Monday, Sept. 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee Titans
Miami Dolphins WR Jaylen Waddle
(Is there a sense of frustration? How do you not let this game affect the next one confidence wise?) – “It’s definitely frustrating. We definitely are better than what we’re showing out there on game day. We ultimately go out for the game day, so to not have the success that we put in the work for every week is definitely frustrating. Man, wins and losses, 24-hour rule – it’s obviously a short week, get back to it.”
(We know how key QB Tua Tagovailoa is to this offense, but how do you guys get it going without him, whether it’s QB Skylar Thompon or QB Tyler Huntley or whomever?) – “Like I said, playmakers got to be playmakers. We’ve got to be better than good. When your starting quarterback is out, you have to be extra open to clear it up for the quarterback. He’s new here, and we just got to go out there and make plays for him.”
(You’ve probably never been through a stretch like this in your career, so how do you get past it?) – “Man, 24-hour rule. We back to work, it’s a short week. We got a division opponent this week, a really good team in New England. Good thing about this league is that you can go out there and get another shot at it next week.”
Monday, Sept. 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee
Miami Dolphins S Jevon Holland
(It’s obviously very early in the season, but 1-3 is not a great place for a team to be in. How do you get back on track and get this train headed in the right direction?) – “You really just got to stick together, kind of just revert back to all your fundamentals. That’s what it is really about. Whatever is happening now or happening the week before, you just have to let it go and move on to the next week. You have to have a clear conscience and have an open conversation just about what needs to change or what needs to happen. Have a real conversation with each other and move on.”
(What was Head Coach Mike McDaniel’s message to you guys after the game?) – “Exactly that, what I just said, stick together. We’ve got to be honest with each other and people have to take accountability and step up and that’s basically it.”
(What did you learn from the 2021 season that can help you this time around?) – “Really, what I just said, just sticking together, honestly. That was like a main message was stick together, trust that it’s going to turn around at some point, and we’re just kind of in this slump. That was the emphasis, that the defense should give the ball back to the offense. The offense, however many times that you get the ball, just keep on trying to score, keep on trying to get first downs, keep on trying to have successful plays, playing together, trusting each other and trusting the process.”
Monday, Sept. 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee Titans
Miami Dolphins LB Emmanuel Ogbah
(How do you guys, everyone is talking about accountability and putting in the work, what is the going to be the mindset when you guys get back and prepare for New England?) – “Just go back and watch film. See what we messed up on, what we have to improve on. It has to be a group effort, no pointing fingers. There is still a long season ahead of us. You have to be willing to come in and work and push ourselves.”
(Did you see what happened to LB Jaelan Phillips on that play? What was the reaction knowing how much hard work he has put in to put back?) – “No, I didn’t see it, I am praying for Jaelan. That’s my dawg. He’s like my little brother and I am just praying for him and hopefully everything is good with him. I know how hard he fought to come back from the Achilles. My heart goes out to him.”
(Feel like you’ve got the guys in the locker room, the talent to make this thing work.) – “We’ve got the talent, but we’ve got to put in the work. We cannot keep losing. I am tired of (expletive) losing.”
Monday, September 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee
Miami Dolphins FB Alec Ingold
(Is it not really fair to judge the offense and judge the team while the starting quarterback is out?) – “It’s a performance-based industry. I think every man here has a job we have to execute. The quarterback is obviously a very important piece of that puzzle, but we need 10 other guys to be performing and executing. It’s a performance-based business that we’re all a part of, so I think it’s more than fair and I think that’s where you know we’re doing the same thing internally. And to shy away from that because you’re not getting the results I think is weak-minded and I think we have to we have to attack that; we have to lean into this uncomfortable moment to see what type of team we are and what type of human beings we are.”
(How tough is it going to be to get out of a funk like this?) – “It’s just the work, man. It’s just the work, and I think to have the courage to continue to go all in, to continue to chop wood, carry water, to continue to persevere, to continue to have the courage to be your best self, to put yourself out there, it’s hard, man. It is, but I mean, that’s why it’s the NFL, that’s why you have the guys here, that’s why you’ve had success in the past. So I think that’s where we need to get back to and it starts with working; we all have to have supreme accountability of what we just did.”
(Was it a decent week of work and practice leading into this?) – “I don’t think any single person would have expected this outcome based on the week of work. Obviously it wasn’t good enough and that’s something that we need to go back to and all ask ourselves how much more can we give to one another?”
Monday, Sept. 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee Titans
Miami Dolphins DT Calais Campbell
(On today’s game) – “We didn’t do a good enough job. It is what it is. We put a lot of effort into it, but we’ve got to do better. This is a result-oriented business. We didn’t do a good enough job.”
(On if he’s experienced something like this in his career) – “Seventeen years, I’ve seen it all. This isn’t anything new. It isn’t going to be anybody but us together getting out of it. It is what it is. It’s football. We’ve lost one – we’ve lost three in a row. We’re not a good football team right now and we need to be better. But the good thing is we have a lot of football in front of us and it comes down to the work. I told the guys after the game, it’s going to be the work that gets us out of this. Look yourself in the mirror, all of us have to look ourselves in the mirror – coaches, everybody – and ask what we can do to be better, what we need to do to win a ball game. Everybody individually needs to figure out what we can do individually to win a ball game. It’s football. It’s one game at a time, one play at a time, one practice at a time. Whatever it takes to win a ball game.”
(What was the message from Head Coach Mike McDaniel after the game?) – “The same thing. It is work. We’re going to get back to work. It’s a short week. We’ve got to go play a division opponent and win a ball game. He says all the right things. It is what it is, but it’s execution. This is a results-oriented business and we’ve got to get it done as players.”
Monday, September 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee
Dolphins Head Coach Mike McDaniel
Q. Where do you start with how the offense just couldn’t get anything going? It seemed like the whole entire night. What was the main issue as you look at the way the game transpired?
MIKE McDANIEL: I have to look at the tape. There was a tremendous disconnect between preparation and execution. So there was a multitude of contributors to it, I believe, but I have to check the tape out. Bottom line is it doesn’t matter what we’re doing behind the scenes. On the field that’s not even close to good enough, so you just have to go back to the drawing board and assess very critically.
Q. How would you assess on Tyler Huntley’s performance?
MIKE McDANIEL: I thought he did some good things. There’s some stuff as a competitor he wanted to have back. Had a couple of ops and there was a throw down the sidelines to Tyreek. There was just a couple of ops, but overall I thought he did a good job. I didn’t think that his teammates around him at times were doing what we needed them to do in a game like that. I thought he had a lot on his plate. I thought he was a competitor all the way through.
Q. Do you need significant changes to your offense, do you think?
MIKE McDANIEL: Yeah, everything is on the table. You can’t argue the offense is good or – to me in a situation like this, I hadn’t really been in one where we haven’t had production consecutively like this so you really have to open your mind to really all things.
Q. Can you talk about LB Jaelan Phillips’ injury?
MIKE McDANIEL: I don’t know much. I know he had a brace, but beyond that I’m going to have to find out more tomorrow.
Q. Was the playbook I guess fully allotted for QB Tyler Huntley tonight, or was there some sort of — was it like an abbreviated version of it for him?
MIKE McDANIEL: There were calculated decisions made based on what he was comfortable with from the previous game plan that he was a part of for Seattle and then some stuff that he had done in his career. So it was abbreviated to an extent and all things he was pretty comfortable with. We were able to rep everything that we ran in practice.
Q. Despite the current results, are there any positive takeaways that you can take away from today’s game leading up to the division matchup next week?
MIKE McDANIEL: I thought the defense will probably have one play that they’re not pumped about, but outside of that, I thought it was a step in the right direction. I thought Braxton had a chance to change the momentum of the game. And I think the game could have been a different ball game had we not had that early turnover on the lateral pass. So there was some stuff. I thought there was a couple of plays here or there, but ultimately there’s nothing good about this situation right now in terms of where our team needs to be, and we need to do enough to win a football game against any opponent and right now that’s not the case. We have to fix that fast.
Q. You’ve been very open that you are huge on player empowerment, that you let the locker room run the locker room. Do you think you might need to have more of an assertive role then?
MIKE McDANIEL: I think we have to assess everything, but I hesitate to overcook before I watch the film and kind of marinate on this whole situation, but there will be things that will change. It’s kind of hard to say exactly what those things are, but we’re definitely in need of it.
Q. With regard to the changing quarterbacks, how do you explain an offense that has WR Tyreek Hill and WR Jaylen Waddle, RB De’Von Achane, and so on just being unable to move the ball?
MIKE McDANIEL: Yeah, I think there’s a story in the tape and all the things that we’re trying to do. They didn’t really do anything that surprised us. We felt like we could get those guys the ball in premium situations. We weren’t able to. So I don’t think – that’s not up to my standard at all. I know for a fact that I play a part in the whole thing, but it’s a collective issue for sure and we have to figure out how to score points and those guys can help us do that for sure.
Q. How do you guys address the formation, illegal shifts, procedural stuff that has been plaguing you for the past couple of weeks?
MIKE McDANIEL: Between the eyes, all the situations off the top of my head it’s one of the first things that I know that we can control. That guys aren’t getting set fast enough. So I have to take a look at the amount – you use motions and stuff to try to give players some advantageous situations, but if you have to pull back from that if you can’t execute them because there’s no play that works that doesn’t even get a chance to get started. The motioning part of our offense is something that our players have been good at in the past and have used it to create advantageous situations, but I mean, you just can’t keep doing the same thing. You have to fully adjust if guys can’t execute in the moment of truth.
Q. How concerned are you that four weeks in this has been going on it seems like weekly the same issues, that it could cause a problem that could snowball into more? What do you have to do to make sure those guys keep positive and try to move forward?
MIKE McDANIEL: Well, I think we’re really tested as individuals. We’re tested about a lot of things that we’ve said that we are individually and collectively as a group. It’s very, very challenging to have a situation like this. I don’t foresee this locker room quitting. I don’t see it as their nature. However, you have to give guys reasons to go above and beyond. I think you have to hold literally every person in the building accountable to what we see their jobs as and their purpose and what they’re doing for the team and what they’re not doing for the team. It’s hard conversations that are very, very necessary, and we’ll hit those between the eyes from a constructive standpoint. Bottom line is that there will be a list of things. I’m pretty sure I already know several of them, but there will be a list of things that you can tell the coaches and the players that if we don’t do this, this won’t change and then get those things to change. It’s already been too many weeks in a row so you just have to identify clearly exactly the direction you want to go. If you want to win, you have to do certain things, play sound football and clean football. Until we do that, we will be stuck in the same results.
Q. Late in the game the cameras caught Tyreek Hill visibly upset shouting at someone on the sideline. Can you give us an idea who he was talking to or what he was saying?
MIKE McDANIEL: No, I would expect him to be visibly upset at somebody. A lot of times guys can be yelling at – he’s a leader and he wanted to do everything that he could to make sure the result wasn’t that. Within the locker room there’s a lot of guys challenging each other and we get an opportunity to see what we’re made of for sure.
Q. Mike, what’s the challenge in I guess installing a new quarterback with little experience in your system versus actually just letting a guy get some reps and get comfortable?
MIKE McDANIEL: There’s pros and cons to really everything you do. I think, you know, yeah, there are challenges. I know what they are. I have a history of having to adjust for different players and different personnel. It’s just how much are the new guys getting better, where is the team’s conviction? We just need to be able to trot out a game plan that we are actually executing things from an offensive perspective. Each player gives us some advantages, some disadvantages in terms of how long they’ve been here versus what their skill sets are. Bottom line is I think you have to make some tough decision, but that’s what this league is about. That’s what my role is. It’s never void of adverse situations. This is as big of one that we’ve had to overcome since I’ve been here, and in those times you get to find out a lot about who you think people are and get to identify whether or not they’re the guys that you thought they were, including myself. So tough times bring out the best in people, if you have the right people. That’s what I’ll be expecting from everybody, and they’ll get a chance to prove me right or wrong.
Monday, September 30, 2024
Postgame – Tennessee
QB Tyler Huntley
Q. Can you put into words how difficult this offense is to gather and execute just two weeks into a stint with the team?
TYLER HUNTLEY: Yeah, you know, you wish you have 1,000 reps that you went through the playbook, but you know, it is what it is. I’m here. Just got to hone in on it more.
Q. How comfortable did you feel out there even less than two weeks after you got here?
TYLER HUNTLEY: I felt pretty good. I felt pretty comfortable. Just now I got to dig in deeper and just know the ins and outs of the offense, and it will take our offense to another level.
Q. Where do you feel like your level of chemistry is with the guys that you are throwing the ball to?
TYLER HUNTLEY: You know, they’re great receivers. I’m a pretty good quarterback, so I just got to hone into being on time with them and get more reps on it. That’s the only way we’re going to build is if we get more reps.
Q. You had an early chance to hit Tyreek Hill up the sideline. Is his speed surprising on to you? It seems like the throw was underthrown.
TYLER HUNTLEY: They just did — they had the quarter safety over top, but he took a peek in the inside, so I tried to rip it out there fast. It just ended up going behind him. So, yeah, I wanted that one back.
Q. Not the outcome you expected, but how was your Dolphins debut otherwise just to be here and just to play?
TYLER HUNTLEY: It was good just being back home. It’s a great environment, you know. I know it’s great when you winning, so hope to get on that train and we get it rolling.
Q. How much are you putting on your own shoulders to kind of get this team through until Tua can get back and keep you guys competitive?
TYLER HUNTLEY: We out here every week. So our goal is to go 1-0 on the week. That’s what we’re focusing on, and we got a good chance this week to come out and hit the field running and be ready to go get a win.
Q. It looked like that last — or the scoring drive you were a lot more willing to use your legs and actually run. Was that I guess part of the game plan for the first three quarters was trying to make things happen throughout the pocket? What happened on that drive that made you decide, Okay, I just need to take off?
TYLER HUNTLEY: Man, we felt the sense of urgency. Man, we’re just trying to make plays. At the end of the day we’re just trying to make plays. Took a little bit long, but hope that we just build off of what we did today.
Q. What was the number one thing holding this offense back today?
TYLER HUNTLEY: We killed ourselves on a lot of drives. They stopped us on a couple of drives, and then we had lots of penalties. We just got to be one as a team and fix that and lock in.
Q. You mentioned the penalties. What was going on those illegal shifts?
TYLER HUNTLEY: We just got two men moving at once. That’s going to get us every time.
Q. When you think about more so getting the no-huddle offense together, you kind of got it together at the end of the game, but how comfortable does it feel just getting from the start to the finish and then just getting more reps?
TYLER HUNTLEY: Yeah, like he said, the more reps, the better you will feel. You know what I mean? I think that it’s self-explanatory. More reps, the better I feel.
