Shurmur press conf. transcript

CLEVELAND BROWNS COACH PAT SHURMUR

(Opening statement)- “No injuries of note, which is good because we came into this thing a little bit banged up, but for the most part the guys pulled through it. I’d have to credit, we were real thin up front, defensive line-wise. We dressed a couple guys that were only going to play in emergency situations and we had other guys fill in in nickel situations, so we were thin in some areas. That’s just the way it works. I told the team they played hard from the first snap until the last and you have to play hard, you have to be productive and you’ve got to take care of the basics. We didn’t take care of the basics at the end. You fumble, give them points and then you’re set up to get points, you don’t get points and this is the result. That’s the reality of it.”

(On what happened on the snap during the missed field goal)- “We’re going to have to look at it on tape. My understanding is the snap hit Alex Mack in the leg, that’s my understanding. The ball got down extremely late and it fouled up the rhythm of the kick and then he didn’t make it. That’s my understanding in talking to the guys that were involved.”

(On if he considered going for a touchdown while in the red zone)- “We were in a position to score points. Our defense was playing extremely well and I wanted to make sure that we were going to get an opportunity to kick a field and go ahead, so that’s what I chose to do.”

(On the handoff to Alex Smith)- “He knew he was getting the football, we needed to execute it.”

(On Smith he ever got the handoff)- “We’re going to have to see. We fell on it. We were in position to score we just have to execute.”

(On what’s going through his mind knowing Phil Dawson has been perfect all year)- “I’m disappointed we lost and I think everybody in there is. We go down by a point and then we find a way to get the ball down the field. Our defense had been stingy all day and I made the decision that we were going to try and do what we could to get points there, go ahead and play it from there. It hasn’t sunk in enough to go through my head yet, I’ve got a thick head.”

(On the decision to use the Wildcat and play Seneca Wallace)- “Just trying to do everything that we can to win the game and some of those things worked. I obviously had an idea of how their defense would respond to certain things and I felt that some of those things would work. The last few weeks with some of the teams we were playing, that stuff doesn’t have great effect on them because of the way they line up on defense. We just tried to use everything we could to try to move the football and I think Obi (Chris Ogbonnaya) had a good day, he ran the ball pretty effectively. We tried to run the ball with (Joshua) Cribbs, (Colt) McCoy, (Thomas) Clayton and (Greg) Little. We tried to spread it around and do what we can to move the football. I thought for the most part Colt executed efficiently, played hard and we fell short.”

(On how big Cribbs’ fumble was on the punt return)- “We gave them points and I think that you can’t do that in a game that’s close to the vest. The defense did a good job of going in and making sure it wasn’t seven.”

(On his thought process of handing the ball to Smith)- “We tried to hand him the football and he dropped it, that’s the thinking. For the moment that it was in there, that’s what happened and we’ve got to do a better job. There are so many things that happened in that game. Missing the kick, dropping the (ball), there were a lot of things. There was a lot of good, there was a lot of bad. I promised everybody that I would be genuine from day one till the last day and I’m genuine right now in saying that. We can focus on what we want to focus on, but we lost the game. That’s genuine.”

(On if he expected St. Louis to call a timeout before the field goal)- “Yes, I would have done the same thing. They’re anticipating that we’re going to get points so what they needed to do was preserve time, much like we did before the half. As the rules go, you try to preserve time so that when you get the ball you have as much time as you can. That didn’t surprise me.”

(On if they have to be creative on offense in order to compete)- “No, I think we did some creative things. I think we’ve done some creative things all the way through. It seems like the ceiling or the floor on creativity is Wildcat. We’ve done creative things all the way through, that just happened to be something we did.”

(On if he thought about throwing into the end zone before the field goal attempt)- “I wanted to make sure we got points. I considered a lot of things.”

(On if this was McCoy’s best all around game thus far)- “I want to look at it, but I think he generally was pretty efficient in making sure we did the right things. We had other guys that made some plays, but I thought he executed pretty well.”

(On if he was worried that McCoy would throw an interception if they threw on third down)- “No, I trust every player out there. I wasn’t worried about anybody’s ability to execute any set called play. But, what I did know is that you have less things that could go wrong, possibly. I didn’t want a sack and I know the way the Rams would respond in that situation. I felt like running the ball was the right thing to do.”

(On if Alex Mack has always been on the field goal team)- “Yes, he’s been out there.”