First-year Falcons offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan’s unit is ranked No. 7 in yards per play and fifth in yards per game as the team prepares to face the Redskins on Sunday at the Georgia Dome. Here are some excerpts from his Thursday session with members of the media.
(Edited for clarity and space)
Q. How do you handle Roddy White saying he wants to be more involved on offense?
A. You just talk to a guy. Make sure nothing is personal. You are open and talk about it. I talked to Roddy today and I definitely feel totally fine about it and I think he does, too. Everybody gets frustrated when they don't get the ball. I think Roddy has handled it well with us. He's been great here in the building. I think if we would have played four quarters of football with the way the coverages were going, I think he he would have ended up getting a lot more balls. He would have had to with the way they were spreading their coverages we would have had to spread it around a bunch.
Q. How do you see a backfield that features both Tevin Coleman and Devonta Freeman?
A. I think we've got three real good backs. I think even (Terron) Ward showed last week that he can run real hard, also. We've got three guys that we are confident in, in both the run and pass game. It's a good situation for myself. I don't have to keep looking up to see who's in. It really doesn't matter. We can keep guys fresh.
Q. You talked about Devonta getting in a rhythm as he got carries last game. Is there any concern about not giving him a chance to get in a rhythm?
A. You learn that as you go. I've never worried about that in the past. Running backs get the ball, and they run hard as they can. It's not so much as with the quarterback, when you are trying to get a guy in a rhythm. We will see how he handles this week. We will look at it week to week. He's looked really good these last two weeks so we've got to make sure we keep that going.
Q. Do you see opponents changing their defense because your running game is producing?
A. Defenses change every week, they change every quarter. It changed throughout the Dallas game, throughout the Giants game. That is something you are always looking at and you have to have a plan with everybody. You've definitely have got to expect it to change too based off of Julio (Jones). You know what you see on tape you are not always going to get going into the game. You've got to have a bunch of different plans. You've got to spread people out. You've got to have a contingency plan.
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