- 5 hours ago
"What makes him (Vrabel) a good coach is..." Former Patriots QB Brian Hoyer joins! "He knows exactly how to talk to the team"
How important is it to get A.J. Brown involved early for confidence? Is
Hoyer concerned?
Drake Maye vs. Caleb Williams- Hoyer: "For one, his (Maye) style of play, translates more to longevity"
How important is it to get A.J. Brown involved early for confidence? Is
Hoyer concerned?
Drake Maye vs. Caleb Williams- Hoyer: "For one, his (Maye) style of play, translates more to longevity"
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SportsTranscript
00:00Hey, good morning, guys. How are you?
00:01Well, not as good as you.
00:03Shine was telling me you were a part of the alt cast on ESPN the other night.
00:08So you may be soon. You may be too big for this show.
00:12Never, never. I love doing this, especially on behalf of my friend Bill Powers and CMT.
00:16And so I really enjoy our Wednesday conversations, especially when the Patriots are winning football games.
00:21It was not so comfortable at the beginning of the year.
00:23But now I feel like they got things in check, even though it was kind of a sloppy game.
00:29But I kind of feel like at this point, that's kind of the floor of what you can expect for
00:33the Patriots going forward.
00:34Yeah, I had a good time with the simulcast and in my broadcasting debut.
00:40And it was an entertaining game. So I had a lot of fun.
00:42Yeah, I was going to ask you about that because Mike Crable was on with us Monday talking about how
00:46they were lucky and fortunate to win that game.
00:50And is that your perspective on it? Or are you a, you know, any any win any week in the
00:57NFL is a good win?
00:59I mean, look, winning in the NFL is hard. There's no doubt about it.
01:02And I think, Mike, the reason what makes him a good coach is he knows exactly how to talk to
01:06the team.
01:06And so when they were struggling in the beginning of the year, you know, he was kind of keeping the
01:12morale high.
01:13And now when you win some games, you can be a little tougher on the guys, especially when they know
01:18that they can play better.
01:19And so I thought it was funny the way he talked about not funny, but I mean, he was pretty
01:24blunt when he talked to you guys about the turnover.
01:25He's like, we we turn it over at a historic rate and flat out. It's embarrassing.
01:30And I think that's a message to the team. Like, hey, look, we're winning football games.
01:34But if we keep doing this, eventually it's going to catch up to us, kind of like it did in
01:38the beginning of the year.
01:39How important is it that Josh McDaniels first play of the game tunnel screen to A.J. Brown, just to
01:45give him the confidence he needs when it comes to his ability to catch the football?
01:49You know, receivers and tight ends guys like that ball early thrown to them and they like the easiest pass
01:54possible.
01:55Yeah. And I think, you know, on a short week, you're going to simplify the game plan.
01:59You can't put everything in that you would want to put in. And I think, look, I'm not concerned with
02:03A.J. Brown one bit.
02:04I think, you know, you have an injury, you're on IR, you're rehabbing, you're working on getting the ankle strong,
02:10you're running, you're not catching a lot of passes.
02:13And when you are, it might just be from the jugs machine when you're just standing there.
02:16It might be a trainer or an equipment guy who's trying to throw you routes.
02:20And we know that those guys can't throw that well.
02:22So he only had a few days of practice of getting back into the flow of running a route, having
02:27the timing, the balls in the air.
02:29I don't think this has never been an issue for A.J. Brown, I think.
02:32And the best thing that I liked was Drake kept throwing it to him.
02:35You know, 10 attempts to A.J. Brown. I expect it to continue, especially with Dobbs out.
02:39So I'm not concerned at all. I'm sure.
02:42Look, I having played for Josh and actually my last game I ever played was for the Raiders in Chicago.
02:49And Devontae Adams hadn't been getting many targets.
02:52Well, we went in that game, I think we targeted him like 12 times, and the first five passes all
02:56went to Devontae.
02:57So I would expect a similar game plan for A.J. Brown.
03:01Brian, you bring up Dobbs.
03:03Drake blames himself for him landing on the IR.
03:06Would you put that throw and result on him?
03:08And how hard is it as a quarterback to take that pressure onto your shoulders when one of your receivers
03:13goes down?
03:14No, not at all.
03:15I mean, I think it's the right thing to say to try to protect your guy.
03:17But look, this is a – it was a scramble play from the pocket.
03:21They only brought a three-man rush.
03:22Dobbs was actually running a seam to the left side.
03:24He sees the opening.
03:25You have to throw that ball out there.
03:26I mean, it's not one of those where it's actually a designed route.
03:29And so I thought actually Drake gave him a good chance to go get that ball with a lot of
03:33air.
03:34And obviously it's unfortunate.
03:35It's part of the game when you go and dive around and have to make plays like that.
03:40Things like that happen.
03:41And so, I mean, I think that just shows the leadership that Drake has,
03:45taking accountability for things that maybe you aren't even responsible for.
03:49I mean, that's ultimately the best quarterbacks do that.
03:51They take accountability when things go wrong, and they dish out praise when things go right.
03:57Brian, take us inside the QB room.
04:01Who do you have if you are in charge from now until the end of their careers, Drake May or
04:07Caleb Williams?
04:09Oh, I'm going with Drake May.
04:10I just think that, for one, his style of play translates more, I think, to longevity.
04:19I think with Caleb, obviously you saw already the hamstring injury.
04:23And I will say this.
04:25Caleb has gotten better under the tutelage of Ben Johnson.
04:28They both have great coaches to learn from.
04:30But I just think Drake, and we saw this last year, and even in the game against the Jets,
04:35his ability to protect himself.
04:37I don't know if Caleb will have that for the longevity of his career because of his style of play.
04:42Now, I will say, watching him play this past Sunday, coming off the hamstring injury,
04:47he wasn't so quick to get up to full speed and try to run around.
04:51And I think it actually made him play better quarterback.
04:53He played more from within the pocket.
04:54But I just think with Drake, you know, the style of his play, only using his legs when it's absolutely
05:01necessary,
05:02and just the ability to throw from the pocket has been so good at such an early age, I think
05:08I would stick with Drake.
05:10Brian, when you look at Drake, man, you look at his performance over the past several weeks,
05:14I think one of the things that's really impressed me the most has been his decision-making.
05:20And when you play that position, and we know how important it is to make great decisions,
05:25what are you seeing from Drake May specifically when it comes to his decision-making?
05:33Yeah, just the understanding of the play, understanding the read.
05:35And this is, you know, obviously we sat here six weeks ago, and we thought the sky was falling.
05:40We're like, what's wrong with them?
05:41And I think the confidence has just come back.
05:44And this is, the way he's played the last few weeks is kind of the way I expected him to
05:47play
05:47coming off of the season he had last year.
05:50And it's just a total command of the offense.
05:53He's finding the guys that the plays are designed.
05:56And I know this play resulted in a turnover.
05:58But, like, the one that deep crossed the Pop Douglas towards the end of the game,
06:04that Pop ended up fumbling on the ball.
06:06Like, Pop's actually kind of the third read on that because you're running these crossers,
06:10and you've got to kind of figure out which one they take.
06:12And so you're looking left, but he feels Pop getting open to the right.
06:15It just shows to me just the level of comfortability and how well he's seeing it.
06:20And then I know we talked about the touchdown to Dobbs.
06:23That is one of those classic, you go to empty.
06:26Sometimes a team has an empty check.
06:28You know that that empty check is just a three-man rush.
06:30And I love the fact that he just hung in the pocket.
06:33He wasn't trying to run around.
06:34There's no need to run around when your line is just dominating that three-man rush.
06:39And to be able to have the vision to find Dobbs all the way down the field,
06:43you know, we kind of call that, like, the scramble within the pocket.
06:46And he just seems, to me, to be seeing the defense really, really well
06:51and understanding, you know, the purpose of each play that's being called.
06:54Big test for this Patriots team on the road tomorrow night in a little bit.
07:00It appears now that he was unaware that it was fourth down.
07:04You had the luxury of playing for a long time for a head coach who I don't believe that would
07:09ever happen to.
07:12Is that surprising to you at this point?
07:16Yeah, and honestly, that was part of the broadcast that I was doing on Monday night.
07:19And you're just wondering, and I get it.
07:22Look, you're the head coach, and he's helping the defense.
07:25A lot of stuff's going on.
07:26But you've got to know it.
07:27And then on top of it, it made it even worse because Jaden Daniels threw the ball away on fourth
07:31down.
07:32When you go for it on fourth down, as a quarterback, you're basically told,
07:35if we're going for it, like, throw it up.
07:38The worst thing that could happen, you throw it in an interception in the end zone,
07:41and it's a touchback, like, to me, there's a lack of situational awareness
07:45that unfortunately has played out for the commanders the last two weeks.
07:51So they're lucky.
07:53I think Dan Quinn's lucky that the commanders fought back and made it a game,
07:57or else I could have seen that being, you know, grounds for basically losing your job.
08:02I mean, it's just, it's a bad look, and the lip readers are out,
08:07and you're saying, oh, man, that's fourth down.
08:09Like, the head coach has got to know that, especially, to me,
08:12the biggest thing with the commanders, you've got David Blau.
08:14He's a first-time play caller.
08:16Like, he's not making the decision to go for it on fourth down.
08:19So someone, there had to be some kind of miscommunication there with the head coach
08:25to the play caller to the quarterback.
08:27Well, and he doubles down on it.
08:29Like, I love the confidence.
08:31But it's clear he's like, you know, okay, field goal.
08:35Oh, wait a minute.
08:35That wasn't.
08:36That was fourth down.
08:37Oh, that was fourth down?
08:38Like, it's shocking.
08:40Well, I think that's the importance.
08:42And, Brian, we talked about that.
08:43That's the importance of having a guy like Stretch or having a guy like Ernie Adams
08:47that can constantly stay in a coach's air just because there's so much stuff going on.
08:52Like, you as a quarterback, there's a ton of stuff going on.
08:56And if you don't have an offensive coordinator who's constantly reminding you of things
09:00that people look at as a simple thing, you can completely forget those things and be caught
09:05up in the situation and go, oh, I thought it was fourth down.
09:08I thought we had another time out.
09:10Yeah, there's so much going on, Wiggy, especially at the quarterback position.
09:14And so we talked about, you know, Jaden Daniels last week not knowing the situation at the
09:19end of the game.
09:20And that's where I feel so fortunate having played for a Josh McDaniels because Josh would
09:24give you so much information in your helmet before.
09:28He'd be like, all right, you know, it's 11 personnel.
09:30This is the situation.
09:32All right, this is the play.
09:33And then if you had time after the play call, he'd be like, this is what I'm thinking.
09:36It's man, it's zone.
09:37I mean, he was constantly communicating.
09:39And the best thing, you know, for me to witness was Tom Brady wanted all the information he
09:44could get.
09:45I mean, that's, you're talking about the greatest of all time.
09:47It's not like he was like, yeah, I got this on my own.
09:49No, there's a lot going on.
09:50You got to call the play.
09:51You got to identify the defense.
09:52And so if you're a guy and your helmet can give you as much information pre-snap that he
09:57can, like you want to take every, you know, piece of that and use it to your advantage.
10:02But Brian, real quick, do you think the guys, because you played longer than I did and you
10:06played kind of into a different generation, I sometimes think these guys, they're just
10:12like, they don't study enough.
10:14Do you feel like some of the younger players just don't know enough about football and studying
10:18and understanding situations?
10:20Because Curtis.
10:21Yeah, I mean, I think, I think there's an aspect to, I think we were fortunate to play
10:25for a coach who was so in tune to situational football.
10:29I mean, that was, as you know, it was, it was his, the, the one thing that he wanted
10:33to emphasize the most, because ultimately that's what the games come down to, right?
10:37It's not the first and second down play.
10:39It's when you get into a situation where it's the two minute drive before the end of the
10:44half and you're trying to score, but you don't want to give the ball back to the other
10:47team or whatever it may have been.
10:49And I think because that was ingrained in me early on, I always carry that with me, no
10:54matter where I went and played.
10:55Now other coaches, look, they don't have, um, let's just call it the time they're trying
11:00to like get their head above water and win some games.
11:03So eventually if they're around long enough, they have the time to cover it.
11:06And Bill had 20 plus years.
11:07So we would go to start OTA one and we'd be starting in the red zone.
11:12And we, we'd be talking about, you know, a clock situation at the end of the game and
11:16how we were going to complete the ball, get down, take it, you know, clock the football.
11:20Like other teams aren't even doing that until training camp some years.
11:23And sometimes they don't even have a chance to get to it.
11:25So, uh, I think with this younger generation, there's not as much time spent.
11:29There's less off season work.
11:30Uh, you got young quarterbacks who come in and they're athletic and coaches are trying
11:34to figure out a way to win as quickly as possible.
11:36So they, they rely on their athleticism and not maybe so much the mental side.
11:40And I think you're seeing the effects of that.
11:43From the quarterback perspective.
11:44Are you surprised by the way it seems the Eagles handled the Jalen Hurts situation?
11:53Yeah.
11:53I mean, look, there's a lot of information coming out on that.
11:56And I saw the NFL kind of backed, uh, Philadelphia and how they handled it.
12:00I think his agent kind of went out there and wanted to show like, oh, this is how much Jalen
12:04cares about the team.
12:06He's trying to play through it.
12:07Then I read the things like they told him not to sleep.
12:09And I'm thinking, told him not to sleep.
12:11Like if, if you can't sleep, you probably shouldn't play a football game.
12:14So I think there's a lot of, there's a lot of different, uh, information coming out on
12:18that.
12:18I, now I know, uh, obviously I have a, a very close relationship with David Andrews.
12:22We have our podcast together and he had dealt with this issue in 2019 and, um, he was having,
12:30you know, the blood clots in the lungs.
12:31It's a very, very serious issue.
12:33And so now that they found it, obviously they're handling it the right way.
12:36Uh, it's just, look, the, it gets worse for, for Philly.
12:40They, they, I mean, how quickly they've fallen from winning a Superbowl to where they are
12:44right now.
12:45And, um, it's going to get a lot harder now that they don't have Jalen hurts.
12:49They're basically in a, in a reset mode now, only six weeks into the season.
12:53Brian, I've been a fan of Ramond, Ramond Ray Stevenson, since he got here.
12:57And I was happy to see you on X talking about him becoming so dependable.
13:01How do you feel like he matches up with the, with this, uh, bears defense going on tomorrow?
13:06Yeah, I mean, Mondray to me, I, I'm so, you know, I, I hesitate to say the word proud,
13:11but like, I remember when he came in as a rookie and you saw the talent, but it, it took,
13:17you
13:17know, some time for him to realize like what it is to be like the ultimate pro.
13:21And even last year had some of the, the issues with the fumbling, but now I look at him almost
13:26in the same regard as like a James white.
13:28Uh, he probably doesn't get the recognition he deserves, but I was glad that, uh, Taylor
13:33kind of put out the, the blocking that he, uh, had in that, in that, uh, rep where he's
13:39basically becomes a guard and he's passing off this TE, uh, game with, with the left tackle
13:44and he just does everything the right way.
13:46And, and you hear, and, and obviously the big thing for me is I listened to the way Josh
13:50McDaniels talks about him and it's just being a reliable player.
13:53You're not always the flashiest, but you just do everything the right way is so important.
13:57And that offense.
13:58And, um, he's, he's, he's so to me versatile.
14:02And, and, uh, even as a rookie, we were like, man, this is a big back.
14:06He's, he's shifty.
14:07He's powerful, but he's, he's good in the passing game as well.
14:09And so I think, uh, you'll see him continue to have that role.
14:13And I know everybody gets excited about Travion and the home run ability, but it's great to
14:17have a guy like Mondra, who's just so reliable every single play.
14:21Brian, as a quarterback, how hard is it to balance the need to get a guy like AJ Brown
14:27your number one receiver involved in the offense early while also not upsetting a very successful
14:34system that's been going on prior to his return?
14:37Yeah.
14:37And I think it's, it's, it's a, it's a balance you have to find when you have a guy like
14:41that.
14:41Uh, when I played in Houston, that was Deandre Hopkins as he was kind of emerging as a top
14:46threat and, and hop wanted the ball every single play.
14:48And I had to tell him, I'm like, dude, they're doubling you.
14:50I can't throw it to you when they're doubling you, but when they're not, I'm going to throw
14:54you the football.
14:54And I think that's, and then having played in Josh's offense with Devante Adams, it basically
15:00was, here's the play, but if they single Devante, we're going to throw him the football.
15:04And I think that's kind of the model you have.
15:07You don't want to force it, right?
15:08So when a team goes and they either double them or they put a cover to, you know, cloud
15:13and, and the safety over top.
15:15Okay, fine.
15:15If they want to, if they want to take the coverage there, that's the benefit of having
15:19an AJ Brown as well.
15:21But when they don't, you have to give this guy every opportunity.
15:24And I think you saw that.
15:25I mean, look, first game back from a high ankle sprain, 10 targets last week.
15:29I would just assume going forward that if AJ has some type of single on him, that Drake's
15:34going to try to attempt to throw him the football.
15:36Brian, when you look at the Chicago Bears team, the one, I think they're top five in
15:40the NFL when it comes to sacks.
15:41If you're Josh McDaniels, what's your game plan heading into this game to maybe try to
15:47slow that pass rush down a little bit?
15:49Yeah.
15:50And, and honestly, Wiggy, like watching them against Atlanta, the sacks come from their
15:54third down blitz package from Dennis Allen.
15:56And it's always, I mean, I go back to when I played against them 10 years ago.
16:00It's always one of the most difficult packages when you get into third down, they're going
16:04to have all eight up.
16:05They're going to show one way blitz another way.
16:07So I think that the goal tomorrow night is to try to skip as many third downs as possible.
16:11And if you do get in a third down, try to keep it in under, under five yards, because
16:15when you're under five yards, they can't do all of the disguise because there's still
16:20the threat of run.
16:21You could always throw a quick pass or a quick screen.
16:23But once you get third and six plus, we used to call that the danger zone against Dennis
16:27Allen, because you just never know what type of zone pressure you're going to, you're
16:31going to get, then all of a sudden you go to block it up and they drop everybody out.
16:35So they got to avoid that.
16:36That's really where their sacks come from.
16:38All right, Brian, give us a score.
16:39Who do you like tomorrow night?
16:41You know, on a short week, I, the only thing that concerns me with the Patriots is the injuries.
16:46You're really not going to know who's playing, but I do think if they have a good game plan
16:50and stay out of third down and they can contain Caleb, I think they can win this game, but
16:54I think it's gonna be a close one, maybe like 28 to 24.
16:56I think the Patriots should win this game.