Good, good, go ahead. Any questions you guys have, So.
What do you know now about the kickoff role that you didn't know the last time we talked to you.
Well, you can't put the tee or the ball and the t flat like that. That's what I do know. And there's probably gonna be more changes, that's the other thing I know. So we'll deal with it as they come.
Did you guys do that earlier in camp before you're.
Told not to. No, we messed around with some different things, but that's one of the things you looked at or heard about. But yeah, that's off the table now, so we'll just go with how it ever plays out of.
What you look for in the kicker change in terms of you know, obviously hangtiming distance maybe less important than how you can control those line drive kicks and things like that. What's the difference.
From Yeah, you just said that's probably the easiest way to explain it. Hangtime does not matter at all anymore. So placement where you're going with it, or I think what a lot of things are going to happen, and we call them dirty balls, where once it hits the ground, that's when everyone can move. So whether it's that extreme or just more of a line drive. That's what I think is gonna happen. So more target practice basically instead of hangtime is out, doesn't matter? Good? Yeah, no good.
That's something he's been working on all summer and he's been preparing for it, and that it just changes, you know, their whole lives. Kickers have been told hangtime number one and placement, you know, and now hangtime's out, so it's really displacement.
You done any research on defensive guys who have played soccer?
Oh yeah, oh yeah, we ask everybody and you have to have a guy to do that. And I think with the position player, if you had one, there's just a lot that goes into it. You know, through the game, if he's playing, if he gets sore, and you know, it's such a if you get outside the target line, if you get outside the twenty, you know, that's pretty big penalty starting on the forty. So that's going to
happen too. If with guys that don't kick every day, you know, So we don't have a guy, but what we'll see who does it.
We saw Demo lobbying for doing getting some kickoffs, so I'm sure that decision will be made by Kyle. But is there something to that where a guy powerful like that can hit the middle and only.
The kicker is going to be there. Uh yeah, I think there's a lot of things that nobody knows what it's going to look like. The one thing I do know though, is you have to have returners that can get to the ball. It that just with what I said about the kickers. When you take hangtime out of it, it's it's gonna start in the simplest form to me as a kicker and returner game because they're the only ones that can move until the ball either touches somebody
or hits the ground. So right there, simplify that to me is like, Okay, that's where it starts. So that's where the game starts.
To me, it looks like Moody broke the team down at the inner practice today.
Yeah, Kyle, Kyle brought him up there.
Yet I'll say about that and how it has Moody performed.
Moody's done a really nice job. He's It's always fun seeing guys in their second year come in the building when camp starts. You know, I saw it in Jake, you see it in the winners. You see it in Graham. You see in those guys it's just a whole different feel where their body feels like, how comfortable they are. They know exactly what it looks like. So they're all really excited. And Jake was no different on that. He was. It's just a different mentality coming in year two.
Second, you're a Luder obviously had a you know, mishappen the Super Bowl.
How is he? You've seen him respond from that, and Loud's great. I Luder is a great worker. He gets better every day. You know, he was on pup for a while last year, I think, so it took him longer to develop. But no, he's excellent. He works great. Love him.
When you're looking at the punt returners and you have Trent Taylor back there who's very experienced. Is I guess is he more of a natural fielder of the punt than maybe Ricky Pierce?
All he seems like he's learning how to do it.
I would say Trent is just so good because so many reps he's had. You know, the punt return is a thing of reps. So the more reps you see at the ball flight, the different nos where the ball is going and just fielding the ball. So Trent is excellent back there. He's done it for so long, so confident, so cool, and and so it's really cool to get all those guys as many reps we can and helping every it's about just getting the reps so that that's where he looks really natural at it.
He tried multiple combinations for kick returner. Are you still kind of working through what you're looking for or is the idea that, hey, we may have multiple combinations that we use it at various points this year.
We're trying everyone there. Basically every running back is back there with the receivers that we're trying everybody. And I think, what what I'm anticipating it looks like, and I'd rather anticipate this way is all the different kind of balls you're going to get. And I think when you can move returners around again the cat and mouse game, but also there's a lot like you put Debo and Juice back there. They have a real instinctual piece about them, like when you like, My job as a coach is
to give them any tells. We have to let them know where we think the ball is going by alignment, by the kicker by the whatever it is, give them that information so they can anticipate where the ball is going. But now there's some just an internal instincts that really good football players have that I don't know if they can tell you why they felt something, but moving with the kicker as it comes. So it's all about fielding
a ball clean. So if I'm on kickoff return, when we're doing kickoff return, if we can field the ball clean, we have all the advantage. There is no advantage for the kickoff team. It's zero if on our kickoff team as we're covering, if we can get the returner not catch it clean, that's the only advantage I see for a kickoff team. Or the hit the ground going to the end zone. And now the ball's at the twenty, So another dirty ball is the way we look at it.
So that's where I see And if it's not that, it's not that, but I want to start there.
Juice in particular, just because of they have so much experience, you know, in the run game, like in the actual offense. Is that almost how you have to view it as like, hey, there's an element here too. If these guys are familiar in that way in terms of like deuo running behind juice or whatever.
Yeah, I just if it turns into trying to steal possessions from our team, or it turns into trying to win field position by kicking dirty balls and trying that's what teams because in special teams, teams try to tax that way. We've had multiple teams try to fake punts against us, you know, to steal another possession. So going into that, I almost kind of look at it. You have to have your best players back there if that's
what they're doing, and think of hands team. You know, when we do a hands team at the end of a game, we have all our best players there. And the reason they're there is they are our best players. They have the instinct, the ability, whatever it is, the no hesitation, something told them to do something and they move on it. So that's kind of how we look at it. And we're trying a bunch of different guys there, see who has the skill set there.
You talk to Chris Firster at all just in terms of like blocking schemes big picture on those returns.
Absolutely, yeah, the kickoff return looks more like an offense or defensive player than a kickoff or a kickoff return, So all those principles, I think it's way more comparable on an offense and defense how it's lined up. The difference is how we get there on a kickoff return is different than how offensive defense get there. But once
you get engaged, all football rules are the same. So that's that's the thing we're trying to figure out, is what is where our eyes going, where's our helmet going, what is our steps? How are we getting there? How do we get to that spot? And then it's really just a football play. It's an offense defensive play where leverage, head, hand placement, footwork, eyes, physicality, all of it. So that's what we're trying to figure out, and we don't know what it looks like yet.
Are these three three preseason games? Are you going to get more out of this than you've gotten out of preseason in years?
Absolutely? I mean I can't wait for Thursday night to see what it looks like. So every preseason game. I don't think it's going to end until the end of the season. I mean, think of like I just compared it to an offensive defensive play. Right, the fundamentals of football haven't changed all that much. We know all those answers, but take Kyle's offense right the outside zone that he was running here in seventeen. There's probably a lot more
wrinkles to it now. In fact, there is a lot more wrinkles to it now because they have so much history on it. They start scheming on it. You see what the defense is doing, and it evolves. No one has any information on this play zero, So as the plays happen, as schemes happen, as you see things and put what they're doing, what they're doing, what works with us, what we've already done, it's going to be constantly evolving until we get enough information on it and then you
can start moving. So it's going to be an adjustment all year. Talk to other.
Special teams, coaches around the league, or are guys in your position around the league being real inquisitive with one another about this.
To try to conquer this whole thing. Well, that question was asked in spring, and we had a couple big all special teams. I think we had three zoom meetings, so it was really clear to everybody. I talked to a couple guys I know, and they were being quiet. I haven't talked to anybody. So that's the tape is going to be the work.
You know, well, you haven't seen this play live very much, right, I mean you practice this play, but as far as live reps of it, how many reps have we've.
Seen whatever you call and practice live. Whatever we can do which is going to be different when it actually is tackling, and when that's the difference the speed, Like, we know how fast guys run down the field in the old all the kickoffs I've ever coached and our players have ever run, we know exactly how fast the guys are. We know exactly what moves they do. We know when they go back door or away from the
return if they have enough speed to get there. So you take all that speed out, and now we don't know what it looks like when the returner is going left. I don't know if I can go back door. I don't know if I can go and have enough speed to get there. So all those things and now those decisions have to be made within this five yards. So
think of it last year. If if I'm on the kickoff team and all of us are running the balls kicked, we're moving, we have four seconds to take in all all the information that the other team has given us, how the returner, where he's moving, what is the blocking scheme, how deep are they're going. So guys have always processed a kickoff that way, running full speed and all these indicators getting them to the football. Now and just train and think of this. I mean every play these guys
have ever done. When the ball is snapped, everybody moves. Right when the ball is kicked, everybody moves. And then that's how they've trained their whole life on moving and making decisions. Now the ball is kicked, they don't move, and now they have to process all that thing without moving. And it to me, I mean it might sound like, yeah, that's easy. I don't know if it is easy. Some guys can't process all that. They have to process a
totally different way. So that's where we started. Let's start there because we don't know what everything else looks like. But what is different about this play? How can we train our eyes and our footwork and our decision making with the information we have now, and then when it happens, it happens really fast. So if you're false stepping, if you don't have a plan, it's going to be too quick. Marna.
Can the athleticism of a long snapper of Tabor be something that can tip the.
Scales at this point now in terms of.
The return, like they can be more involved. Like it's not something that it doesn't appear that maybe the athletics of a long snapper was as valued as maybe it is now when you're in this situation.
Yeah, for punts, that's that's always going to be it. But for kickoffs, Pep would not be involved in that. They'll just do punt stuff. And we always work on him trying to be a factor in coverage because those are always the best long snappers is the ones that cannot be a factor. Thank you guys,