KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas City Chiefs Head Coach Andy Reid and Quarterback Matt Moore fielded media questions during a Wednesday presser. Following are their comments.
Chiefs Head Coach Andy Reid
OPENING STATEMENT: “The guys that won’t practice today are (Bashaud) Breeland, with a sprained shoulder there, and then Frank Clark with his neck. Dustin Colquitt has a quad strain. Laurent Duvernay-Tardif has an ankle sprain. Fish (Eric Fisher) is still recovering from his core muscle injury. Then (Alex) Okafor, with a high ankle sprain, won’t practice. We look forward to the challenge of playing Minnesota. We know that they are a good football team. They’re good really in all three phases, so our guys will start off this week by preparing for them and getting ready to play, like I said, against a good football team. Time’s yours.”
Q: How much do you anticipate Patrick Mahomes doing in practice today? Will he be doing more today than he did last week?
REID: “He probably will, yeah. A little bit more.”
Q: Is there any fear that Colquitt will not be ready to go by the end of the week?
REID: “We’ll see. We’ll see how he does.”
Q: What do you consider being the distinct advantage to playing at home, as opposed to playing on the road?
REID: “I think I know where you’re going with that. We have to do better at home, obviously. We don’t have the wins that we would like to have at home. But we have a great crowd and they’ve done one heck of a job helping us out. We have to do better than what we’ve been doing there.”
Q: The league throughout has a losing record at home. Is there maybe a dynamic that is changing league-wide that maybe makes being at home less of an advantage?
REID: “I don’t think so. I think it’s just one of those things. I think you can change that around. I can’t identify one thing, put it that way, to answer your question.”
Q: How much is there a concern that Frank Clark’s absence and injury could be a long-term thing? Or, he is strictly on a week-to-week or day-to-day status?
REID: “Really day-to-day. Yeah, day-to-day.”
Q: Fisher came back and practiced on a limited basis a little bit last week. Has there been any setback with him?
REID: “We were trying it out and see how it felt. It wasn’t quite ready, so we sat him back down and just let the thing get healed up a little bit further.”
Q: What are you hoping to see out of Chris Jones over these next three days for a potential possibility of seeing him play on Sunday?
REID: “Just getting back into the swing. He has been out for a little bit, so I think just getting him out there and moving around a little bit will be good.”
Q: Do you guys feel like you have enough on the roster to win a Super Bowl? What gives you the confidence in that by standing pat through the trade deadline?
REID: “Yeah, I feel that way. We have to play better and coach better right now. We have good players.”
Q: When you watch Patrick go through a practice now with his injury, what do you watch for in trying to see how he is progressing?
REID: “Movement. We do enough stuff where he has to move around. He is moving around pretty good, you guys got to see that before our game. He was out running around. Then, I obviously communicate with the doctors.”
Q: Is there a potential of seeing Patrick having more reps this week in practice?
REID: “We’ll see how it goes.”
Q: With Chad Henne, is there enough that you saw from him last week and early this week that you could add him to the roster before Sunday’s game?
REID: “I have to see him work this week, see how it goes.”
Q: What is it about Minnesota’s defensive line and LB Eric Kendricks that make up a foundation for their defense?
REID: “You can add 55 (Anthony Barr) into that mix, too. They’ve got a good defense. They’ve played quite a little bit of time together, so there’s some continuity there. 55 left and came back, but they’ve got hours together. There are not a lot of things that you are going to trick them on. They’ve got a pretty good feel for things. Before (Vikings Head Coach Mike Zimmer) became a head coach, he was one of the best defensive coordinators in the league, so they have a good scheme.”
Q: What do you like most about the aggressiveness that Defensive Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo has displayed in his defense as of late?
REID: “I mentioned it to you before, I think the more familiar you become with a defense, the more that you can do. It’s gradual. It takes a little bit of time. I think that Spags has felt comfortable in giving them a little bit more every week. They’ve done a nice job with it.”
Q: How much of that comes down to the trust in your safety play between Juan Thornhill and Tyrann Mathieu?
REID: “They’ve done a good job and the corners have done a good job. It’s a joint effort on that back end when you’re bringing people up front there on the front seven.”
Q: On Juan Thornhill, is he exceeding your expectations?
REID: “Listen, he is doing a nice job. Does he have room to grow? Yeah, absolutely. He is working hard and doing a nice job. He and Tyrann have a good relationship back there. There is good communication. They have to keep growing together. But he’s doing good.”
Q: Do your corners get enough of the conversation? Your pass defense has been pretty strong, how have they matched up?
REID: “We’re growing. I’d tell you that about all of them. I think they’re working hard to get that continuity and maintain it week in and week out. Steve (Spagnuolo) is adding things to the mix. It takes time, that’s what it does. Every week, they are playing a little bit better, getting more familiar with each other, more trust in each other, all of the things that bring a good defense together.”
Q: All of those things that you mentioned about being comfortable with the defensive scheme, where would you say Dorian O’Daniel is at here in his second season?
REID: “He is doing a nice job on special teams. In the opportunities he gets on defense, he has done ok there. His main contribution right now has been on special teams.”
Q: How much do you anticipate Chris Jones and Kendall Fuller being able to do in practice today?
REID: “We ease the guys back in and see what they can do. Good communication with our coaches and (Vice President of Sports Medicine & Performance) Rick (Burkholder), then we go from there.”
Q: Right now, where do you stand with who is going to be your starting quarterback this Sunday?
REID: “We’ll see. We’ll see how it goes. I’m taking it day-by-day here. I’m going to watch them do their thing and see how they do.”
Q: If Matt Moore is the starting quarterback, how much more prepared do you feel that he would be because of the familiarity you’ve built with him after getting a full game in?
REID: “Listen, I appreciate how he handled his business last week. I don’t know him as well as maybe the other guys, but I liked what I saw. He goes about it the right way. The players around him have confidence, which ends up being very important.”
Chiefs QB Matt Moore
Q: You had a chance to evaluate yourself after we last talked to you, anything you learned about yourself?
MOORE: “There’s a couple things, some footwork stuff I can clean up a little bit, some throws, timing stuff. All stuff that I initially thought after the game. I looked at it and now moving forward.”
Q: How did you feel on Monday morning, were you a little sore for the first time?
MOORE: “Oh yeah. Yeah, I was. All good but after not being hit for a long time, you’ll feel it a little bit.”
Q: How does this team rank with the skill players that you have as weapons?
MOORE: “It would be hard to say it’s not high on top of the list. I’ve played with a lot of good guys over the years. I’ve been fortunate to have great teammates but the guys on this team, you can’t overlook these guys for sure.”
Q: How do you approach the week not knowing if Patrick Mahomes is playing?
MOORE: “Same. Same thing. You go out, you prepare, you get ready to play a game, you value the reps you get and use those to your advantage. You move forward with that mindset. Again, this is nothing new. I’ve been in this situation before. I’m used to it. You just go practice and get yourself better for Sunday.”
Q: You say you want to get out and start quicker, what goes into preparation for that?
MOORE: “I don’t know, I think part of it for me is mindset. Maybe not overthinking things early on. Just playing what you see and playing what they’re giving you and taking what they’re giving you. Things like that. I don’t know if there’s a true answer to that question but how you get comfortable quickly, I have to do that.”
Q: Coach Reid said there’s a lot of guys in the locker room that have confidence in you, how does that help towards the comfortability?
MOORE: “Yeah, it’s great. That’s a huge deal and it means a lot. You can feel it. I can feel it. I think they can feel it. It just makes things go smoother. I think they know what the capabilities are. Everybody knows what the capabilities are, what we can do if we’re all functioning on the same page. It makes everything work a little better with everybody being confident.”
Q: When you look at the Minnesota defense with six Pro-bowlers in there, what do you see in another test again?
MOORE: “A great test. Great players obviously. They’ve been playing together for a long time They’ve been in that scheme, they’ve been with each other, the communication. It’s an extremely cohesive group. Obviously, it’s going to be challenging. They’re very sound in what they do and that makes us be on top of our game and execute what we got going on. Very good defense for sure.”
Q: You mentioned that you and Coach Reid got more in-sync by the second quarter, how much of that carries over into the game plan for this week?
MOORE: “I think it’s still early to answer that question but that will stand true any week. I think that’s going to get better as the weeks go on. I think who knows what the situation is but as we go on down the road, he’s going to know five weeks from now a lot more of what I like, what suits me and call it accordingly. I think time is just going to be a huge thing as opposed to scheme. Our staff always does a good job of scheming stuff up, but I just think time is going to be the biggest thing with that.”
Q: Does anything stand out about working with Andy Reid during the game for the first time?
MOORE: “No it was pretty normal. If I wasn’t playing, I would still be sitting right there. If I had to compare the conversations, it was very similar to something we would have with Patrick. There’s only so much time over there, it’s not like we’re getting into crazy stuff.”
Q: Are there any memorable things that Patrick Mahomes told you during the game?
MOORE: “I think Sunday night I said something where he would tell me techniques or be like ‘hey this corner is playing this way,’ or ‘hey if we come back here and the safety is this, come back to here,’ things like that. This guy is pretty good at running this offense, so I was all ears listening to him. His vision is incredible. I told him ‘you be you and keep the information coming.’”
Q: You’ve now seen the skill players in game action, is there any difference between game speed and practice speed?
MOORE: “Oh yeah. Always. Especially here. Obviously, this is built around speed and that shows. I think if I had one I wanted back it would be the post to Tyreek (Hill) when we were backed up, I kind of shorted it. There’s a big play potential there based on speed, so I noted that one and I have to get it out earlier next time. For sure everything steps up and everything is quicker in a game.”
—CHIEFS—