Opening statement…
Injury update: (Trenton) Cannon, he’ll be rehabbing today, doing some running progression. He’s still out right now for today (with a) hamstring, ankle, he’s working to see if we can get him available. DT (Demaryius Thomas is) finishing up his rehab, so he’s going to be with the strength and conditioning today, which is a good sign. (Josh) Bellamy will kind of change here with the shoulder (injury), he’s going to be limited today in practice, so that was kind of some positive news. Sam (Darnold) is going to go through practice and kind of see how it goes. He’s going to keep increasing his cardio. So, we’ll just kind of take this day-to-day – meet with the doctors a lot and just keep getting the information we need. Kelechi (Osemele), shoulder/knee, he’ll be limited. (Jordan) Jenkins, still has the calf, rehabbing. He’s working to try to see if he can put himself in play for this week. Then, C.J. (Mosley), same thing with the groin. He’s going to keep doing his rehab progressions there and kind of see where it puts us by the end of the week.On if Darnold has been cleared for contact…
Not for contact.
On if Darnold will practice…
Yeah, he’s been cleared medically. He has been cleared for non-contact. So, they’re not allowed to hit him yet, which we shouldn’t have that problem in practice.
On if Darnold will be limited today…
Yeah, limited sounds good. I just don’t know how it’s going to go. We go out there and I don’t know, plans could change. He could take every rep. It could go either way.
On if Darnold will be in for team drills…
Yeah.
On how he’ll prevent a player from slipping and hitting Darnold…
Don’t slip. No one’s going to touch him today, I promise you that.
On how he’ll balance the reps with Darnold and Luke Falk…
We have to be flexible in practice. We start going and kind of see how it goes. The good thing about Luke being as sharp as he is knowing the offense, he’ll get reps in practice. We have some changes in practice where we’re doing more reps, so it works out for us.
On if there is a cutoff on needing to know who will start at quarterback…
Sunday.
On what will determine how much practice Darnold will have today…
For us, it’s going to be, how does it look? How does he look or how does he feel? Just that communication.
On if it’d be better to know who is starting at quarterback before Sunday…
Well, it’s ideal. Ideally, it’d be nice to be able to say, ‘Hey, this is what we’re doing.’ But, that’s just not the situation. We’ve just got to keep talking to the doctors every day, keep talking with (Darnold) and we have to be prepared to go either way.
On how much stress it adds to him in putting together a gameplan without knowing which quarterback will start…
Nothing. Zero stress. We’ve got our things set for the group and whatever guys (are) in there. Does it change a couple things? Yeah, but I mean it’s not like it’s a full rework of the offensive gameplan.
On if adding reps to the itinerary was because of the quarterback situation…
No, it’s probably more of (being) 0-3. So, we need to get better at a lot of things, so we’ll do a little more.
On if there will be a significant ramp up of reps…
No, it’s not crazy. We’re not doing 150 reps today or anything.
On if he has gotten a strong indication that Darnold will be cleared to play by Sunday…
I’d like our odds better than what they’ve been. Like last week, obviously, if we would’ve been playing a game, I would’ve said it was really low. I like the fact that things have looked and progressed in the right direction, but I don’t know what that five percent is. There’s just some gray there still.
On if it feels like he’s rushing to get Darnold cleared to play…
That’s why we’re practicing. If it doesn’t look right, then we’ll go in a different direction. That’s why the communication with him, the communication with the doctors, the coaches, it’s kind of a lot of people that are going to be involved in this conversation. That’s what Joe (Douglas) and his guys do for a living. They’ll watch that and be very aware, especially today and tomorrow of how does this look? Does it look weird? How are we seeing it as coaches? So, it’s going to take all of us to kind of be really checking our boxes and say we feel good about this including (Darnold).
On if it’s difficult to not consider that the team is 0-3 and needs the starting quarterback to return as soon as possible…
That’s why it can’t just be one person. That’s why Joe and those guys (have) got to be involved and the training staff, the doctors because I know what (Darnold) is going to say because if it was up to Sam, I know what’s going to happen. If it’s me, yeah, that’s why Joe is an important part of this – for him to be here, seeing if it doesn’t look right, this is what we’ve got to do.
On if Darnold has to be tested everyday…
Yeah, we’re going to wait. We’re looking at Friday. But the doctors are going to be here every day, so we’re going to be talking through it.
On if he’s worried about Darnold’s strength…
No, he’ll be all right.
On if Darnold is lifting at all…
No, just conditioning.
On if there is part of him that wants to keep Darnold out due to the severity of the illness…
That’s what we have the doctors for, the trainers. I’m just leaning on those guys to tell me what’s safe. If it wasn’t safe, they’re going to tell me.
On if C.J. Mosley’s injury lingered longer than expected…
No, it’s just what he has to do is different than some of the other spots. He’s got to be able to open up and run and burst. There’s a lot of things that he has to be able to do and he’s got to be right to do it. So, I mean he’s doing everything he can. It’s just how the body reacts.
On if Mosley will practice today…
Today, he will not.
On if having Douglas gives the team an advantage because of how well Douglas knows the roster…
It’s kind of one of those things, when you have good players, you can know as much as you want to know, but they’re still good players. (Douglas) knows that roster inside and out. He can help us at least tell us what kind of guys they are and kind of how they work and what might be some weaknesses. But you’re talking about a team that won a Super Bowl two years ago. They’re pretty deep. They have a lot of really good players.
On if Tom Compton will replace Kelechi Osemele if Osemele isn’t ready by Sunday…
We’re working everybody. For me to say it’s going to be this guy or this guy, we’re working that whole group. We had how many guys active (two weeks ago)? Nine linemen? We had every lineman active. Obviously, we like all those guys. We want to just keep rolling them in there and just keep working that group.
On if the offensive line will be splitting reps more…
Yeah, we’re going to be working everybody.
On if working all of the offensive linemen is part of a benefit to adding more reps in practice…
I think for us, especially on the offensive side, we’ve just got to get something going. We’ve got to do some more. We need to do more walk-thrus, meeting time, practice. We’ve got to pull our weight.
On if he’s concerned about Le’Veon Bell’s workload…
It’s hard to take him off the field. When you kind of say like, ‘Hey, we’d love to take you out this series,’ it’s not ideal for him. He wants to be in there. I know we’re always looking – if the play count is extremely high, then we’re definitely going to have to start looking at that. Last week, we had 49 plays? It’s not like it was a lot of plays.
On why he hasn’t been using variety of personnel groupings in the offense…
Well, that’s not true. We used eight different personnel groupings against New England. We played everybody. It’s just when you don’t have a lot of plays, it’s going to look (similar). And then you get down, like we did. We had three wide and it just became stale.
On if it looks like Quinnen Williams will play this week…
Yeah, so we’ll get him out there and practicing.
On if Williams would have more of a situational role after missing two weeks…
It’s hard to say. We’ll see how it goes. The good thing is we’ve got a lot of depth.
On having a rough start with Miami in 2016…
Yeah, we were 1-4 and got written off by everybody. So, it’s good. We went 10-6 and made the playoffs.
On if he has sensed any frustration from Bell getting hit in the backfield…
No, he’s not a complainer. He’s always, “Hey, what do I need to do different? How can I help?” He’s always looking for the solution. He’s been awesome in that aspect of just trying to help, like how do we get positive plays? How do we stay ahead of the sticks? How do we get third-and-manageable? How do we stay first down, second down, first down? He’s been outstanding as far as just trying to find the solution.
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