**
TITANS HEAD COACH KEN WHISENHUNT**
(on game injuries)
I'll update you on a couple of injury things from the game. Delanie Walker's got a shoulder, and that was why Craig (Stevens) ended up in the game finishing it for him. We'll let you know as the week progresses where he is. Taylor Thompson's got a knee, and Jake Locker's got a wrist. We'll know a little bit more about those guys, obviously, over the next couple of days.
(on Jake Locker's injury)
He got it bent up under him at some point. He did hit his hand a couple of times, but that happens during the course of the game. He did something where he strained part of his wrist. I neglected to ask him when that happened. He may not be able to even tell me. I just know that it was sore. He's a tough guy. We asked him, 'Are you okay?' and he said yes, but I know that at the end of the game (in the locker room) he could hardly grip the ball. I'll know more later in the week. He had an MRI this morning. Obviously, I have talked briefly with Todd (Toriscelli), but I've been pretty busy, so I haven't had a chance to go through the results yet. He just gave me the report. We'll talk about it later. I'll have an idea, but once again it's going to be something that we won't know for a day or two. **
(on the possibility of Mettenberger being active)
It's early in the week. I'll know more. I don't know right now. We'll know as the week progresses.
(on keeping the team's confidence up)
Show them what they can do to correct it. Show them how close you are on a couple of plays that can make a big difference in the game. That happens in this league, especially when you haven't been together very long. You're still working through some of those situations. After yesterday, it's not a lot of fun. It's not easy, but our guys will work through it.
(on incomplete passes, especially on throws down the field)
I don't know. To be honest with you, in my mind I don't go through them and categorize them by how deep or how long the throw is. We missed some throws. We missed some catches. Perfect example is the first time in the red zone, we had a second down and we throw a pass out to Kendall (Wright) and he slips. That was over five yards. Whose fault is that? There are a lot of things that go into it. Jake (Locker) got hit twice as he was throwing the football, caused inaccurate throws down the field. Really, I'm more about situationally trying to correct the things that we can correct. Part of that is protection. Part of it is route running. Part of it is Jake.
(on Kendall Wright's footing in the game)
As did others, and one of the things that we talked about before we even went into that stadium was to be aware of that, because you could see it on tape. There have been other teams that have gone in there where their players have had a hard time keeping their feet. We talked about it before even going in there. Go out on the surface, bring an extra pair of cleats, longer or shorter, check the surface. He's got to be more disciplined at the top of his route, because there were other times where he didn't slip.
(on Justin Hunter's missed catch late in the game and his struggles as a receiver)
I don't know if I would say that. Would I have like to see him make a play? Yeah, I would like to have seen him make a play. With the way that game went, there were a lot of guys that could have made plays. Do I expect Justin (Hunter) to make that play? Yes, I do. Those are the kind of plays that we're expecting him to make, and if he wants to get to the place where he can be like number 18 for Cincinnati, he's got to make those plays. There were a couple of balls that weren't thrown great to him, and he made the catch, especially the first play of the game.
(on what drives players to make plays)
Everybody wants to make plays for themselves, but I think a lot of our guys want to make plays for the team. That's what we're trying to make this all about, is the team. I think you saw evidence of that in Kansas City. We had a lot of guys make a lot of different plays. It's a competitive business. Your drive to get to this level because you believe you can win in one-on-one situations. Your expectation is you make that play. **
(on players not performing as well as they did in the preseason)
I saw improvement in some areas from the standpoint of our route running, but I think we still need to increase or improve the sense of urgency at times with our receivers, an understanding of what we need to do. To be fair, I could say that about a lot of places with our football team, so I don't want to just single the receivers out. Some of it is coverage. When you're playing in preseason, you're getting a lot of man coverage. You're getting some of those situations where it's inherently more common to get those type of situations. When I'm talking about physicality, I'm talking the large part of it about blocking and the run game. As far as running the routes and being physical going up for balls, yeah they're doing OK with that. We're dropping too many of them.
(on Bishop Sankey's performance against the Bengals)
His snaps increased this week. I'll tell you what I like about Bishop (Sankey) was he's got good vision, looks to have good movement skills. What I didn't like is attention to detail with him. If he can get the attention to detail better, his reps will increase. His footwork, there were a couple of handoffs where he's not doing it the right way and it almost was a fumble. When he gets those things correct, then he'll have the opportunity to get more play time.
