Miami Dolphins Joe Philbin post-game comments

Miami Dolphins head coach Joe Philbin stated, “we are what are”. The Dolphins released the transcripts from Sunday’s post-game interview with Joe Philbin and here are the questions and answers from that session. Along with my comments regarding his.

Transcripts are courtesy of MiamiDolphins.com and are used verbatim as the team has presented them. My comments are noted clearly as indented comments.

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(Opening Statement) – “Obviously Buffalo played a very good football game there. They deserve to win the football game. They outplayed us. I’m the head coach – I told the team after it certainly starts with me, the accountability, and the responsibility to get the team to perform up to their potential. It was not a good performance so certainly I take responsibility. We’re a team, so players and coaches, we need to do a better job, both of us. It starts with me. It’s really simple. We’ve got two ways to go. We can start saying, ‘You’re the problem, I’m the problem, he’s the problem, we’re the problem’, or, ‘We’ll work together and come up with some solutions and play better football’. That’s really where we are as a team. I don’t think it’s very complicated.”

"It does indeed start with the head coach and this is something that has become more or less an exercise of repeating as Philbin said the same thing after the Dolphins fell apart last year. He needs to say that to Stephen Ross."

(How do you account for a game like this – a home opener, all of the excitement about it – it just seemed, from the opening kick that it just didn’t seem like they were competing out there. Buffalo made it look very easy, all the way down the field.) – “Like I said, they made a lot of plays in the first half. They jumped out to a lead, we had some opportunities, I think, to gain some momentum going in before halftime, to close the gap a little bit. Obviously we had a pick six and we had a field goal right before half. They came out in the second half and scored right away. We obviously didn’t perform well.”

"Not only did they not show any opportunities on the field, the biggest lesson I have seen now two weeks in a row is opposing teams will challenge the Dolphins defense at the end of the half with less than a minute to go and get points. The Dolphins under Philbin would never risk trying to add points with a lead at the end of the half."

(How do you get this turned around? The missed tackles, penalties, mistakes?) – “Well, really, I think we had two penalties in the first half. We were down 27-0 in the first half – obviously we’d love to have zero penalties. I’m not saying I don’t think the penalties are the issue in the first half, necessarily. We’ve got to play better in all phases of the game. Fundamentally we’ve got to play better, we do have to tackle better. Offensively we have to take care of the football better. This is not one side of the ball. I think it clearly was evident that both sides didn’t perform well.”

"So first half penalties had nothing to do with the score at half-time. Two penalties didn’t cost the Dolphins a 27-0 deficit."

(Obviously you had to make a lot of improvement defensively the way last season ended. You sign DT Ndamukong Suh and yet it seems like your defense is either where it was last year or maybe even worse. What do you attribute this to?) – “It’s the third game of the season. I wish we were playing better, but we are what we are right now. I’m going to take a look at the tape and look at everything we’re doing and make decisions that can help us become better quicker. There’s no magic potion. If there was a magic potion I would have brought it out earlier. Going into the game, we were fifth in the NFL in scoring defense. Obviously we’re not going to be that coming out of the game. We didn’t play very well on defense today whatsoever and we’re have to do better.”

"What he will see on tape is the same thing he saw on tape after week one and week two. He shouldn’t need to watch the tape to know that Kevin Coyle’s defense is horrible. The fact he is going to make decisions is scary in and of itself."

(With the pressure that QB Ryan Tannehill was getting up the middle, especially in the first half, did you consider rolling him out any before you got to the second half? I saw you made a little bit of an adjustment at the half.) – “We did a little bit. I didn’t think our protection was terrible in the first half. It wasn’t great.”

"He will see after watching the tape that pass protection wasn’t horrible on the first two series. It was after that. Ryan Tannehill’s uniform was dirtier than the offensive linemen’s."

(Did you hear fans booing at different points in the game and what did you think of it?) – “I can understand. I’m not in a position where I can do that, but I could see their point.”

"If he can point out the loud noise from Dolphins fans at away games, he can surely acknowledge that the fans were NOT happy with what they saw on Sunday."

(You’ve got the Jets next week and then another big game, it’s become a much more tough situation. How do you rebound from this, with the loss and everything that goes along with it?) – “They have to travel across the ocean like we do. We’ve got to have a great week of preparation. It’s real simple – we’re either going to stick together or not. We’ll see what kind of a team we have. I don’t think it’s much more complicated than that. We’ve got good players, we’ve got a good staff, but we haven’t demonstrated that, certainly well enough in these first three football games for anyone’s satisfaction. We’re going to find out.”

"So traveling across the ocean evens the playing field?"

(The Bills do an excellent job of disguising their blitzes and where the extra man is coming from. At any time did you have difficulty in figuring out where the extra man might be coming from?) – “Not a lot. Not a lot, I didn’t think. Again, I’ll watch the tape, but there wasn’t a ton of that. They did do a good job, they have a good blitz package, no doubt about it.”

"Pressure came from everywhere and the Bills didn’t need a blitz package because the Dolphins couldn’t block one on one up front."

(Ryan Tannehill with the three interceptions – what did you think about his performance?) – “It’s all right. I don’t think anything really stood out as a team. It wasn’t a good performance by the team. I’m sure some individuals played well. I don’t want to douse everybody with the same bucket there, but it just wasn’t clean, it wasn’t efficient, it wasn’t productive, it was a tough afternoon.”

(How immensely wearing is it on the guys to game after game to fall behind and have to try to dig out of a hole?) – “Well, you know … It’s not easy, but as I said at halftime, this is the hole that we’re in. We don’t really have anyone to blame. We can’t put blame on other people. I’m the head coach. We have a coaching staff. We have players. We go out there. We put a plan together, in place, that we think has a chance to be successful. We’ve got to go execute it. Obviously that didn’t happen. You come in 27-0 at half … but there’s nobody to blame. Again, I don’t believe in the finger pointing aspects.”

"Whoever put that game plan in place should be fired."

(They came out and threw five straight passes to start the game, which Rex Ryan probably hasn’t done in his career. Was that a surprise?) – “They ran a lot of those nakeds and boots and movement passes with obviously the quarterback that they have. They obviously had a lot of success. We didn’t tackle very well that first drive. It was a well-designed opening drive without a doubt.”

"So Miami has one of the best mobile quarterbacks in the NFL and a QB who throws so much better while moving and the coaching staff didn’t design a scheme for the game to take pressure off of the QB while Buffalo did? You noticed that in the 2nd half, Tyrod Taylor stopped rolling out."

(The touchdown over the top to BUF WR Chris Hogan, at the end of it MIA CB Jamar Taylor is looking at MIA S Walt Aikens like what are you doing and Aikens is looking back at Jamar Taylor like what are you doing … whose fault is it?) – “There was miscommunication. Obviously. There was miscommunication. There was miscommunication on the play. That’s what he saw.”

(DT Jordan Phillips, your second round pick, was inactive today. Was that injury related or performance related?) – “We went with the 46 guys we thought would give us the best chance to win.”

"Well how did that work for you? He is your 2nd round pick and there is no reason for him not be active and playing."

(As far as Walt Aikens and S Michael Thomas, Michael Thomas started. Is he the starter?) – “It was based on packages. It was based on their personnel. We knew we were going to play both guys based on who was in the game for Buffalo. That’s really what we did. We kind of mixed and matched, so to speak.”

(And then CB Brice McCain at the end, it appeared that he got replaced by Jamar Taylor.) – “We rotated guys in the second half. Obviously we weren’t covering as well as we liked, so we rotated some guys in.”

"No you didn’t rotate McCain and Taylor, McCain was lost on the edge and has been since week one. He is a slot coverage corner and the team is using him out of position."

(How do you assess the team’s performance just from the standpoint of the effort level, the enthusiasm, all of that.) – “I thought the effort levels been very good. Until this game, obviously. It didn’t match the first two games, but there’s no dogging it on the film. There’s none of that. We’ll see. We’ll take a look at the tape and see what happened today. From that aspect I have no complaints. Obviously we have to be more productive, that’s clear.”

"This team plays with as much emotion as Philbin has displayed since his arrival in Miami. That’s why he sees no difference."

(You spoke a few minutes ago about the type of quarterback that Buffalo has and his ability to run the naked and those kinds of things. Were you surprised at how easily he could get the corner, that he could get the edge?) – “He got the edge. He got the edge nicely a couple of times. Again, you have to give them credit. They had a good scheme, they executed it well. He did get on the perimeter a little bit and made some throws. Early in the game he took advantage of our over-pursuit a little bit.”

(Your defense seemed so dominant in training camp and preseason … any explanation for the drop-off in the first few games?) – “We have to do better. Again, preseason, I want to say they maybe played 40 plays, maybe 35 plays in three games give or take a few. It’s hard to make concrete evaluations or conclusions on 40 plays. Certainly we were expecting to perform better. We’d better, quickly.”

"NO it’s not. John Offerdahl, who I interviewed a few weeks back with our On The FinSide team said that any coach who needs pre-season to evaluate his players is the wrong head coach. The Dolphins need to start evaluating players in training camp and use the games to get acclimated to the start of the season. Not evaluation of the talent."