Los Angeles Rams Transcripts - Head Coach Sean McVay - Monday, November 20, 2023

Los Angeles Rams Transcripts - Head Coach
Sean McVay - Monday, November 20, 2023

Head Coach Sean McVay

(On WR Cooper Kupp’s injury status)

“Yeah, it'll be day-to-day. It was just a lateral ankle sprain so that was positive
news for us.”

(On if he expects Kupp to play this week)

“Not sure. I think that's the goal. I know he’s going to do everything in his
power, but I think it's definitely favorable where that's a real possibility that he
would be available. It's not something where you're saying he’s definitely going
to be out for this week, but you want to see the functionality. I know that his
mindset was encouraged based on how it felt today, based on some of the
results of what the scans and different things like that showed, and then his
willingness to attack this and put himself in a position to be available for the
team if so.”

(On why the defensive captains received the game ball)

“I thought the defense was outstanding overall. I really think with those guys,
the whole defense, the defensive coaching staff, I thought they kept us in the
fight. Thought their play throughout the course of the game… and I thought
Seattle did some really good things offensively where they take the opening
drive down. I thought a couple of our key red zone stops to keep it to 13 points.
Then another one to be able to just enable them to only get to 16. Stop after
stop. Big play after big play. Just staying the course when offensively our guys
just weren't having some of the success and the continuity and consistency in
terms of moving the ball or coming away with points because they had a drive
offensively where they go down the field, don't end up coming away with any
points when we missed on the fourth down conversion. I was just really proud
of the overall effort. I thought the way that the game was played, so many guys
that had a jersey got on the field and contributed and it was a true team effort.
Our defensive group, they did an outstanding job. That was why those guys got
the game balls.”

(On how he’s seen the defense grow throughout the season)

“I think there's been a lot of examples. I think you're getting young players that
are accumulating experience. I think yesterday was a great reflection of getting
some guys back. I mentioned (L Ernest Jones. I thought (NT) Bobby Brown
made his presence felt. You saw some guys get more snaps than what they
had been in previous outings and thought they played really well. The (D
John Johnsons of the world, the (D Quentin Lakes. I thought (D Derion
Kendrick had his best game doing a great job in a lot of challenging situations. I
think that yesterday was a really good step in the right direction for a lot of
different reasons and now we want to see if we can continue to build on that.”

(On if RB Kyren Williams will be returning this week and what that will
bring to the offense)

“Yes, he'll be back. It'll be great to be able to get him back, his productivity, his
play energy, his overall just presence. He's a guy that we've missed. I think a
lot of guys have done a good job stepping up in his absence. Thought (R
Royce Freeman did an especially good job down the stretch being able to really
convert and create on some hard, tough runs that kept drives alive and ran
some clock off. It'll be great to be able to continue to see those guys develop
but get Kyren back into the mix and do his thing and hopefully pick up where he
left off against Arizona.”

(On having to game plan around Kupp’s injuries this season and last
season)

“Well, I think the first thing is you feel for Cooper. Nobody wants to be out there
as much as he does. It's been unfortunate things that have led to him not being
available. Whether it was injuries last year, he didn't want to get rolled up on a
toss crack play where he is doing a great job blocking a defensive end. Had
some setbacks and so feel for him first and foremost. When he's out there we
all know what a unique and special player that he is. He brings a great
presence to our offense, but we've got to be able to continue to adapt and
adjust. I think that's part of our challenge as a coaching staff. I thought (WR)
Austin Trammell did a really good job of stepping up in his absence and
immediately stepping in. (WR Ben Skowronek) ‘Benny Sko’ took some of those
reps. It was good to see (WR) Demarcus Robinson be able to make a play and
contribute in a variety of ways in addition to (WR) Puka (Nacua) and (WR) Tutu
(Atwell) playing a lot of snaps. It's never fun to see a guy like him that means so
much to us go down or not be available, but it has been cool to be able to see
the responses from a lot of guys that have stepped up. Austin Trammell
immediately making a couple catches right off the jump and thought he did a
good job when he was a part of the blocking surface. We've just got to be able
to adjust. If there's anything that I especially learned last year, we were really
fortunate my first few years of staying relatively healthy and didn't have to
navigate through a lot of the inevitable challenges that occur pretty frequently in
this league. I think the worst part is when you see guys get injured with the
amount of work that they put in and how much they want to be available for
their teammates and be able to contribute to positive outcomes. But when it
does go down in an unfortunate manner, hey, how quickly are we really training
the depth of the roster? How quickly are guys ready to step up and try to allow
us to operate as seemingly as possible in the absence of some really good
players?”

(On if this is the same ankle Kupp had surgery on)

“It's his right ankle. You would probably honestly know better. I'm not a hundred
percent certain on that.”

(On clarification if it’s his right ankle)

“It is, yes.”

(On what empty sets tell the receivers and quarterback)

“We could talk about that for a while. I think it depends on what type of
formation that you're in and certain alignments that help kind of give you certain
information. The main thing that I think empty formations enable you to be able
to do is activate all five eligibles immediately. Then there's certain empties that
teams will look at where you get into chip looks where maybe your non-vertical
threats and people don't necessarily treat them as empty, or they have certain
adjustments that they can activate. You do eliminate in a lot of instances the
threat of running the football so it becomes a little bit more regulated in that
fashion. But the different varieties of the way that you can distribute the field
increases and the way that you can activate all of your eligibles. Coverages and
defensive coaches are doing a such a good job the last handful of years, and
really just in general, but I think it's especially prevalent over the last couple
years of being able to overlap, change the math. When you are forcing people
to defend all five of your eligibles immediately and you show that you'll activate
them, it disperses the coverage in a manner that can be sometimes favorable
for yourself. There's also tools and different things that defenses can present
where you can put it back in their favor or they can grab the pen back from you.
These are things that we talk about a lot. For us, you do give yourself the
obvious option of it's a known pass. Whereas you see some teams with these
guys, you still have the legitimate option of maybe some of the quarterback
draws or different things that can really put pressure on people like what you've
seen (Philadelphia Eagles) Philly and things like that do. It's been something
that's been favorable for us, but there's always pros and cons to both ends.”

(On if it’s helpful to have a quarterback that can dictate coverages into
something clearer)

“It depends on the scheme. I would say this, depending upon their philosophical
approach, some defenses enable you to gather more information than others.
Are they a zone aligned? Are they a man aligned type of team? There's a lot of
different tools that they can activate where they can change it back into your
favor based on understanding, all right, how many are you protecting with? And
what are the different ways that you want to be able to distribute the field? You
look at it, going back to ‘21, we had an unbelievable amount of success getting
into empty. But it's like anything else, you look at us and I want to believe
Cincinnati had an incredibly high rate of success in empty and that's always a
part of the offense that you look at now. How much you actually activate is
predicated on all right, how does it fit for us, number one, and then what are the
different things that we're anticipating and expecting to try to try to be able to
get out of that. What's the intent of the call and the intent of getting into those
things? And at what point are you talking early downs? Are you talking in
known passing situations when you want to actually get into those formations? I
know you know this. There are just so many layers to it. I don't know that I'd
really be saying anything that would give away too much, but I'm always a little
reluctant to kind of dive into too much philosophical stuff relative to what people
can hear whether it be, hey, you're not saying anything that I don't know or not,
I'm always just a little bit more careful in those types of settings and I think you
understand that.”

(On the success rate being lower than what it usually is in empty sets)

“I think probably a lot of the ones that you're talking about for us are in like third
and super long where you get double chips that it's taken off as empty, but I
don't really consider that empty. That's a different form of empty for us. But if
you look at like against Philly, we had a lot of success going in empty where
you're truly in five wides. But I think the empty that I think analytics would go in
depth about, it all is in the same bucket, which I get it. But empty when you're in
double chip presence and empty when you're an actual five wide that's a very
different narrative and there's very different times. But our empty, like
yesterday, we would add a lot of empties. Those were mostly in third down and
fifteens, second and super longs, and we were the (explicit) on those. And I
believe that that's not going to be very good and there's a lot of reasons to that.
Some of which I know I can do a better job of, we can do an overall better job
of. But I think when we were activating a lot of what would be broken down as
empty, those are in situations that percentagewise aren't successful downs
across the league just in general. Instead of just saying, alright, this is their ,
empty success just as kind of one part.”

(On the decision to have DB John Johnson play a lot of the snaps that DB
Russ Yeast was getting early in the season)

“I think John had earned the right to be able to get on the grass. He had done a
good job. He’s a guy that we had a lot of confidence in. I think there was a
timetable that it took, maybe a little bit longer, to get himself back into the shape
or feeling good, and some of the different things that are in alignment with the
JJ that we know. I thought he did a really good job yesterday and then I thought
Russ capitalized on the snaps that he did play and some crucial known passing
situations for us.”

(On injuries coming out of the game and an update on DB Cobie Durant)

“Cobie’s doing good. He's making good progress. (WR) Puka (Nacua) had his
shoulder banged up a little bit on the one PI (pass interference) that he drew.
He'll be day to day. (OL) Coleman Shelton just got his ankle banged up a little
bit but he should be good, but he'll be day to day. (WR) Ben Skowronek got a
hip pointer. (D Quentin Lake had some soreness in his hamstring, so we'll
see where he's at when we come back on Wednesday. And then everybody
else, just your typical bumps and bruises and hopefully we'll get Cobie Durant
back this week.

(On DT Aaron Donald’s imprint on the game)

“It was huge. He dictates a lot of attention as always. Obviously came clean on
that inside move when we ended up bringing him and (OL Ochaun (Mathis)
and Quentin Lake and was able to put a lot of pressure on (Seahawks Q
Geno (Smith). It might not always show up on the stat sheet, but the way that
he affects and influences every single game with his effort. Thought the red
area stop that he had on second down to be able to knock (Seahawks R
(Zach) Charbonnet out of bounds for a negative was big. Just his leadership,
his consistent work ethic, his consistent game day demeanor, and then the
production, it's all a huge part of it. (Reporter) Sarah asked me at the beginning
of this, why did the defensive captains get the game ball? I think that was such
a good reflection of the player-led leadership by the Aaron’s, by the (L
Ernest’s (Jones), by the (D Jordan Fuller’s in addition to all the other guys
that stepped up. But he had a huge impact on yesterday and he's going to
continue to do that in a variety of ways. And he's having a lot of fun. I know this
team is at their best when they're enjoying playing. They're bringing that type of
energy that we want to be able to see and I thought that was on display
throughout the course of the day. And really the defense and Aaron's
leadership is what kind of kept us in the fight and allowed us to be able to
capitalize when those opportunities presented as a team.”

(On the strides the defense has made since Week 1)

“They've made a lot of strides. I think there's been some really good things. I
think the younger players have gotten a lot better, especially the ones that are
accumulating all that experience and using it for the right reasons. And then I
also think the bye came at a good time. I thought we got some healthy bodies
back for some key contributors. I thought the defensive staff did a phenomenal
job of being able to utilize all the guys that had a jersey where we got some
different personnel groupings, guys all have roles. They're owning their roles
and I think that enables us to be able to stay fresher throughout the course of a
game. I thought that was why yesterday was definitely one of our better
performances as a defense. They were outstanding and it's definitely
something that we want to be able to build on this last half of the season.”

--RAMS--

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#HelmetHornsMatter

“Well, the color is good, I like the metallic blue,” Youngblood recently said while laughing, via NFL Journal. “The horn is terrible. It looks like a ‘C.’ When I first saw it on the logo I honestly thought it was a Charger logo.

“Now when I see it on the helmet, it just isn’t a ram horn. There is no distinct curl like a mature ram horn. I don’t know how the Rams could get that wrong. That is your symbol and it has been for what? Seventy years or more? Longer than I have been alive? It’s just not us, it’s not the Rams.”---Mr. Ram Jack Youngblood