Rex Ryan Conference Call Transcript 9/3/11

New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan addressed the media after the team made their cuts down to the 53 man roster.  Here is the transcript courtesy of the Jets.

On whether LB Aaron Maybin’s performance against the Eagles secured him a spot on the roster…

Certainly, he did have some moments in that Philly game. He had a sack-and-a-half and he actually missed another one, but certainly, he played well and again, he’s on our roster so he’s one of those guys we had talked about. (We) had probably three spots open and I thought his play rushing the passer (was good) and that’s what landed him on the roster.

On what led to the Jets trading away S Dwight Lowery and why they traded for G Caleb Schlauderaff…

First off, Dwight, when we looked at our secondary, we’re pretty much loaded when you have Brodney Pool and Eric Smith come back, along with Cookie (Emanuel Cook) and obviously, Jimmy Leonhard is healthy, and we have depth at corner now. I just think that as an opportunity for Dwight to go to a place where he’s really going to be used, competing for that starting nickel job. So, I think it was kind of good for Dwight to go to Jacksonville to get more playing time, and then for us, we just felt that we had the depth that we needed in the back end. And as far as Caleb, and there’s no way I’ll get this (pronunciation) right, Schlauderaff, I believe, we had targeted him, he was a guy we were interested in drafting. We had some high grades on him coming out of Utah. Mike (Tannenbaum) and I watched the tape. Bill Callahan watched the tape today. We were excited to get this young man, and so we proposed a trade to Green Bay. Mike pulled another trade off and we were able to get the young man. I talked to him, he’s excited to be a Jet, and we’re excited to have him.

On carrying three injured players on the roster…

Well, each of those guys, with Rob (Turner), Logan (Payne) and Greg (McElroy), right now they have no plans to place any of them on injured reserve at this time, so we’ll see. It’s hard to tell exactly when guys will be back and things like that, but we’ll take a look at it, but right now, we have no plans to put them on injured reserve.

On how long McElroy will be out and the team’s plans for a third quarterback…

Well, I think right now, he’s kind of out indefinitely. We’ll just kind of see how it plays out, but for now, the number three guy would be, it would be hard to say, but we’ve got a couple of guys that could go back there, but I would guess it would be (Jeremy) Kerley if we had to (play a third quarterback). He’s a young man that can take snaps. We did have him take some snaps underneath center, as well as we all saw, out of shotgun, so that would be our number three right now.

On whether he thinks the team will bring in a third quarterback this week…

I don’t want to speculate on any of that. Certainly, we’ll look at every scenario, like Mike always does. If we think that it’s a way to improve our football team, we’ll certainly look at all possibilities.

On whether they will keep TJ Conley as their punter…

Yes, I think so. We feel good about him. TJ, it’s funny, because the longer training camp went, the better he punted. We’re excited about TJ. I think he has earned that right. I did notice some other veteran punters, but we like the way TJ punted.

On whether John Conner will be healthy for the opener…

We certainly hope so. I think he has spent like 15 hours a day in treatment, so he’s trying to get back and I would never bet against him. I’m anticipating that he’ll be back, but we’ll know later in the week as things get going if that’s a real possibility. I believe it is, though. Again, he’s doing everything in his power to get back.

On whether they will make any more roster moves in the next couple of days…

That’s always a possibility. I think the way Mike is, he does a great job and has his guys looking at every possibility. When we get those rosters of all the teams and the guys that were let go, then we’ll look over them. If we think there is an opportunity to upgrade our football team, then, obviously, we’ve had a history of doing that and we’ll certainly look at all possibilities.

On preparing for the game against Dallas…

Getting prepared to play the Dallas Cowboys, obviously, that’s what we’ve been doing. Our focus has been getting ready for Dallas. Our coaching staff, we’ve been preparing for them for quite a while now, so we’ll be ready to roll.

On whether Caleb Schlauderaff could be the backup center…

I think, when we looked at him and evaluated him coming out of Utah, we thought that he could play center and guard. He played both guards for Green Bay. He did practice as a center at University of Utah, so we think he’ll be able to do that. Will our best option be to put Matt Slauson at center if something happened to (Nick) Mangold? Maybe so, but we’ll see what we have here. Certainly, when we were looking at him and evaluating him off the college tape, we thought he had that kind of ability. When we watched the pro tape, we thought the same thing.

On Kellen Clemens and Kevin O’Connell as options as a third quarterback…

Well, certainly we’ll look at all of the options that are out there, whatever presents itself, regardless of the position. You know the way Mike is, he’ll look at everything and if we think there’s a player that can help us, we’ll certainly consider it.

On McIntyre and Bellore making the team…

Both those guys, they came in, we told them that they’d be given an opportunity and they were running with the two’s the day they came here to practice. It was their job to keep it and they did. Both (of) those guys did extremely well in the preseason, they’re tough, smart football players and they earned it. They came to a team with, in my opinion, the best defense in football. So, those two guys really stepped up. They also did a nice job for (special teams coach Mike) Westhoff on special teams. So they have a lot to be proud of.

On if he feels comfortable going into the season with only four wide receivers…

I think, again, we’ll look at everybody out there. There’s no question about that. But would I be comfortable with those four? Absolutely. When you look at gameday, active (rosters), there’s probably, I don’t know the exact percentage, but a lot of teams will go with four. There will be some teams that go with five receivers and obviously in our situation we just have four right now. But again, things can change and it’s a possibility (they could) change. We’ll make sure that Mike will always check out what’s available to us and if we think there’s a young man that warrants us looking at him and adding to our team, we’ll certainly look at that.

On if the trade for Schlauderaff means that he is worried about the offensive line depth…

I think this helps us, I think without question this helps us. This is a young man that we really were interested in and when we watched the tape we were excited about him. I feel better about our depth now than I did, that’s for sure.

On Bellore being the only undrafted free agent to make the team…

I think (Garrett) McIntyre was a free agent as well, but absolutely he was a young man that we liked. Coming out of college, he was a guy we were definitely considering drafting as well. But when he came here, he had to earn it. We put him in from day one. He was running with the twos. We had him and Josh Mauga as the second string linebackers and the young man, you have to give a ton of credit to him and to Bob Sutton, who did a great job of getting this guy up to speed. And Nick is a smart guy, he’s a tough guy, very competitive, and was flying around, making tackles all over the place. He definitely earned his spot here and you’re exactly right, this is a tough team, a tough roster to make, so you really have to earn it, and he did that.

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