All right. Injury-wise, Tyjae Spears left with an ankle. We'll get more information on that. See where that's at. But did not return. Other than that, that's it. A bunch of little things, but nothing that nobody didn't return back from. So, kind of the same story as the last one. We had a had solid first half and then we lose the turnover battle 2-0. We give up another block punt. We haven't got a turnover yet on defense. We go five three-and-outs on offense That's on me, I can't let that happen. We were okay running the ball. Wasn't great, wasn't terrible. Defense played well in the first half and then when we needed to stop, we couldn't get one. That's partially on our offense for not sustaining many drives, that was difficult to overcome. I thought we played better than last week, but the mistakes were critical. You lose two one-score games and your turnover margin after two games is -4, and you're going have a hard time winning. So that's ultimately the name of the game is protecting the ball and getting it back for us to go score and we're not doing a good enough job of it as an entire team.
What did you say to Will Levis over the fumble? I know you look very upset on the sideline.
I think the camera got it pretty clear, if I had to guess. Yeah, I was upset. It was dumb. It was the same exact thing he did last week, and it cost us points in the red zone. That is what it is. He's a grown-up and he knows better. I was really irritated that he cost us three points in a game that we probably needed it.
What was his answer to that question? What the 'F' was he doing?
You'll have to ask him what the answer was. He didn't have an answer in the moment, I think he was just mad. But we tried to come back and rally. I mean, those things happen in football games. Good things. Bad things. I got mad at him. He'll get mad at me. Whatever. It's the way it goes. But yeah, just was really kind of an inexcusable mistake.
How much more frustrating does it to make it when you're a couple of plays away from winning once again? How do you keep frustration from setting in?
It's incredibly frustrating, but at the end of the day, I think we have what it takes on our team to win football games. We've been in position to win them, and we've made just enough mistakes to not. We clean up those mistakes, we protect the ball better, we get the ball back on defense and we protect our punter, we're going to have a chance. We've had chances even with those things happening, so imagine what it would look like if we could play a cleaner game when it came to taking care of the football. So I believe in our team. I believe in our guys. I believe in the way they work. I believe in what they're made of. And those things to me is it's going to come. It's going to come. We're not going to give up. It's Week Two. We played not anywhere close to our best football, and so we're going to keep going.
Back to that Will Levis mistake. It's the second week in a row for something egregious like that. How do you handle that? What do you say to him? How do you go about trying to curb that from happening because it's back-to-back weeks.
Yeah, I think my tone and demeanor to him changes dramatically in that moment. But yeah, we can't have it. He's got to protect our team better. He's got to protect the ball better. It's inexcusable to do those types of things.
On the pick that Will Levis threw, did it look like Treylon Burks might have been able to come down with it? And also, did you think it was a wise throw? It looked like maybe a double coverage situation?
Yeah I didn't mind the aggressiveness of the throw. It hit him right where you want it to hit him. As they were coming to the ground, the DB kind of got lucky as he rolled over the top of him and the ball was sort of sitting right there. I'd like to see us come down with that play. I don't mind aggressiveness in the passing game down the field. I think it just ended up being a play that sort of bounced the other way on us when I thought we had a shot for a big completion. I'm going to keep being aggressive down the field. I kept at it throughout the entire game and I kept trying to see if we could get some throws and it helped us. The one to Calvin (Ridley) was a huge momentum shifter for us and gave us a chance. And so, there's sometimes you got to be more aggressive than others, but I don't fault the decision on the throw there.
What's going on with punt protection and where's does Colt Anderson's coaching of that fall?
I just didn't see exactly how it happened. I just know it happened. Just came off the edge and it looked like a lapse in release timing and technique. Look, it's inexcusable for us. We can't have that when that's two games in a row to get a punt blocked. I don't know that I've been around a blocked punt for six years. So, to have it happen back to back is really frustrating. But that's on all of us to fix that. That's on me to fix that. That's on Colt (Anderson) and that's on everybody else to make sure we're doing our jobs on special teams because as of now, it hasn't been good enough all the way around.
When you said release and techniques, do you think of those as physical errors or mental errors?
That one is hard to say at this point. I would refrain from comment until I watch it fully.
You mentioned losing the momentum there a little bit. You guys had the ball twice when the score was tied. Do you look back and say you should have been better in those two drives that were three-and-outs?
Yeah, there's plenty of things that I can do better and put us in a better spot. One of the third downs, I thought we had a chance to get a run off on a third-and-two to three. Sometimes those things look really good, and I thought we had a shot, and it just got strung out. We didn't get it. But yeah, I got to do a better job. So, there's really not nothing more to say than that.
You mentioned Calvin Ridley earlier, a big day with the two touchdowns. What did you see from him and from that connection?
It's growing. We're doing a good job. He's doing a good job. I love everything Calvin's (Ridley) about. Still trying to continue to get more from that. I'm trying to get more from our pass game. I just think that we're not going to our capabilities right now. I think we're better than what we've shown in two games. But I got to keep working to help fix that. So, some good, some bad, but we need to be better.
Was the plan to use DeAndre Hopkins a little more today? We didn't see a ton from him.
He was out there a lot more, trying to find ways to get him the ball, and I need to do a better job of getting him involved. He only had one catch, maybe. So though sometimes when he was open ball and somewhere else, I can't control that all the time. That's just playing receiver in NFL. Calvin (Ridley) had a big day, and hopefully Hop's (DeAndre Hopkins) day coming sooner than later too. He definitely played a lot more. He's ready to roll. I appreciate the way he's attacked his return. So that part's good.
What happened on the touchdown run for the Jets, the winning run that seemed to go untouched.
From what I understand, looks like he got edged out and they climbed up and cut us off is what it looked like. We didn't have a hat in the hole. That's what it looked like from the field level. I couldn't see. I just knew there was a pretty big hole and a pretty well blocked run for them. That was tough.
Looked like the right call but they got Jeffery Simmons for the roughing the QB. How tough a swing was that? You could have got off the field and instead they scored?
Yeah, those are the critical penalties. It's not Jeff's (Simmons) fault. I don't know that he could have controlled that very much. He was just trying to mirror-hand the quarterback and get his hand up, and then just the way he sort of came down. They're going to call it every time, whether you like it or not, any contact to the head of the quarterback. But they're explosive penalties and it was a third-and-15 where they kept their drive alive where we should have been off the field. So not much I can say about it other that I wish didn't happen.
Second half, they started to spread it out. At times, went Empty. What was going on there to allow that to be so effective against the defense?
I think it was effective to a point, and then I think we did a good job responding to it. But, you get a Hall of Fame quarterback at the line of scrimmage and he's just picking his favorite plays versus whatever he sees. We did a good job of holding our disguise quite a bit, hence the handful of almost delay of game timeouts they had to take where he wasn't quite sure. He was trying to check late. So that part was positive. But, he took some really easy completions, trying to stay on top of some things and he took the underneath routes that gained them some yards. So, that overall probably is an average performance against their Empty sets, but they found some production in there.
On the Jets last scoring drive, for the better part of the drive neither Harold (Landry III), nor Jeff (Simmons) nor (T'Vondre) Sweat were out there. Was that just the other guy's time in the rotation to go?
Yeah. That's the way I would see it. We didn't do them any favors offensively at that point going three-and-out, I think back-to-back. And so they're on the field a lot. If we do a better job on offense, those guys can play a little more. But I know they were playing a lot of snaps in a row and it was loading up. So we're trying to rotate and keep them fresh for the end of the game. So that's probably what the case was there.
Walk us through the design on that last fourth down. Did Tyler (Boyd) kind of get pushed off? Was he supposed to be on the goal line?
Yeah, we got to get—I mean, we got to get the end zone, it's fourth down from the 14-yard line. And so, you're trying to pry a window open underneath and give a chance to hit it. But we didn't quite get deep enough. And even if we caught it, which he did initially, even if he caught it, we're going to be short. So we got to be in the end zone. It's those details, I think, that we aren't good enough yet at. And so those are the things that have we even caught it, it wouldn't have mattered either. So would've like that one to be plus two in the end zone.
You mentioned the kind of similarities to last week's game. I guess one of the disappointing things, the fact that you guys have been outscored pretty widely there in the second half.
Yeah, it's miserable, to be honest. It's hard to overcome it when you're getting outscored like that. And we're putting ourselves in good position. We had opportunities and we're not doing a good enough job capitalizing on when we have them. And so ultimately, I think it's just disappointing, not how I thought the start of the season would look. And here we are.
Have you been around a quarterback that makes plays like that in the game?
Who Will (Levis)?
Yeah.
I mean I thought—you talking about good plays or bad plays?
The bad ones.
Okay. I mean I've seen guys make plenty of plays like that. You see it every week. It's not like it's—he's not alone in that regard. But we just got to do a better job and keep coaching and protect the football better because one score games and losing turnover margins are going to send you to the losers column more often than not. And we just have to do a better job protecting the ball.
Do you think he's trying to be a hero when he does these things?
I hope not. I've told him a million times at this point that you're one of 11. Just do your part. And that's all that really anybody's asking of you. And so, some of that stuff we're trying to work out of him. He did slide today, in case anybody cared about that. But no, he's just got to do a better job. And it's on me to keep coaching him. I got to do a better job. Something's not quite making sense because we keep having it happen and that's ultimately on me.
How much confidence do you have in Will Levis operating this offense?
I got plenty confidence in Will (Levis). I believe in everything he's done so far. We just got to keep working to get better. And he's made some mistakes that are costly. And I think he's learning from them. It's a painful lesson and there's things that I'm learning about him that are helping me call the game better for him. We're just going to keep at it. And there's really nowhere else to go but keep fixing mistakes and then trying to go win a football game. So that's ultimately where we're at. And I believe in Will and what he's capable of. I thought his improvement this week was good. Obviously, the error aside, but there's been a lot of things he's gotten better at this week that I was happy with and pleased with.
