News

Browns Head Coach Pat Shurmur press conference 8-13-11

(Opening statement)- “Before I get started let me just talk about injuries.  Fortunately, there’s not much to talk about.  Coye Francies has a lower back (injury), but he’s day-to-day.  Carlton Mitchell wasn’t in there.  He had surgery on his finger and he’ll be out a couple of weeks.  Eric Hagg will have surgery Monday on a minor knee deal.  Those two guys didn’t compete and then you had the other list of guys that weren’t in the game.  It was fun.  It’s fun to play the game.  I told the players before the game that playing games is what coaches and players do.  All through camp they’ve kind of responded and worked hard.  There were some good things that happened in the game.  We tried to set a record with our first play called ‘time out’.  It’s just an indication that there’s some communication that needs to be worked out as we move forward, but I thought the effort was good.  There were some guys that showed up that we expected to show up and make plays.  There were some others guys that flashed and did well for themselves.  There were a lot of game situations in there that we had a chance to work through.  From a two-minute drill at the end of the half where we were just trying to work the ball down the field to a four-minute drill at the end; we had some clock management situations to work through.  We had a challenge.  In the preseason you’re working through all those mechanics.  I thought there was good communication amongst the coaches.  I thought the players played hard.  I talked to them about when bad plays happen in the game that you have to overcome them and play on.  We turned the ball over a couple of times, which the defense stopped.  There’s something to build on there, but we have a long way to go.  There were some flashes of things there that I think we can build on.  The players come back to work on Monday and we will get back to the business of training camp for a couple of days and then start to prepare for Detroit.  All in all, it was a night where we got to see some things from our players.  As coaches, we got a chance to communicate and I’ve got a long list of things that we’ll end up working on and talking about.  It’s nice to see these players have success.”

(On where he thought they would be this first preseason game)- “I didn’t know where we would be Week 1.  For the first unit to go down there and score and then the defense to battle in there the same way, I thought that was good.  It was good to see Colt (McCoy) to go in there and execute pretty efficiently.  It looked like to me the game was moving pretty slow for him, which is good.  He didn’t have any real mistakes to speak of other than the first throw, which was inaccuracy.  I think if he could have it back he would have taken off and run with it.”

(On Colt’s performance tonight compared to practices)- “He’s had some good practices.  Again, I’m basing it on some of the first practices when we came together for the first time.  He’s shown some of the things in practice that he did today. Colt’s a little bit of a gamer, so this situation when he’s playing in a game, in my opinion, is right up his alley. ”

(On the new offensive system allowing receivers to get open compared to situations in the past.)- “I don’t know.  I don’t want to compare to last year. Again, I don’t know what they were being taught although I watched the tape.  It’s hard.  I do know this: we had some guys in there today that were working hard to get open.  We had a chance to play against man coverage, which is really good.  We found a way, for the most part, to be somewhat efficient throwing it.  Credit to the players and I’d like to think the system has a little bit to do with it, but the players do the business.  ”

(On what the first game was like for him)- “It was very exciting.  Needless to say, I thought I could get a lot of sleep last night and I did get a decent night’s sleep.  Any first is exciting and to be a head coach in the NFL is very exciting.  I learned from Andy Reid a long time ago, it’s hard to win in this league.  Even though this one doesn’t really go in the record books as a regular season victory, that feeling that you get when you win a game is something we all long for and try to search out.  That part feels good.  When I watch the game operation and watch the players compete and somebody that’s teaching young men, to see them respond to some of the things we’ve been talking about.  I thought it was good.”

(On Titus Brown)- “No I saw him.  He ran really fast with the ball in his hands.  Now I have to listen to all the noise about him playing offense (joking).  No, but that was a great play.  Really when you look at things statistically, it’s an even game except for that play and then you end up winning at least by a touchdown.  Those are the types of things that you need to do.  You need to score on defense, you need to score on special teams and we found a way to do it.  He is a fun guy to be around.  You all know him, but life is fun for him and he works very hard and he is a big, physical linebacker.  I was kind of watching because if he would have got tracked down, it would have been worse. Then his buddies would’ve got on him pretty good.”

(On if McCoy made all the reads he had to make)- “I thought so.  The first play sticks out.  Just like your first play he pushed up in the pocket and he came to the sideline and he tried to flip it over to Owen (Marecic).  My first response was, ‘Oh geez, that’s backwards.’  I didn’t want to make it too obvious, but he came right back and said, ‘Coach, I should of just ran with it.’  He knows what he’s looking at.  As we get more and more comfortable with one another, as he gets more and more comfortable with his players and the system, I hope he will progress next week.”

(On if McCoy exceeded his expectations)- “Well, he let us on two scoring drives.  That is the mark of a good quarterback: getting your team in the end zone.  I don’t know if that exceeded it, but I think that’s a real good start.”

(On balancing the offense)- “Well, we are in training camp mode, but it’s just so happens that we play four games.  Those days in training camp that are hot and you are in pads, if you don’t do them now you never get them back.  The idea for the players now is to come back and correct this game and we get back to the business of getting the Browns better.  We will spend two or three days here, Browns vs. Browns, working on the fundamentals.  As I mentioned when we get near the end of the week, we will start working on the Detroit Lions.”

(On Josh Cribbs being developed in the offense)- “I think Josh is a playmaker.  Our hopes are that he is going to have an opportunity to return some kicks, then we are lining him up at receiver and we are going to do what we can offensively to give him the football.  Most of the time, you throw it to the receivers.  I don’t want to sound trite, but I thought he did a good job getting open.  He is very strong to the ball, he catches the ball well and he finds ways to get yards after the catch.  I am really happy with his progress in what we are doing as well.”

(On if Carlton Mitchell could end up on injured reserve)- “I think that is way too early to know.  The injuries we are talking about with them, although they are surgeries, we anticipate them coming quickly.”

(On if he had butterflies before the game)- “I don’t really get butterflies.  I don’t know what I get, but they are not butterflies.”