HEAD COACH ANDY REID
OPENING STATEMENT: “Alright, I don’t have a lot to go over with you. I can just give you a brief update on Rashee (Rice). His surgery was not his ACL, it was the posterolateral corner. There’s damage there. It’s probably the same result though that you’d get timewise for an ACL. It takes a while for that to come back, and he’ll get into his rehab and get rolling on that as we go here but that’s what it was. Other than that, we look forward to the challenge of playing a very good 49er team. I think both teams know each other and what we’re about. (It) should be a heck of a game. Anyways, with that, the time’s yours.”
Q: Is it still your process to use the bye week to self-scout? If so, what was your point of emphasis?
REID: “We actually have a continual self-scout that we do throughout there and then look at it and we’ve got areas to improve. I’m not necessarily going to go through those areas but there are things that we can definitely improve on, (on) both sides of the ball, special teams so we’ve got to – and special teams. We were able to go back and look at some of that to be able to – offensively – to keep our drives going and things that can help us sustain things that might have hurt those drives. Then, the obvious redzone questions, we kind of worked through that (to) make sure we’re a little bit more sound there. Defensively, we’re doing a pretty good job in most of the situational things. We’d had that first drive thing going and (that) we did a little better on so we’re doing a pretty good job there. There are some things that (Defensive Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo) Spags has got that he’s got to work on with the guys. That’s kind of in a nutshell, that was it.”
Q: What stands out to you about the redzone offensively from week-to-week?
REID: “Well, listen, we can do a better job of not stopping ourselves with things. Whether it’s penalties or dropped balls, we’ve had a couple of those. Schematically, we go back and we hammer through that. We can help out the guys in some of the areas, too, there – just putting them in a little bit better position. The things that are hurting us right now – which are obvious, but the penalty situation’s hurting us, and we’ve got to take care of that. That’s something we can control, focus in on (and) do a better job with.”
Q: How much of JuJu Smith-Schuster and Kareem Hunt’s production is due to them being here before?
REID: “I think that’s a big part of it. They kind of know how we operate. They know the offense, they’re comfortable with it. Kareem (Hunt) had obviously been away for a while, but he was able to pick everything up quickly. He and Pat (Mahomes) are very good friends. They’ve stayed in touch throughout the years here, so he was welcomed back in, he had that part of it, the comfort part that you’re welcomed back in and to get things rolling. That opens up another avenue there for him psychologically.”
Q: What are your plans for Clyde Edwards-Helaire now that he’s been at practice for a week now?
REID: “He’ll (Clyde Edwards-Helaire) be back in tomorrow. We’ll be able to talk to him then. I haven’t had the chance to talk to him here, so I want to just get with him first before I put anything out there publicly. We’re awful glad to have him here.”
Q: Do you still see Wanya Morris starting at left tackle for at least the interim?
REID: “We obviously looked at that and we’ll just – both of them can do better. Wanya (Morris) knows what he has to work on and likewise Kingsley (Suamataia) does and we’re lucky to have both of the guys – both young guys. We’re kind of growing with them here so we’ll just kind of let that process keep rolling.”
Q: How important is bringing in a receiver with some familiarity if you are to acquire one at the trade deadline?
REID: “I think – it’s probably what Adam (Teicher) was saying too – just I think that helped JuJu (Smith-Schuster) and his situation coming back in (and) jumping in. It helped Mecole (Hardman) coming back, but I’m not telling (you) other guys can’t come in and help out. That’s not – I don’t think that’s an issue. It’s just going to take them a little bit longer to figure it out and get on the same page with Pat (Mahomes) and all of those things. It won’t be quite as what you’ve seen with these other guys that have been here, but that’s – and I’m not saying that we need to bring anybody else in. You asked the question. I’m just saying that I’m answering your question on that, Matt (Derrick).”
Q: On Xavier Worthy’s progress.
REID: “I think Xavier’s (Worthy) has done a nice job for us; he does a lot of things there for us. (He plays) a lot of different positions, we have flexibility with him to move him around. He’s a quick learner which helps in this offense. I’m happy with what we’ve got so far and I don’t think we’ve tapped that out at all. He’ll keep getting better and that’s exciting.”
Q: Do you feel good about everyone on your active roster health-wise?
REID: “Yeah, the only one that was working on something was (Mike) Danna. Mike had hurt his pec(toral) and so he’s working through that, but he would be the only one that was working this past week with something.”
Q: What is a good number of carries for Kareem Hunt at this point in his career?
REID: “I kind of joked with him (Kareem Hunt), Soren (Petro), that he’d spend the bye week in the cold tub after all those carries. I told you – I mentioned before that he came back in pretty good shape other than not having played football and that’s held true to this point. He’s been able to do a good job in practice when he was on the scout team. Then, he worked through that (and) he was able to get in the game. We started him off relatively slow and then increased it and he was able to handle both of those things. I think – and we’ll just see how the game goes but I feel comfortable with him carrying the ball. We had (Carson) Steele backing him up there (and) he had a few carries that were productive so we’re in pretty good shape there.”
Q: You usually have later bye weeks and home games coming out of the bye week, since it’s different this year, will you do anything different?
REID: “The bye week – there wasn’t anything that we did different. I still gave the guys time off to get out of here and recover. Normally, these things (the bye week) happen the ninth week or somewhere about that area for us. We’ve got a little different schedule the way things work out so the days these guys do get off, I encourage them to make sure they take advantage of it whether it’s a Thursday game or a Saturday game. We’ve got games every day of the week except Tuesday so make sure that you utilize that time as the season goes on here, for recovery.”