better, learn from it. Pace of the game, calling plays in the huddle, recognizing defenses, managing the clock, et cetera. I know other quarterbacks have done those things before. It's a little bit different at this level. More things to think about. More things that the defense can do, so forth, so yeah.
Q. Hockenson, just one catch today. What were you guys able to do to slow him down?
BB: Give credit to the players, the defensive coaches. We doubled him at times. We tried to disrupt the timing a little bit.
I think some of the credit in our pass defense goes to the pass rush. We were able to I think disrupt the timing of the Detroit passing game, which, again, is very good. They have a good quarterback, good receiver. St. Brown is an excellent receiver obviously. Reynolds and, of course, Hockenson. Raymond. All those guys. They have a good group of skill players, good backs.
It's kind of everybody doing their job, but we tried to reroute them a little bit. Coach set a good game plan, and the guys that were on him, particularly Kyle, but A.P. had him some, Devon had him some, Pep had him some.
The linebackers, Jahlani, Bentley had a lot of awareness of him to just not make his routes easy, to try to reroute him, force him to go over or under the coverage, things like that.
It's team defense. It's not just one guy. It's just good team defense.
Q. Bill, we saw the Croatian flag on your chest there week and last week as well. What does it mean? What is the significance to you to be able to have that symbol out there on this platform?
BB: This year the NFL gave us the opportunity to do that, so I'm proud of my Croatian heritage, and I'm proud to wear it.
I'm not in Croatia. I'm not a citizen, but it is a heritage that is half of my family. My mom was English. My dad was Croatian. So, for other Croatians, Coach Saban, Coach Carroll, and others of us that have that little bond, proud of it and glad to have the opportunity to wear it.
And I've heard from some people across the ocean that they appreciate it and appreciate the recognition as well. Go, Croatia. (Laughing.)
Q. Two things. Two guys. Matthew Judon, how much of a beast was he today? And I don't want to overlook your kicker, Folk.
BB: Nick is so consistent. You kind of start to take it for granted, and then you realize how difficult it was. Today it was not an easy day to kick. The wind gusted, and it was blowing straight across the field really from our bench to their bench.
When you kick straight into it, you can't kick it as far, but it goes straight. If you kick with it, it goes further, and it pushes the ball. The crosswind, especially when it gusts, is tough.
Nick makes it look so easy. Honestly, it's kind of what it's like in practice. We've got some wind out there, some crazy wind, and the ball goes in between the uprights all the time.
Yeah, I mean, I can't say enough about Nick Folk. He is so professional, so consistent, so dependable. When you stop and think about how hard that job is over the amount of time we're talking about, it's really, really impressive.
The first question was?
Q. Judon.
BB: Ju had another great day. Again, he is a very physical presence for us on the end of the line. This is a very good off-tackle and counter team. They hit us on the one counter. I think that was their biggest run.
Then they threw the screen. That was really the big run, but that's been a very productive play for them going all the way back to the Eagles game. All season really.
I thought, again, defensively it's team defense. No one guy can stop the run game, but certainly it helped with the good edge play from Ju and Wise to try to slow down those off tackle runs. Two very good tackles, right? That's really where a lot of those off tackle plays get going.
So, you have to give a lot of credit to those guys, Bentley, Tavai, D.G. inside. We push a lot of plays back into D.G. and Carl Davis, and those guys did a good job inside. It bled a little bit, but there's some 4- or 5-yarders in there, but not like the 20, 30, 50-yarders that they've been ripping off every week.
Yeah, Ju had another solid game. Again, with Wise and Uche, we have two different type of players that generally play opposite of him. That's worked out fairly well for us.
Q. You touched on it off the top. How pleased are you with the way the defense faired in some of the clutch situations, 0 for 6 on fourth down, 0 for 2 in the Red Zone?
BB: Yeah. Then we had the other stop. We had the roughing the passer penalty, which looked like a tough call.
Again, great coaching by the staff. Good plan. Well executed by the players. They have so many go-to guys, it's hard to stop. They're a good sub-run team. We made the stop on that on I think it was a third and two, which put them into a fourth and 8, 9, whatever it was. That was a big stop.
The fourth down stop was really -- third down stop, it's a good sub-run team. St. Brown is tough. Hockenson is tough. Reynolds is tough.
We saw Goff scramble out of the pocket sometimes as well. Not that he is an elite runner, but he is an effective runner and knows how to convert those third downs or fourth downs.
Again, team defense. Pass rush, disrupting the quarterback, covering the receivers. Again, Hockenson, St. Brown, Reynolds, they're all tough. Then you still have to play the running game. There's a reason why they're the highest scoring offense in the league and most yards and all the accolades that they've had, but I think, again, really the majority of the credit needs to go to our players. They're the ones that went out there and defeated blocks, tackled them, covered, and all that. There's no one guy. It's just a good team effort.
Q. I wanted to ask you about Trent Brown. Was kind of matched up with Hutchinson on the weak side a lot, and I'm not sure he lost a matchup all day. What did you see there?
BB: Without Harris, he is a very good player that they were missing today, but they still have good edge players. Obviously, Hutchinson is tough. He is a fast guy. Plays hard. He has a great motor.
We'll look at the film and see how it went, but it seemed like overall the protection was pretty good. Bailey was able to move up in the pocket. I think we took one sack.
Generally speaking, the protection was good. It was clean. He was able to step up. That's every quarterback's dream.
You know Trent, Isaiah, Marcus, Hunter, and some of the protections where we used them on, those guys did a good job against a good edge rush team.
Thanks a lot.
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