Chiefs-Patriots Postgame Quotes

Shapecity · Sep 7, 2008

EDWARDS: Brody Croyle has I guess a separated shoulder right now, so we’ll see the extent of it once we do an MRI.

Q: Is it his throwing shoulder?

HE: It is his throwing shoulder I believe. His right shoulder. So, obviously we hope he gets back and hope Tom Brady gets back, too. I don’t know what his injury is, but I hate to see quarterbacks go down like that. Well, you watched the game. We had some opportunities, I thought, it the first half to capitalize on field position and points but we didn’t quite get it done offensively. [We had] too many three-and-outs. Defensively, we did a pretty good job but I thought the second half they ran the ball on us and got themselves in the position to score. I thought at the end, defensively after the turnover, we held them to three and that was important to try to get the ball back and go down and score seven to try to keep it to a tie game or decide whether we are going for two points to try to win it. But, that never occurred. It’s like anything else. There are always a couple plays in football games that you don’t make and the outcome is like it was today—a loss for us. We have to go back and regroup. We have a home game this week. We have to figure out a way how to win a game.

Q: Is there anything that you can take away from this game?

EDWARDS: No. We lost. No. We lost. That’s all you take. We lost the game.

Q: I know you never want to lose your starting quarterback, but is this a better team with Damon Huard?

EDWARDS: I don’t know that. We lost the game with Damon playing half the game. We have to score more points. I know that. We have to have the ability to score points and get some drives going. We had too many three-and-outs early in the game. Defensively, we let them off the hook a couple times on third down. I thought the big third down play in the second half when it was third-and-11 and they hit the one behind us, that was big for them. It got momentum and they took the ball down again. You can’t allow that. On third-and-long you can’t go up the field.

Q: What did you discuss when you took a timeout when they were pinned on the 1-yard line and they completed the big pass to Randy Moss?

EDWARDS: Well, we were going to try to make them punt into the wind because the wind was in their face. So we called a timeout knowing that if they ran the ball we would call another time out and try to make them punt into the wind. We’d get good field position that way. I guess the game was 3-0 or whatever it was at that point. We just felt we wanted them to punt in the wind because he would have been in the end zone punting against the wind and that was to our favor. So, that was our thinking there. It didn’t work out because they got the big pass.

Q: How would you characterize the play of Dwayne Bowe?

EDWARDS: Too many drops for him. He’s a better player than that. He was probably pressing. I know he was pressing early in the game. I told him to relax and catch the ball and don’t try to run before you catch it and he did that a couple times. But he makes the big touchdown catch. He had a chance there at the end to catch one. You have got to make those plays. That’s what you’ve got to do. If you are going to be a good team, a winning team, you have to make the plays. When they present themselves, you have to make them.

Q: Can you talk about Matt Cassel filling in for Tom Brady?

EDWARDS: He did a good job. He ran the offense. He did a good job hitting the big pass. He had two long drives. They did some good things with him. I thought their run game really helped. When they ran the ball they became two handed and that was tough. They ran it when we had nickel personnel and dime personnel. So, they ran the ball and moved the ball and that’s what they do. They are a very experienced offense. He is an experienced quarterback. He hasn’t played a lot, but he knows the system. Most of those kids played in the preseason. So, he did a good job.

Q: What were your feelings about Tom Brady leaving the game with an injury.

EDWARDS: I would hope that he gets back. That has happened to me, when you lose your quarterback a couple times. It’s not a lot of fun at all for anybody. You hate to lose good players in this league, especially marquee players, to injury. So hopefully he’ll get back.

Q: Did that affect your strategy?

EDWARDS: No. It didn’t affect theirs, either. They ran the ball a little bit more probably. But, he spreads you out and throws the ball and that’s like a run. When you throw it outside to the numbers, a short pass, that’s like a run for them. That’s a wide perimeter run. They kept doing that. They ran their offense, for the most part.

Q: Branden Albert played the whole game. Did he hang in there better than you thought he would?

HE: There was discussion about giving him a breather going into this game, but he didn’t need a breather. He wanted to play football. We would have gotten into a fight if I tried to take him out of the game. So, I wasn’t going to fight him. He’s too big. So he played, and good for him. A breather was to get him out for a series or two. But, he didn’t want to come out. I asked him, “Are you okay?” and he said, “I’m fine coach”. So, he got through it. Good for him, and good for us, too.

Q: How do you think the rookies played overall?

EDWARDS: I thought, for the most part, I can’t tell because I can’t watch all of them. But, I thought they went in there and they were very competitive. They probably made some mistakes, but we had some veterans make some mistakes, too. I think we have to learn from it and build on it. That is what we are going to have to do every week. We are going to have to get better. And they are going to have to get better because there are no options for us. We are playing these guys. Next week it could be seven of them in there. That is just the way it is going to be for us the whole year. We are going to keep playing these young guys and make them good players. We’ve got to win one.

Q: Why did you make Damon Huard your backup going into the game instead of Tyler Thigpen?

EDWARDS: We just felt that he was more ready for that role right now. Thigpen, I thought after the Chicago game, he really pressed some things and turned the ball over too much for me. And in this game, playing a veteran defense like this, Damon knows them pretty well. He can handle it. He can handle this, I thought, better than Thigpen. I thought he did a pretty good job for the most part.

Q: Is Huard now your starting quarterback with Croyle out?

EDWARDS: Right now, yes, he sure is. He is the second best quarterback.

Q: Watching from the sideline, did you think that [Devard] Darling was going to outrun the defense and score on that play?

EDWARDS: I thought, but I guess the guy caught him. I guess the guy had an angle or something. The guy made a great play and it ended up being a great play because we couldn’t score.

Q: Do you have any idea who recovered the fumble of Huard right before the Darling reception?

EDWARDS: No, because I know they said it was dead. They said he was down, it was dead. That’s why we got the ball back.

Q: How do you think Brody Croyle played?

EDWARDS: Brody was okay. He was doing what we asked him to do and made a couple good throws. He made a couple throws to [Dwayne] Bowe and some other guys, to Tony [Gonzalez]. He got hurt. You could see it coming. The guy came and all of his weight landed on his throwing shoulder. The guys was trapped up underneath his throwing shoulder and he couldn’t get away from it.

Q: And it’s a separated shoulder?

EDWARDS: I don’t know. We’ve got to find out more as we go. It’s sprained right now. We’re going to look at it on an MRI and find out.

Q: Can you talk about the throw Huard made to Darling when he had three guys coming at him?

EDWARDS: He did a great job. They were blitzing and you knew they were coming. He hung in there and got hit and delivered a good strike to the guy. I wish he would have scored. It would have made it kind of interesting. Then I would have to decide to tie it or try to win it. That would have been kind of interesting.

Q: It looked like Larry Johnson was only in on one play during that final drive.

EDWARDS: We were in a two-minute offense. There are different personnel groups. I thought LJ ran pretty good too today, the first time out. He ran hard against a good team that can play against the run.

Q: What about your other running back Jamaal Charles?

EDWARDS: He ran good. He’s a young player and ran good. He’s fast. We have to try to get him the ball and get him some touches. A lot of those kids had to play today, and they played against a good team, so hopefully they learned from it.

Player Quotes

Brian Waters, Guard
(On Brodie Croyle’s injury)
“We’ll be able to find out tomorrow or Tuesday, but I expect him to bounce back. He’s young; he should be able to bounce back quickly.”

(On changing quarterbacks)
“Is it any different than the last few years? We’ve been able to bounce back and fight through. We know what we need to do and Damon [Huard] is a pro. We’ve seen what he can do and he knows this offense better than anybody. Our focus still hasn’t changed. We still have to run the ball, we still have to complete third downs, and we have to do a better job of not doing so many three and outs.

Glen Dorsey, Defensive Tackle
(On Matt Cassel’s 3rd down pass to Randy Moss from the Patriots 1-yard line)
“It was a big play. If we could have gotten that stop, our offense would have been in a better situation to be successful. We have to look at it and learn from it and try to correct it for next week.”

Tony Gonzalez, Tight End
(On the loss)
“There’re a lot more positives from this one. We are so young and we can play a lot better. There are some guys, without saying names, that can play better, and we will. It looks good as far as I’m concerned.”

(On play of Damon Huard)
“He took advantage of his opportunities and [Dwayne] Bowe came up with a great catch. Obviously Damon brings experience, but I think Brodie [Croyle] played real well also.”

(On play of Dwayne Bowe)
“I think it’s part of that growing process. My second year, I dropped 17 balls. You come out with all these expectations after having a good rookie season and you put a lot of pressure on yourself. He makes great catches in practice and in games. He just needs to be more consistent and I know he will. He’s going to be a great football player in this league.”

Derrick Johnson, Linebacker
(On his sack)
We blitzed up the middle. I can’t take all the credit. I did some kind of stunt blitz with Pat Thomas. Pat took up the blocker for me and I came around.

(On Brady and Cassel)
“We were planning on him playing the whole game. You want to beat the best. When you knock a great quarterback out of the game, that is what you want, as a defense. Of course, we don’t wish anything bad on him but as a defense you want the second guy in there. (Cassel) played better than I thought he was going to play. He played really good. He held up. He held his own.”

(On letting the game get away)
“Big time. We had chances. We didn’t seize opportunities. You can take some good out of this game. We are going to be disappointed a little bit but we still have 15 more games.”

Larry Johnson, Running Back
(On the battle of his offensive line against the Patriots)
“Those guys are real good, [Adalius] Thomas and [Richard] Seymour. Ty Warren, those guys are Pro Bowl guys so you are playing against a championship defense. That is what we faced out there. All of our guys were fighting hard and did a good job. They were going to play us hard all the way through. So, we had to keep pounding and pounding and hope for something to open up.”

(On the end of the game)
“I was hoping for the goal line offense. We had to go five yards and I know I could jump for two or three. It is difficult, we have to go through what our game plan is to put the ball in the end zone. That was a crucial point in the game and I want the ball. I have been through it, Oakland twice, in crucial games where I have gotten the ball and put it in the end zone. But, different philosophy, different offensive system. It is tough.

(On Brady)
I just put my head down and I was like ‘damn’. Coming off of a Super Bowl loss and coming in here with a lot to prove again… it hurt me because he is a good football player and a good person. It is tough to see someone go down like that in pain. Hopefully he can get back real soon.”

Tamba Hali, Defensive End
(On the Patriots)
“New England can run the ball and pass the ball. We just went out there and tried to execute our game plan. We watched a lot of tape on the other guy (Cassel) and we knew he was more of a scramble guy. But as far as the game plan we didn’t change at all.”

Nick Novak, Kicker
(On the field goal)
“I was just trying to focus on having a good hit because of the direction we were going in. If I did not have a good hit, it was going to miss.”

Jamaal Charles, Running Back
(On the game)
“We could have done better; I think I could have done more to help the team out more. We came out with the loss so I was not satisfied.”

(On his strengths)
“I learned how to pick up blocks and the coach believed in me. I missed some today, it is my fault, and I have to apologize to Brodie.”

(On the running game)
“I tried to make something happen, trying to just run the ball good and be a playmaker for the team. We were not satisfied. We could have moved the ball up the field a lot, but we didn’t do our jobs so at the end we had one big play to go and we just didn’t make it.”
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Source: KCChiefs.com

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Chiefs-Patriots Postgame Quotes

Shapecity S2/JBB Teamster Staff Member Administrator

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Chiefs-Patriots Postgame Quotes

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