OC Alex Van Pelt (9.7.23)
Can you just talk a little bit about how you’ve seen Deshaun (Watson) progress throughout the preseason? Come along with everything you guys are asking him to do this?
“Sure. Yeah. I think he’s done a great job, much more comfortable than where he had been in the past. An offseason, to kind of understand the offense and figure out how we’re trying to scheme things up. I think he has a great understanding for that now. Really dove in, took ownership of it. And really, for me, it was the last few practices of the minicamp where you’re like, okay, this guy’s different than he was earlier times. On the practice field really lit up and started to really command the offense and understand everything we’re asking him to do.”
Is getting Marquise (Goodwin) back going to help open things up with the offense in the passing game?
“That’s an area that like, we know he gives you great speed, great experience as a player, has made a ton of plays in the league, and having that ability to run through defenses and push the coverage deeper is obviously going to help any team. But not only is he fast, he’s also a very good receiver, so we’ll use him in multiple ways.”
Does this offense have more potential to be more versatile week to week because of the different personnel you have now?
“I think so. I think that’s one of the things we always strive to do offensively, is to stay multiple and versatile and make teams defend multiple looks, multiple personnel groupings, multiple formations. That’s part of our system, and that’s how we’ve started it, so I do believe so. We’ll see how it goes. Every year is different with injuries and the things that come with the football season, but I feel like we have the pieces where if we need to change and go in a different direction, we have that available.”
Looks like David (Njoku) had a really strong camp in the preseason. How did you see him improve from the previous couple of years?
“Yeah, Dave’s obviously a talented player, one of the top wides, in my opinion. I mean, he can do both in the run game and what he does in the pass game is exceptional as well. He’s another guy that just continues to grow. This is his fourth year now in the system, so his understanding and knowledge of what we ask him to do. He’s improved as a route runner. He’s caught the ball extremely well for us, and then when he blocks, he’s as physical as there is in the league. So, he’s really had a strong camp and really, the last couple of years has really come on as a top wide in the league.”
There’s a lot of empty formation in the preseason game, of course, wasn’t all Deshaun (Watson). DTR (Dorian Thompson-Robinson) a lot too, but is that kind of a concession to something that Deshaun wants?
“No, I don’t think so. I think we all want it. I think obviously his strengths are when you get people spread out, his ability to move in the pocket and create when things don’t work out, or if he decides to take off with the ball, that gives you more space to do so. But we’ve always been a pretty heavy, empty formation team before him. I think we’ll see it as much, if not maybe a little more or a little less. But that’s nothing that we’ve decided to do because of Deshaun. I think we’ve always been that way, and it’ll just play to his strengths.”
One of the differences this year is that (Nick) Chubb is on the field, more so he’s on the line of scrimmage more than he’s been in the past. How does he adapt to that?
“Oh, I think Nick will be just fine. Whether it’s the ball in his hands out of the backfield as a receiver, or handing it to him whether we’re under the shotgun, I think Nick will fit in well. His skill set, he’s not just a dot runner, he’s not an under center, just wide zone runner. He can do a lot of different things. And the way he gets ready for the season and the offseason with his training, his ability to run with the football. I feel good about throwing it to him, handing it to him from the gun or under center.”
Did Jerome (Ford) missing most of camp with the hamstring injury – did that alter your plans on what you can do at your third down back?
“No, I don’t think so. We envision him getting more playing time, kind of in the Kareem (Hunt) role last year, third downs. Nick (Chubb) spent a lot of time with him in the meeting room on some of the things that come up on third down from a protection standpoint. He’s very sharp. He hasn’t missed a beat since he’s been back, in all those meetings we’ve had. Feel very confident with him in there as a protector and a ball carrier, whether it’s first, second or third down.”
What makes the Bengals deep and so good?
“I’ve been around Lou (Anarumo) a lot. I got a lot of respect for Lou. I think he’s one of the top coordinators in the league. The thing that Lou will do is show you different things, much like punch and counter punch. You’ll get different looks, you’ll get the same look over and over with two or three different variations of that look. I think he does a nice job of keeping you off guard, keeping you guessing, and they play hard. Obviously, it’s a defense that finishes really well. It’s a big motor, a challenge for us to play at our level with our finish and our ability to play to the echo of the whistle has been something we’ve talked about all week.”
Is that particularly true with their D Ends against your tackles?
“Absolutely. There was a play where I think they got a hit or a sack on Jacoby (Brisset) last year where he moved around in the pocket and we kind know, let the time clock expire. We’ve talked a lot about that, but those two edge rushers, they’re going to go till the end of the whistle. So, mindset is we’re going to play it to the echo of the whistle as well. Infinity and pass protection. Doesn’t matter how long we got to hold him out, the mad minute, all those things that go into it. But as we grow and learn more about Deshaun, his ability to break tackles within the pocket, extend plays, it really heightens our awareness as an offensive line to continue to fight until the play is finally over.”
Five guys up front. The whole line is getting to that second, third level, the defense has been so instrumental offensively for you just because of Deshaun’s (Watson) ability to extend plays in that. How do you think that group has adjusted to dealing with that, not getting caught downfield, not holding, things like that?
“It’s tough. I’m not going to lie and say I ever played offensive line, but I can imagine when you got a guy locked up and all of a sudden he starts to react opposite to where you think the quarterback is. It’s training Coach Callie (Brownson) and Coach (Scott) Peters. Those guys do a great job. At some point, you just have to let go. We would rather take a guy who got loose late in the down as opposed to a ten-yard holding penalty. So, some of the things we learned to adjust and adapt to Deshaun’s play style.”
You have guys like Elijah (Moore) running and Deshaun (Watson) running. Do you have to kind of not live in your fears and just go out in there and run your game and not worry about them getting hurt?
“Yeah, I think we’ve always thought about it this way, is never to play scared. That’s never a healthy way to do things in this league. So, we’ll go out and we’ll play and guys will make plays when they’re there and we’ll be smart. He’ll be smart when he does have the ball in his hands of (knowing) when to get down and how to get down. But that’s nothing we’re afraid of.”
You know week one, you’re not going to be able to put it all out there. You have to go over the first couple of weeks and into the season for you. How do you balance the excitement of wanting to put the work that you’ve done on the field week one against a tough opponent and knowing that it might take time to lay it all out?
“Yeah, that’s the hard part. As you know, there are two things that kill coaches in that opener and that’s time and tape. So, you have all the time in the world and you got all the tape to watch them. So you start chasing ghosts, you start doing a lot of things that normally you won’t have time to do during the normal season. You know, Kevin’s (Stefanski) done a great job of letting us know as a staff that we need to keep this plan tight. It’s about execution and it’s about finish. It’s not really about the scheme so much. It’s just how well we can operate within the scheme.”
With Joe Burrow on the opposite sideline, obviously, you want to keep them off the field as much as possible. At the same time, you have so many explosive weapons at your disposal. Do you picture this game being more of a shootout or how do you kind of balance that schematically with keeping him off the field and being explosive at the same time?
“Yeah, it doesn’t matter who the quarterback is on the other side. Quite honestly, our goal is to possess the ball and finish in the end zone. So that’s converting on third down. That’s all the little things of situational football. Really doesn’t matter who we’re playing offensively. Our mindset is, hey, let’s convert on third down, let’s win situational football, short yardage, and when we get down to the red zone, let’s end up with seven on the board. So really not even think about it from a standpoint of who’s on the other side. That’s just the way we operate.”
Last year it was tight ends and fullbacks and now this is year four, fullback is not nearly as important. There’s not even one on the roster. David’s (Njoku) kind of your number one tight end. The evolution that you guys have made offensively here, coming in with one philosophy and now having to fit with the personnel.
“I mean, that’s the story of coaching, right? Adjust and adapt to the players that you have and putting them in the best position to be successful. And I think that’s just kind of how we’ve evolved offensively. We’re not stuck in this certain system. We can be multiple, versatile with different people out there. So I think that’s one of the things that’s a strength of ours.”
I know with Deshaun (Watson), when Kevin (Stefanski) or basically anyone talks about him, like the football junkie aspect of his personality comes up, I guess. Have you seen that rub off on some of the rest of the offense?
“Yeah, and I think he leads by example. For starters, I think he loves football. That’s evident. He sees it extremely well when you sit and talk ball and watch film. I mean, he has a great vision of what he sees in front of him and then the little things he does on the side, bringing the guys in, having those extra meetings where he runs and directs the meetings. I think you got to follow a leader like that.”
The perception out there, not really sure exactly where it came from or how it came, that he didn’t have a very good camp or he didn’t look good at times during training camp. What do you say to that?
“Yeah, I would say it probably came back from the red zone periods against our defense. Everybody can admit that’s one of the hardest drills in football. So, we like that. It’s hard. There’s not a lot of space and we’re not running the football, so it makes it tough on him. But all that training, again, is going to pay dividends in the end. Those weren’t the best drills offensively for us. Again, we didn’t scheme what we were trying to do to beat that defense. We were trying to work on our craft and work on our scheme that we have in that area. So I would say that’s not true in that regard, but I can definitely see how that would look to the outside world as you watch out of those tight red zone seven on sevens where you might have two or three completions out of, say, six or eight. It may look like that, but again, that’s really the hardest drill of the day for the quarterback is a seven on seven in the red zone and compete.”
When you’re watching those, how much do you set the results aside and really look at what’s actually happening in the play as far as maybe the crispness of the routes that are being run and things like that?
“I mean, that’s what we coach off of. We always want to try to be perfect in everything we do. Again, we ran a lot of the same type of concepts against them. Not worried about what happened there during training camp. I thought we got a lot of great work out of it. The defense got better; we got better. So, it was a win-win for both sides.”
Last year ended for Amari (Cooper) with that injury. Does he look like he’s back to the guy that started the year last year?
“Yeah, really. Man, what a tough guy he was to stick it out last year for us. I’m just thinking about it, you watch the games from early in the year and since we played him here on Halloween, and the guy that was out there compared to the guy that came on the field. Tribute to him to fight through and battle for his brothers. But he looks like he’s back to the old Amari right now after the injury.”
Cedric (Tillman), being a rookie, how much have you seen him sort of absorb more as this has gone on? And how much more has he kind of had put on his plate as you’ve gotten closer to Sunday?
“Yeah, it’s a lot for a rookie to come in, especially in the system where you never really got in the huddle. So, the communication, the verbal information that was delivered in the huddle is new to him, so he’s growing. I thought he had an excellent camp for a young guy, and he’ll be instrumental for us throughout the course of the season as well. He’s a big guy. He’s got great pass skills, he can catch the ball, great body control, all the things that he does well. He’s tremendous in the run game, so he’ll be in there a lot as we move forward during the season.”
Will he be in the red zone?
“That’s an area where he can obviously use his skill set to help us there.”
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