**
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(on if he's worried about the Titans' lack of time of possession)
Well we've had two weeks where it was skewed heavily in the last two weeks, and I explained why that happened last week against the Broncos. This week it was the same thing, we had two short fields; we had a first-and-goal at the one and a first-and-goal at the six. You score two plays later, you put the offense back on the field. Plus, yesterday we weren't as good defensively on third down; they converted 50 percent of their third downs and that keeps you on the field. Clearly our offense should be well rested by Monday night.
(on how Fernando Velasco did and the play of the offensive line)
**He was fine. He had two holding penalties, which you kind of wonder sometime—one clearly should not have been called, the second one. But, other than that he was helping, he was doing fine in pass protection, he was active on the line of scrimmage in the run game. They are very physical and very stout up front. They were two gapping, shedding and doing the things they do well, but I thought Fernando played pretty well in Leroy's (Harris) absence.
(on being able to score on the goal line despite missing two of the normal starters on the offensive line)
**I think it's a credit to their room. Mike (Munchak) does a great job of preparing those guys. Last week they got practice reps; it's one of the few positions on the team where we are able to put backups in and get practice reps and Mike does a good job of that.
(on Eugene Amano's injury)
We're okay. We'll have more information for you later in the week, but I'm not concerned about anything that took place yesterday.
(on if he thinks the umpires new position on the field impacts their ability to call holding penalties)
It's hard to say, I didn't see the restriction—there was no restriction on the play. It was a unique play because (defensive) pass interference should have been called on Nate (Washington)—it wasn't. Then we had a late hit, an unsportsmanlike hit on the shallow cross that wasn't called and then the penalty that was called on the field I didn't think was correct. So it was just kind of a unique play.
(on why they called more passing plays this week)
Really no different than the start of last week's game. I think we had 27 rushes and 25 pass attempts yesterday, so we had balance as opposed to last week when we threw it 28 times and ran it 20. We're going to do what we feel gives us a chance to win on a weekly basis. We have our shots called, sometimes we're able to get them off and sometimes the defense takes them away. Last night we got them off. We took advantage of some things that we saw, it was a great throw and catch by Kenny (Britt). Vince (Young) is putting the ball down the field and guys are making catches.
(on if he thinks Vince Young is ready to take the next step in his game)
It's not a matter of turning anybody loose; it's just a matter of going ahead and executing the game plan that we have in. Vince has thrown a lot of passes in his career; I don't know where all of this is coming from other than we didn't have to throw it often against the Giants to win the football game. We threw it better last week, not particularly well in the second half of the game but each week's different. We're going to hand it off to our back and spread the ball around whenever is possible.
(on if opening up the offensive play calling helps open up things for Chris Johnson)
People look at tape, they're going to see what we do—they're going to see what we do early in the game, late in the game and they're going to make their own decisions. We have some good receivers who can go make plays on the ball and we're going to continue to put the ball up in the air.
(on if he was impressed with Vince Young's patience in the Dallas game)
Yeah, it's difficult to stay in the pocket and not get off track—off a spot, because they're such good rushers. They push and they've got good edge speed, so he knew that it was a little later developing route. It's one that we've thrown several times, and he did and he knew where he wanted to go with the football and Kenny (Britt) made a big catch.
(on how Gerald McRath played and how many snaps he played)
Gerald played really well, I don't know how many plays but he probably played 30-40 plays, but he played very well.
(on how impressed he was with Gerald McRath's strong play)
It is (impressive), he stayed in really good shape and he stayed with what we were doing as best he could just by watching the game on television live. He played well, he shed blocks, he was active in pursuit, he was in the right place in his run fits and ran well and made some great chase tackles.
(on why they were able to have success sacking Tony Romo)
We hit him a few more times than that (six), but we got him on the ground.
(on how they were able to get pressure on Tony Romo)
I know Leonard (Davis) struggled a little bit and JJ (Jason Jones) was having his way inside. JJ had a great day rushing the passer, they made some changes and we got him all different ways. We beat one-on-ones, we got them by gaming, by flushing, with blitzing—it was just a great effort by those guys up front.
(on if Alterraun Verner is potentially becoming the permanent starting cornerback)
We'll face that when J-Mac (Jason McCourty) is ready to come back. As I said, the race was very, very close to start with, and I'm not saying that Jason isn't going to come back and be our starter, but they've both played very well throughout camp and the preseason.
(on the Titans pass defense)
I am disappointed in that. Fortunately for us we have a lot of things to fix from this ballgame. It's going to be a great experience for this club to get things corrected and to take advantage of the extra day after a win. I was disappointed in some areas.
(on how they plan to use the extra day this week with their upcoming Monday Night Football game)
Thursday is a Wednesday and Wednesday will be an extra day for us.
(on how they reduced the number of penalties)
It was a big point of emphasis throughout the week and in meetings. We had one neutral zone infraction, but it was offsetting so the numbers came down. There were two others—I think we should have really been guilty of just two penalties and I disagree with two of the calls.
(on what happened with Rob Bironas' two bad kickoffs)
It's a difficult thing to do on a week-to-week basis or the rare occasion when you ask your kicker to kick directionally. Rob just hit that one bad, he hit a couple in practice and in retrospect we should have just had him kick down the middle, but Rob is fine. He's a kicker, he always has some kind of issue going, but he's okay.
(on what Damian Williams brings to the field)
**He's got a really good sense of all three positions. He gets open, he's natural at it and he played well. We're going to try and keep him on the field, we can count on Marc (Mariani) in the return area, we can count on Damian to play the position.
(on if he returned after taking a shot to the back)
**He could have but we were just rotating.
(on if Marc Mariani has a knack for returning kicks)
**He's got that ability. He did it in college and he's got a good sense for that decision making as far as it relates to punt returns number one. It starts with his decisions and he understands that. Then in the kickoff he understands what we're trying to do by design, by scheme and he hits it hard. He's got real good vision, he catches it and goes—and he likes to do it, he's a good player.
(on there being no 4-0 teams in the NFL this season)
**It's hard to say. There are a lot of good teams and a lot of talented teams out there. There are teams that I think should have better records than they do, and there are teams that shouldn't have the difficulties that they're having—like San Francisco is a good football team, they just can't get a break. I just think it's a combination of things, it's injuries, it's quarterback play, it's the scheduling. Here we are, we're finally in our division—it takes us six weeks to get in our division. It should be an exciting week for us.
(on if Marc Mariani's returns are a result of his speed or the blocking)
**Our guys know that based on early experience in the preseason that he has the ability. It's not like your group isn't going to go out and do the best that they can if they question whether your returner has the ability, but things just pick up. They get better, guys are excited about blocking. We have a group out there that has done it for a while, they understand how to do it and Coach Lowry comes up with new schemes every week like most special teams coaches do, and they buy into the scheme. They're doing the best that they can to execute it.
(on Cortland Finnegan struggling yesterday)
**I think what's happened, our secondary had some issues yesterday--we gave up some passes in double-coverage. We gave up some plays because of poor technique. We gave up some plays because of whatever. We're just going to have to tighten some things up and go back to technique and it's always things that are certainly correctable. I think that applies to Cortland too, maybe he's trying to do too much. Just do what we ask you to do and how we ask you to do it and good things happen.
(on if his recent set of fines from the league make it hard for him to play his game)
**I don't think it's a distraction, but he needs to pay more attention on making the plays and playing with the defense. That's everybody on defense too, I'm not just singling him out—we can play better. Now keep in mind the last two offenses we faced were throwing the ball all over the yard now. They are a very, very talented group of receivers and quarterbacks so there is a lot of pressure on the secondary, but I think we can play better.
(on the decision to release Jamie Winborn)
**It was a very, very difficult decision.
(on Jamie Winborn)
**There were a lot of factors involved, I'll just say that. With the roster, the way the roster's shaped, special teams, the way things went down last week—we had a good conversation, I'll just leave it at that.
(on how Jamie Winborn did in Gerald McRath's role)
**He did fine, he did a really good job filling in for Gerald.
(on the celebration penalty called on Dallas late in Sunday's game)
**You can't go to the ground—are you sure it was an accident? You can't go to the ground celebrating like that. It was huge—clearly we capitalized on a miscue. Like I said last night, that was a huge mistake at that point in the game. They just tied the game, it wasn't like they just made a play at the end of the game to win.
(on if he knows why he's had so much recent success against the NFC)
**No, we have another one coming up in a couple of weeks.
(on what has enabled Vince Young to have so much success against the NFC)
**It's really hard to put your finger on it and say why. He has a pretty good win-loss record as a starter, and what we try to do, as we've said over and over, is we try to become as familiar as we possibly can over the course of the preparation with the uncommon, unfamiliar opponents. We have a tendency to play our AFC opponents, like it seems like we play the San Diego Chargers every year, but every four years you see somebody.
(on if the timing for this Monday Night Football game was beneficial)
**I think we're clearly going to benefit from just the extra days rest. Especially for our defense, because they've been playing very, very hard and we need it. So yeah, I think it comes at a good time and I think it comes at a great time for where we're at in the season. We're just really fortunate that it's against a really good football team, at a tough place to play and it's in the division..
