MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – Here’s what Falcons coach Arthur Smith had to say after the 19-3 win over the Dolphins on Friday night:
Opening statement: “I wish a happy 79th birthday to my dad today. It really has nothing to do with the game, but it means something to me. FaceTimed him before the game, and he was sitting in his office on his birthday, and I was like, ‘what the hell are you doing, you should be home.’ He said he was getting ready to watch our game, so just wanted to give him a little birthday shoutout.”
How did you assess how the players played today in the win?: “It was a clean op. Some of the situational stuff, we need to be cleaner, but I think in the critical downs, guys stepped up all over the place and made plays. Whether they had their hands on the football, got a couple picks, it was good to see Dee Alford. That was a really cool punt return. Obviously he had the touchdown. When they rushed late, I thought our guys just continued to grind out the rush. I thought we blocked pretty well, but again, there’s things we’ve got to clean up and I think our depth was good enough sometimes in the drop-back passing game and cost us a few. I felt Logan (Woodside) threw some good footballs tonight, but plenty to work on.”
Did you get enough work in the joint practices to where you didn’t want to play the starters here today in the game? “There are so many things you’ve got to evaluate, so you’re trying to divvy up at a time, and I thought we took advantage of the two practices, but our guys will play next week against Cincinnati, so we’ll be back at home, and we’ll have to evaluate, but those guys will play next week at home.”
And your initial impressions of Woodside? “I thought he played with pretty good poise. I thought he threw some good footballs tonight. Wasn’t perfect, but I thought the ball placement was pretty good. I thought his decision-making was pretty solid. Logan’s a guy who’s continuing to improve. He’s fun to work with. I thought his command was pretty good at the line of scrimmage as well.”
When it comes to Alford obviously for the punt return and everything like that, but how much growth have you seen from this guy in particular from the time that he came in to where he is now? “Dee’s one of the many cool stories we have on our team. He’s a vocal guy and went to Tusculum, he went to the CFL and got here, proved he’s a legit NFL player. So another guy in our program who all he does is work. Continues to improve. Showed it tonight at DB, he made a couple plays. That’s a huge play. Just having somebody that can get you that first first down and punt return. Obviously he was able to extend that to a touchdown, but that’s important.”
On the defensive stops: “You try to simulate in practice, but you’ve got to make your practices competitive. We try to put them in as many stressful situations as well. That’s what it’s going to come down to. That’s what this league is. Most of these games are close. There’s good players on both sides, but when you get there, somebody makes a mistake – we’ve got to improve our tackling which is usually an issue early in the preseason and we got down there, but you don’t panic. That’s what you want to see, is guys understand and then they make a play. A guy may make a hell of a throw and catch when he’s on the sideline and get down to the 5-yard line, let’s pull up and get him off the field, and I thought you saw that tonight. It’s a mindset, but it’s throughout the whole team and staff, it’s what we try to simulate and more importantly you’ve got to have the right guys to do that and I think all our guys have the right character makeup.”
On the pass breakups and tipped passes: “It’s a combination of both, how we want to play, things that we want to change. We want to be aggressive in all three phases, so we’ve got aggressive guys – that’s a credit a lot of people. We’re bringing the right guys, our scouting staff, those guys are 24/7. It’s a shared vision. Then then you’ve got coaches like (assistant head coach/defense) Jerry (Gray), (secondary coach Steve Jackson) and (defensive front specialist) and Lanier (Goethie) and the defensive staff. The first preseason game those guys communicated really well; it was clean on the headset. Those guys are pros. So, it’s a shared effort and it’s a credit to our players, too. Those guys believe in what we are doing, hopefully we can continue to grow.”
On the competition in the secondary: “Well, it’s a long season. The old NFL was pretty drastic; practice squads were smaller, you didn’t have standard elevations, the season was a little bit longer, you need all these guys as they continue to develop. I was telling (owner Arthur Blank) out there when you ask a question like that, ‘How do the guys look?’ When we get short one week in late November, these guys have to be ready to go – that’s our job. So it’s fun, you feel a team building.”
On running back Godwin Igwebuike: “He’s a guy that’s been out there and thankful to get another opportunity to try and take the banners home. He’s a smart, tough guy but he really hit the hole hard tonight. He went downhill not just in Y-zone, he’s pressing and cutting in some of the gap stuff we were doing, I thought he ran the ball – especially on the touchdown drive, he was in a pretty good groove and so was the O-line He’s a good special teams player, another guy we’re thankful to have. That’s a credit to our scouting staff, a guy we had worked out and kept on our radar – a smart, tough player.”
Any update on defensive back DeMarcco Hellams, who had a trip to the blue tent: “I think he’ll be all right. We’ve got a couple soft tissue things that we’ll have to check out that happened in the first half with Frank Darby and Mike Hughes. Nothing major that they told me about right away, so we’ll see what it looks like tomorrow.”
On Hellams injury: “Yeah, he got up.”
On Hellams play: “It’s the same thing we saw it in Alabama – the guy is around the football. He’s a good football player.”
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