00:04out of the bye week it's the lions head coach dan campbell dan good morning
00:09good morning how are you guys doing we're doing all right we're just glad lions football is going
00:13to be back it's i know for players coaches it's nice to have a little bit of a break but
00:17for fans we're itching we're left wanting more and i am curious what were the goals that you
00:24had for the bye week and do you believe you accomplished those goals excuse me yeah um
00:33i think a lot of it is is really looking at yourself you know which i mean we did a
00:38pretty
00:38pretty good job of over the last five games anyway early in the year you're you know you're evaluating
00:44your work and you're you're trying to get get through some things um and and really kind of
00:51figure out you know who what guys can do where do you put them um where do you try to
00:56um you know
00:58help them out a little bit and uh you know and then where can we be better as a staff
01:02schematically
01:03or there's some things we can tinker with of what we got and and honestly when you ask that one
01:08of
01:08the biggest things i think is to be able to go back and look at your your vet squad you
01:12know your
01:12practice squad because that's you know those guys man they've been busting their tail there's there's
01:18we got some guys that are growing and uh then you start asking yourself you know should we elevate
01:23some of these guys because they're man they're earning the right to play here get an opportunity
01:27to play so you really take a deep dive on them too who jumped out from that group there's a
01:34number
01:34of guys i mean i think uh gordon our tight end is doing some pretty good pretty good things you
01:39know
01:39lucky jackson um you know i think lucas is doing some good stuff um and they're not the only ones
01:47you
01:47know those are those are three that jump out right now and uh you know they just kind of catch
01:53your
01:53eye so um you know bachis continue to do good things for us um anyway you just you keep your
02:00eyes on
02:01them and uh and you know and then that's what it's about man you go out you practice you improve
02:08and if
02:08you think those guys can help you then you you elevate them dan when you zoom out because week over
02:13week you got to focus on the next opponent with the bye did you look around the nfc do you
02:18get this
02:18sense of hey it's wide open we can grab the bull by the horns coming out of the bye week
02:21yeah i mean
02:23i'm not honestly i haven't even looked at the nfc like i and i'm not kidding you i like i've
02:28been so
02:29focused on just us our guys um and then now we're in the green bay and it that's what it
02:37really is now
02:38um so i haven't even looked at that like okay where are we at with this is such a long
02:43season
02:43uh this is the first division game green bay at home so that's where my focus is at right now
02:50and trying to help our guys and our coaches win obviously we we look and look at the defense look
02:56at the secondary a lot of questions going into the carolina or to the uh the cardinals game
03:01on the surface to us look like that was the best performance by the secondary first of all would
03:06you agree and second do how much can you trust that moving forward i would agree with that that
03:15was the best performance we've had um i thought we played as one unit i thought uh you know yeah
03:21we
03:21changed a couple things up but more importantly man we played together guys used their help um
03:26you know we we trusted that we played fast um and you know we cut it loose and i felt
03:33like we
03:33gained some confidence out of that and i think that's that's what you get out of it is like okay
03:37man we we're starting to figure each other out here um collectively and now let's grow from here
03:43and it doesn't mean there's not going to be plays that'll happen you're going to get hit on some stuff
03:47that's you know there's but that's not what it's about it's about making sure that if it is they had
03:53to earn it the other the opponent had to truly earn whatever play just happened and then get back
03:59and let's get ready for the next play and make a play on the ball or get a punch out
04:03or but i like
04:05where we're going um i do i feel a more confident group right now now we there again we got
04:10a real
04:11good opponent here that airs it out coming in and uh they don't care who they're playing they're gonna
04:16they're gonna throw it out there now they've done it um for a number of years and and the last
04:22six
04:22games they continue to do it so um but i like where we're going what do you expect the impact
04:28of
04:28brian branch to be on that group well i think whenever you're able to get a player like branch
04:35back he's just uh you know he's a difference maker and he's a difference maker that that can
04:43find the football and he's versatile so he kind of makes everybody around him better even though
04:48he's gonna have to he had a really good day day of work yesterday in practice um you know
04:55preparing for the game you know we soaked him in some reps and we were in full pads and he
05:00was
05:01certainly throwing his pads around um but you know he's a little bit rusty and but he'll be better
05:07for it by the time we hit tomorrow's practice you know um so he'll continue to shake the rust off
05:14but
05:14he's just he's a football guy i mean he can find the ball he's got instincts um and and when
05:21you're
05:22able to use him as a chess piece it makes the other guys around him better and they can play
05:26faster so you know how much i don't know i know this it's not going to hurt us one bit
05:31and that was my question is there a snap count is there a limitation for him at all
05:37under 100 okay that's fair hopefully the defense isn't out there for 100 plays but yeah i like i like
05:44to hear it um let me ask you this because i'm very curious you mentioned cade mays is back and
05:52you want him out there juice has played well mahogany has played well it's a great problem to have
05:59is the thought that you're going to rotate at the center position to get cade out there or how does
06:06that look for you guys yeah i don't i don't see us doing that you know you go round and
06:13round and all
06:13these questions come in as to you know it's different than a guard i mean john you know that
06:19it's a guard and a center are totally different you know um that that guy's touching the ball the
06:27snap counts different the everything the the snap the timing the calls the quarterbacks comfort uh just
06:35you know with one guy over and over and so you know i think right now the plan juice has
06:40done a hell
06:41job for us and um and i've mentioned this before i'm going to continue continue to say it you know
06:46that was i thank goodness we got juice man he's been outstanding for us um that being said we really
06:53worked the heck out of cade yesterday he got some quality reps and we would like to get him give
06:58him
06:59a go here and uh and not make that move and then you know obviously juices starting off is swinging
07:06between center and guard and um you know as needed at center and some guard and and uh but yeah
07:13we'd
07:13like to just rip this band-aid off of cade i thought he had some good work yesterday i you
07:17know i thought
07:17he looked pretty good talking to lions head coach dan campbell the opening script you guys haven't
07:23scored a touchdown on the opening drive yet how do you bridge that disconnect from the the script
07:28that you guys plan during the week to seeing the results uh come sunday yeah i mean we look at
07:34everything and this isn't our first rodeo with this as we all know um i mean we've this happened
07:40in 22 at one point and it was 23 we couldn't come out of the third quarter then we were
07:4524 we couldn't
07:46do it the first um and so look you just continue to tinker with the openers find your rhythm and
07:52it's
07:53really been negative plays on ourselves man it's you know we're doing it's self-inflicted and some of it
07:59i put uh a little bit of it is the youth and um and as we grow i think we'll
08:05help we'll continue
08:06to tinker with the openers um and we'll find our rhythm you know i i do i believe that we'll
08:12find
08:12a rhythm or we'll continue to work until we we do find it um but we gotta you know obviously
08:18we need
08:18to get going a heck of a lot faster than we did at arizona when you look at green bay
08:24obviously you
08:24already mentioned we know we've got them this weekend and jordan love uh christian watson matthew
08:30golden on offense what concerns you the most about this green bay team
08:37yeah i mean they it well that's it all starts with love i mean love love is the secret sauce
08:43this guy is
08:44uh playing uh at a really high level he's seen the field extremely well playing fast processing quick
08:51can get out of trouble by time throws a really really pretty deep ball and gives these guys an
08:56opportunity starts there and then it's it's uh it's golden and watson it's the speed man the speed and
09:04the ability to track these deep balls um because they're you know you're they're catching or drawing
09:10dpi's on 50 percent of these um i mean i've counted over 30 in the last um you know six
09:17games here
09:18for them and i'm not just talking about like oh that was a deep dagger i'm talking about these
09:23the pylon just the goal balls the um and that's the most dangerous because you can sit back there
09:28and say you know what we're just going to sit here for three plays and throw it uh incomplete
09:32incomplete incomplete and you can decide you want to do it on fourth down and throw it up and all
09:36of a
09:36sudden uh you just got a 50 yard gain one way or another so that's why it's deadly it's potent
09:42you know they've made some adjustments on their whole line that have been good for them
09:46you know they're playing good football man these last two weeks they're playing outstanding football
09:50complimentary across the board but this offense is dangerous and they're going to continue to
09:56tinker with that run game they get jacobs back you know um look out so we that's what we can't
10:04allow
10:04them to find a run game now or really start to really develop it and i know they're going to
10:08want
10:09to try to find it uh because it only takes pressure off everybody else but but they're an explosive
10:14potent offense for those two receivers in love dan craft is playing much better by the way he's
10:20coming off nicely from the injury so now all of a sudden you want to take them out you know
10:25that's
10:25the tight end you got to worry about so dan you didn't give much of an update on kirby joseph
10:31i
10:31understand you don't have much of an update but you did say you you think he will play this season
10:36where does that confidence come from yeah it's just he's he's the the progression of where he's
10:43he's calm right now and his his rehab the strength that the knee is gaining and you know we're we're
10:49just we're working here i don't want to give a timeline but i i do feel optimistic that before
10:55the season's out he'll play for us you know and look i hope i'm not wrong but maybe i am
11:01and then
11:01you can call me a liar but but i like what is trending we all want to see him play
11:05i think it's just
11:06hard from where we say we don't see the the workouts the way you do so we like seeing steps
11:11or signs of
11:12progress is all you know oh i get it he's progressing and then last thing you were fired
11:18up with us last week and by all accounts you challenged the team going into the arizona game
11:22what did you find out about the mentality of the guys and trying to get their head screwed on
11:27straight knowing uh what you guys are trying to chase yeah i well honestly i don't want to put too
11:32much stock in any of that our guys did a hell of a job i thought our coaches coach who
11:36tells off our
11:37players were ready to go man nobody likes losing and i thought they answered the bell you know it's
11:43not the start that we wanted but i tell you what it's the most complete game that we played it
11:47was
11:47the most confident played with the most conviction played as one unit had a lot of energy guys feeding
11:53off each other and that's the secret sauce for us so uh we got to continue to to grow from
12:00where
12:00that was at division football baby let's go dan thanks for joining us yep have a good one guys
12:07it's dan campbell 97-1
