Inside the Jets: Fitzpatrick and Quigley (11/23)

down on a run. You know, those are ones where I'll I'll never slide, but uh, it's the other place where I've I've got to try to be a little bit smarter. But it's it's always been a hard thing for me in my career, just out there, you know, fighting for yards, trying to be competitive and you know, knock on wood. Even though I've got a bump thumb and broke my leg last year, I've been pretty healthy.

So if that hasn't changed your mind at all, now, still going at it, Ryan, when you look at this team and you go back and looking video from the games whatnot, is there one thing that just sticks out in your mind is to that that one thing. We've talked about execution. I know coaches talked about execution all the time. Is there one thing that's common when you look at things that could be just one thing that

could change everything around No. I mean it's the frustrating part, you know, for us, especially offensively, is you need eleven guys on the same page. Uh, you know, doing it right. And we we've had a lot of instances where you know, we're we're one guy off for we're we're just not all moving in the same direction. Um, you know, and it's it's one mistake here or there and the end up being big moments and big plays in the game. And so we've just got a you know, it's something

I said today in the conference call. We had just get back to the basics, the fundamentals, and make sure everybody's on the same page and we're we're executing. Because you know, we've shown we can be a very very good offense. We've got great weapons. We've just got to get back to um the Jets brand of football that we're playing at the beginning of the year. It fits something that struck me today on that conference call. You said, we have to ignore the noise. What do you mean

by that? Yeah, you know we're sitting here right now, We've we've got six games left, you know, we're we're at a disappointing five and five, which there are a lot of other teams that are the same way. Uh, you know, everybody got there differently. Either teams have won three or four in a row, teams have lost four or five. You know that everybody's sitting at five and

five has gotten there differently. But we've we've got to forget about what's being said, you know outside, We've got to forget about all that and just focus on us, focus on getting our confidence up and going out there and finishing strong. And that's that's something that's so important in the NFL. Even you've got all these great athletes and great players, but confidence really does play a lot

into it. Your veteran, some of these young kids don't understand the ups and downs up in the NFL season. It's a grind, it's you know, it's opposite turns and everything like that. How do you keep these guys level? The young guys who don't understand, they're just like may have five games maybe wing they've lost in their whole career. Well, I think, you know, you try to set the example of being level headed, whether it's a big win or a or a you know, crushing defeat. Uh, you've got

to be the same guy every day. And that's kind of what I pride myself on, as just being the same guy every day, whether it's in my preparation, in my attitude, um, you know, just the way that I approach it. And it's it's tough. You know, it's sixteen seventeen weeks. It's just a grind, it really is. But this is when we need to start playing our best football and kind of put aside, you know, the things that have happened the last month or so and and just get back on track. And you know, I think

we've got the guys to do it. I know we do. And uh, we just got to continue to work hard in practice and hope it comes fits. How much have you enjoyed this season? Obviously right now you guys are trying to get out of a little bit of a rut. But with that being said, you got traded from Houston

to the Jets in March. As late as August, you didn't know where you be even pet the backup quarterback this year, then you can, uh, come on, you take over your starting signal caller, and you've been in charge. You've been in command, and you're gonna make your loving start for this team this week. Yeah. You know, I love playing this game and so um you know, the reason I'm still in it and still doing is not to pack anybody up. It's to be out there competing

and playing. And I think we've got such a great group of guys, especially on offense, just in terms of the experience, the guys that have played a lot of football. Um, you know, We've we've got a great group, and so I've had a lot of fun this year. Um, you know,

the guy's up front. You've always got to have a good relationship with the offensive line as a quarterback, and we've we've got some good ones up there, some real pranksters and uh you know Deck and and Brandon on the outside and the talent we have at running back. You know, it's a good group and it's been a lot of fun for me this year. Who is the best prankster up front? Uh? I mean, man Gold is always he's always got his hand in something, but usually

will we'll team up on somebody. So he's a pretty good partner in crime. How much fun does it been for you to bilchie chemistry and start throwing with with Brandy Marshall and there deca this season? Yeah, it's awesome. I mean, you want to talk about and intimidating guy you go out on the field with, you know, Brandon, He's got his visor on and he's all yoked up, and you know, it gives you a lot of confidence to look out there and say, hey, I get to throw this guy at the ball. Uh. But but it

has been fun. It's fun to throw the receivers that have played a lot of football, you know, guys that have been around, that have been in a few different systems and really understand the game. And so that's that's been a really refreshing part about this year with some of the targets that we have. I like your approach. You're always even killed, or at least it seems that way. What do you say is a veteran and it's eleventh

season in this fourth year in the system. When you throw a perfect pass to Devin Smith, who's trying to make plays out there, he's a rookie just coming out of the National Football League. What do you say to him, Well, the game of football, I mean, you make They're gonna make mistakes no matter what. Nobody's perfect out there. But it's it really is in a sickening way. My favorite part about the game. It's just the adversity that you face, whether it's individually or as a team, and just being

able to overcome that. And Devon is gonna be a really good football player. You know, no one's out there, uh, you know, trying to drop passes or anything. He's trying to make players. I know that, and we just got to continue to put the work in in practice. You know, I'm in my eleven season. I still can't figure this thing out, you know, throwing a couple of picks in the game and uh, you know, it's it's a difficult game. It's not easy. If it was easy, everybody be able

to do it. And you know, Devin, it was a great example in the game of just a guy that, uh, you know, we don't come up with that completion, but he's gonna get more opportunities and keep throwing the ball and allowing him to make plays. Ryan, what's the challenge in facing a team the second time around. You've already played Miami, you played them overseas, but now you played them against Sunday. What do you do is can you can you? I'll think yourself sometimes to say, you know what,

they're expecting us to do this, so let's do something else. Well, there's always some extra wrinkles with the division opponents. Uh, you know, this one will be interesting because when we played them last time, Um, they had a different defensive coordinator. Um, you know after our game in London is when they let some of their staff go, and so you know, well, I'm interested in the next few days to kind of get into the film and see how much it's changed, Uh,

if at all. But I'm sure they they've changed a little bit and what they're doing schematically, and um, you know they've had some injuries. We've had some injuries. So you've got to look at kind of what's happened over the last few games and go from there. But yeah, you definitely at times try you outsmart yourself a little bit, trying to you know, trying to think of ways to break tendencies and things versus these teams. But you always

give them a little bit of a different wrinkle. You're a tough critic, and you said today that you don't think you've been playing well the less couple of games. What are some specific areas where you think you gotta take a couple of steps in improvement here down the stretch. Well, I mean we've been getting off to real slow starts. But you know the two things is a quarterback that are extremely important, Uh, third down efficiency and red zone efficiency.

You know, those are two things that are very telling stats. Four quarterback really important things, and we just we have been very good on third down the last few games. And you know, some of that we've got to getting better manageable third downs, you know, So it's it's not necessarily all about third down. It's being a little more

efficient on first and second down. But uh, we got to score touchdowns in the red zone and a lot of that falls on me, whether it's getting us in the right play a run or a pass and making the right read and making the right throw. So those are two things, uh, you know that I really need to improve on that they have have been done well in the last few games, and uh, you know, I I've got a lot of confidence in myself you know,

it's it's been eleven years. I've had a lot of up and downs, ups and downs in my career, but I wouldn't still be sitting here talking about ball, if you know, if I didn't have that confidence in myself. So how do you keep that beard so good? Why? As I was leaving, I didn't get a chance to brush it down or anything. Um, And I asked my wife, I said, oh, does it look okay? And she just started laughing at me because there's not really a not

really a good response to that one. Uh, but he didn't just kind of go with the the caveman look, you know, just let it go. So the reason we asked just because we were talking with Nick Man about that and he said that you and him share are eight beer comb and everything. So well, yeah, so we've we've got two different combs, but yeah, hopefully don't share it.

But yeah, it's this the same same brand. Yeah, he was nice enough to order me a few of the combs that he uses, and uh, yeah, he's been good to bounce grooming tips off of. Uh, you know, he hasn't really gotten any from me, but uh, he does a good job, not only with the beard, but the hair too. He's got great flowing locks. Oh you like the hair Huh, yeah, I love it's it's his signature. Look, would you let your hair grow now? My mine just

froze out. Mine doesn't do that. Okay, you're gonna keep it, sure, but the beard's gonna grow. Yeah, probably. Yeah. You could diet and beat Santa Claus. Yeah, I don't want to scare the kids. Speaking of the kids, awesome experience for your oldest son yesterday. Can you talk about that a little bit? Yeah, so we My oldest son is eight. Um, his name is Brady and no relation or reason with any quarterbacks in the NFL. I always get that question. But I was in St. Louis when we had him.

But Brady was able to get on a plane by himself and fly to Houston for the game. Uh. Stayed with a few of our neighbors that we had last year, and um, so it was a neat experience for him to to get on the plane, to be able to hang out with his buddies to go to the game, and then he flew back in last night. Uh, but you know it was a cool deal. I mean, kids these days, you know, I didn't get out my first flight solo until who knows when it's probably twenty or something.

But uh, he had his iPad, he had he had one of his books, and you know he always gets on the plane, crosses his leg. Yeah, he's real worried about the uh you know, ten thousand feet, you know, until he can turn on his device. But now that's that's gone away with. So he's he's a rule follower. He's not gonna break any rules. But he Uh, he did a good job, and you're a popular guy in Houston. He said that the number of year old friends are enough for the ballgame. Uh. Yeah, we you know, we

had a great neighborhood. Uh, and so it was a lot of fun postgame. Uh. Unfortunately a lot of them are Texans fans, so they were fired up and happy. But uh, you know, there's a number of kids and you know it, twenty plus people just in terms of the parents and the kids that we were able to become close with last year. So Ran, what are you looking to do now Thanksgiving week in New York? What do you want the family go doing Thanksgiving Day? Are

you cooking and give me some recipes we're finding? Yeah, yeah, we'll see if the croc pods in use. Uh, you know, we will be at We'll be at work until noon, you know, and I think we're able to go home after after that. And so we're gonna deep fry turkey this year. One or two, we'll see. But I witnessed it last year in Houston. I've got some tips. I know not to put it in frozen. Uh, And so we're going to give that a shot this year. That's

kind of the new thing on the agenda. Okay, good, you have to do anything other than that, just cooking. Now we've got we've got a lot of family coming in. Uh, so it'll be a nice little feast for us. And hopefully you guys get off to a start this similar to the one you did in London against this team, where that's the one thing that to Bold's talking about today. We gotta get off, get off the faster starts. And my ammy, you guys came out from the get first

offensive play. You go up top to Brandon Marshall who had one on one coverage Grimes Brent Grimes and coverage, and and you set the tone early. Yeah, and that you know that was the emphasis that week the whole time. And you know when when Chan came up to me and told me what the first play was gonna be, it was pretty fired up. We got the right coverage and Brandon goes it makes a great play. So it would be great to get off to a to a similar start. Um. I don't think it'll be the same play,

but you never know. Listen, have a great holiday. Thanks. What's talking about today? All right? Thank you guys. All right, let's bring in Jets punter Ryan Quigley, who Larry. If you need a field goal kicker or need somebody uh to connect on a few extra points, this guy can do that as well. Ryan, what was that experience like a couple of weeks ago when Nick Folk gets hurt in pregame and they turned to you and say, hey, Quigs, you're not just handling plunny tonight. You're gonna be a kick.

I you know, I think I think it was a nightmare I had one time, but you know it wasn't It wasn't bad. Uh. It's one of the things that we we've prepared for. And you know, if I go down, folks gotta go in. If he goes down, I would have been and you just gotta be ready to go. You know, I've have a little bit of an experience in the past, you know, doing field goals. Um, but I also had a nice little block in high school that I used to kick off of us a little easier,

but we got the job done. It definitely wasn't pretty at times. But uh, like you said, they went through. They counted for for four AFC Special Teams Player of the Week a couple of weeks ago. Okay, now, you can't make this up because we already spoke to Nick Folk and he gave us the one person. So I'm gonna ask you. Nick walks over to you and he says, come on, he didn't tell you this. I can't go. What are you gonna do? What I need? You got?

You gotta kick field goals? I can't. All right, all right, what went through your mind? What you say? Um? I think I I think I had a joke for him or something like. I said something that made him made him really upset because I wasn't taking them seriously. But and then you know, it was just I was I didn't really even think about it. I was like, alright, sticks. Uh went out to the middle of the field. I think we're getting ready going to the tunnel, and uh,

I'm I'm putting down the balls. I'm I'm kicking them and I think I hit one to the right into the bleachers. And then I was like, okay, I got that first one out of the way. The next one I put up, I hit to the left end of the bleachers. You didn't even hit the net. I was saying, the bleachers, and I was all right, this time, I want to put it right to the middle. And uh, I think I missed that one. Two. So I was like, all right, I'm done with that and I'll just save

it for the game. All right. We were taste of the Jets at four World Trade last week and the Jets head their annual fashion show and then you got good good stuff here and this guy got rave reviews before his spot on the runway. Uh, what were you were wearing, quigs and and what do you think about because you were part of the sports portion you didn't have a suit on. Yeah, yeah, I'm I'm surprised with the reviews I got. I heard a lot of a lot of different mixed reviews. Teammates given you a hard

time that we're talking about the people. The people, but the people, okay, yeah, I appreciate it. Um, I couldn't tell you exactly what I was wearing, but yeah, I was in the casual wear and uh had some jeans that you know, I had never really seen before. But they're called running jeans, and uh, I guess that it's the style now in the city. But uh, fits doesn't know what run into. Yeah, yeah, I don't think anybody we don't know what they are. But no, yeah, it

was fun. We just had fun with it. Definitely, Uh something new for me. And uh, you know, glad it's over now. I will say I saw you there. I would have liked to have seen you. Just take a little more, just come here. This is why they got on, Okay, right, I didn't know. I was talking to somebody and said it was a race like the first one that goes on at the stage and gets off. You know. They went a prize, but I didn't get the prize. I know it was the fastest though. I was. Yeah, Ryan,

assess your season the date. I believe you got nineteen punts down inside the opponent's twenty yearline. Uh yeah, those are always good. Those are the biggest ones. You know, you you really help out the defense when you put him in there close. Uh, you know, our punt teams head in the right direction. Uh. You know, we we started off and you know myself, you know, start off slow. You know, some punts that you want back and but luckily, you know, we have a great unit, great covers team.

Tanner has been money all season and uh, like I said, we're heading the right direction with the defensive unit we have. You know, we can really help this team out. And uh, you know that's our goal each and every week. So yeah, we gotta continue to improve, continue a better help this team. What's the type of stadium to play it at? Top of stadium? Oh, man, I don't want to say met Life.

Uh you know you you know, you go up to Buffalo, you know, it doesn't get much worse that I'm you know, we have that in the last game of the season. You know what it's gonna be. You know, go up to New England, you know what it's gonna be. Um, anytime we get to this part of the year and in November and December, you're gonna get some you know, tough, windy, cold conditions. But you know I've been this my third

season here I played at BC. We know what's coming and you know, as a specialist, you know you you you embrace those opportunities, to embrace those windy games, and those are times where you can get to prove yourself without giving away the game plan this week, how do you approach a guy like Jarvis Landry who we saw over in London. Obviously he's a dangerous returner. He's to me, he's one of the better returns in the National Football League. No, definitely, definitely.

He he ate us up last time too in London. Uh. Kind of have a sour taste in my mouth after after that game in London. But yeah, I mean each week, you know those guys back there, everybody's good, you know you really you really, I mean it gets tougher and tougher. You gotta put the ball in the right place. You gotta have the right hang time, distance, everything, so uh, you know, very little room for air. I'm looking forward

to the test though this week. Jervis is a great, great player and uh, I can't wait to get out there. Do you think you guys have I don't want to say something to prove, but just like you said, you feel a little a little bad taste in your mouth from that, and then and then that's just that's the way I am, and that's the way our unit is. Uh. You know, we're going out there. We want to help the football team. We don't hurt the football team. And I think in in London we we did hurt the

football team. And you know a few of those punts and um, you know, I'll be the first one to say, you know, we just can't let that happen. I can't let that happen. And uh, you gotta be better right quickly. So I guess Ryan, just your mindset every week and just trying to make sure that you follow everything through.

It's it's kind of like a like a golf swing that you want to make sure that everything is is fluid and everything is right and and how much pressure is it now with I think for me now that you don't feel returning off kicks, it's like done now, punny, It's just like everybody's just really into it's even more pressure on the puney to try to get better field positioned because of the way they moved back for kicking. And it's right right, it's yes, definitely put a you know,

bigger emphasis on that portion. Um. You know, you guys were talking about it earlier. You know, just you know, there's just execution, like the the smallest things and um, every yard. And you know Bobby April does a great job of emphasizing that to us. Is that you know, we're these are first downs that were you know, we're taking away from teams and uh and you know that's

the way we approach it. Um. Yeah, no, for me, you know, it's just we're just we're really focused on, you know, pushing the team back as far as we can and just helping our defense. What's the most important stat for punter? Because I know people at home sometime here hang time and said what does that mean? And then the other thing is you have your averages and you also have your net average. You finished with it

in that average, you know where where's the team starting. Yeah, So I mean that gross can you know, can be whatever it needs to be. You know, that's it's gonna you know, that's gonna be what's gonna be. But at the end of the day, I'm looking at the net and that's something that we've you know, we started out slow and you know, like I said, we're heading the right direction, but we gotta get better. We gotta do fool goalkicker man. We got new fooder. Ye what's that?

What's that like in in communication? Does he want the ball the same spots? All that stuff? Yeah. So you know, it's been great getting to know Randy. Two games and he's been he's been money for us. Uh but yeah, it's different. It's something that you know, Tanner and I we had to you know, we really we had to take time and you know, learn his rhythm, learn how

you know, how he wants the ball. Uh, you know where he just Oh, there's so many little things that goes into kicking and punting and uh, you know we've we've taken the time. We're still learning. Um, but you know, Randy, Randy's a great kicker. He's a great guy too, and you know, glad to have him. He seems like he's got a pretty strong leg. Yes he does. I give him a hard time he got fresh legs, but no,

he's he's always had a strong leg. We came out the same year, um, and you know I remember hearing about him and it's been it's been fun playing with him. Uh, you're alma mater. Boston College played Notre Dame over the weekend at Fenway Park. Were you jealous of then? So jealous? So jealous? Yeah? Yeah, I mean I think my one body he played for the Giants, he got to he got to go up there and watch it. Uh, but yeah, you know, I got to see a lot of pictures

and of course watching on TV. Just playing a place like that, it's it's pretty special. Yeah, that was pretty amazing scene. And I'll tell you what. Boston College, Ye a hack of a chance win in nineteen sixty that's you know, they got a good squad up there. Uh. Defensively, you know, we're one of the best. But you know, coach of Dodgers has done a great job. Hopefully, Uh you know, we can build off that and we're finished,

finished season, right, and then working the next year. Ryan, listen, thanks for coming by, Thanks for a couple of minutes. Best the rest of the season, and keep that leg warm, Ryan quickly, guys, Jomp