 Had the MRI exam on Ryan, how's things looking with his ankle? Similar to where they were last year, you know. And so we'll see how it goes. And we've got some time here for our next game. And, you know, Ryan will get, you know, treat round o'clock. And this would be a big week to see how he progresses. And then we'll make a decision on his availability next week and what we do then. If he's not available, is it maybe time to take a look at Will? Well, it'll be one of those two guys if Ryan can't go. I don't know who that would be yet. We'll see, you know, how they continue to practice. You know, it'll be good to get them some work this week, maybe with some guys that they haven't necessarily worked with. You know, they've been working on the show team during the season. You know, so I'm excited to get both those guys some reps with, you know, with some of our offensive guys and see how they handle that. Like yesterday when they came in and where have you seen improvement from him on the practice field? Well, I think that there was some improvement. You know, I think that's a tough spot. You know, we hit it down there in the goal line and just the operation of where we were down two scores, not having, you know, the timeouts and just needing to know that just not taking a sack and not having to hold on to that ball at just the time is critical. So I think that that's, you know, that's tough to evaluate. You know, I think he could have probably, you know, gotten rid of the football or, you know, tried to find, you know, somebody a little quicker. But, you know, I think that it was good to see him get us off to a good start, you know, with the keeper and then, you know, obviously finding Taje and getting the ball out of his hand. So just not a whole lot of, you know, work outside of just that situation. You want Malik and Will to, you clear everybody out for the buy or do you want them to stay behind maybe and, you know, do a little boning up and getting ready? I don't know what boning up means. Study. Oh, study. I'm sure that they're studying every day that they go home. I'm positive of that. I've seen those guys handle the game plan and be prepared and know the opponent. But I think that there's a certain element to, you know, all of us of just trying to, you know, get some things accomplished here and those guys will keep studying and, you know, there won't be a game plan. You know, I mean, there won't be a game plan for Atlanta. It'll be just understanding and watching coverages and progressions and defenses and, you know, having pressure answers, right? And having, being able to see and identify when pressure may be coming. I think that's a huge part of, you know, being a quarterback is kind of having the answers already in your head as you're going through, you know, the cadence and seeing what, you know, whether they're holding the disguise and then all of a sudden at the last minute, you know, being able to recognize some of these things and either have the correct read and put the ball in the right spot and get rid of it quickly or having an answer for the rest of the offense and it will play that we think can be successful. That was an elemental process for those two young guys. You know, being on the scout team, like, how do you like the way that has been done? I don't like it, but the scout team is hard and that's why we try to put it in their language and say, okay, call this play what we call it, right? I don't think that that's fair just to look up there and see, you know, a generic card and just read it out. You know, I don't care where the defense wants you to throw the ball. Like, just throw it to the guy that's open or, you know, take control of the huddle, getting them in and out, making sure that, you know, you're practicing all the things that you would want to practice where you, you know, running our offense. So I think that that's been good. The seven on seven stuff and those throws that they've been having on Monday has been good. The stuff they do after practice with some of the practice squad receivers going through the game plan, calling the huddle, going out of formations. Like, they go up and down the field. It's just trying to find different ways to make sure that their one are ready and one are improving and developing because we just only have so many guys to run full speed reps with. Did you say injury, Mike, is cost you for Will and can't cost you evaluation of him? And then what have you been able to figure out about him since the season started? Well, that was, you know, those preseason reps are critical. But have also, you know, seen some really good practice reps seeing stuff through camp. And then just didn't feel like it was, you know, didn't feel like he was ready to go into games under those circumstances. You know, seeing a more comfortable player, just a more comfortable person, a rookie, you know, unique situation coming in this league is a quarterback with an existing quarterback with a, you know, player in his second year. That's unique. And I think he's handled that well. His comfort level and just being around here has improved. Would you say similar to last year for Ryan? You mean when he first got hurt as opposed to the last year when he was on the left? Yeah, I would say similar to earlier in the year. Did Nick do enough to win the job to look that way? Well, I would still evaluate that. But what I did appreciate that Nick was, he was into it. He acted like he wanted to be out there. He acted like he loved it and was, you know, pushing piles, jumping over the pile, you know, just doing some of those things that we feel like are critical and a way to squeeze the last couple of yards out of every run he was down there. Got a really nice block on Taj's screen, along with some other people, along with Brew and some other guys that were out there in front of that thing. It was a pretty cool clip. Yeah, I mean, Ryan, if he can go round me a quarterback. What else goes into that evaluation? Mike at left tackle, you know, do they know how to do their job? Do they, you know, execute the play and the style in which we want it done? You know, can you get into the line of scrimmage on zone plays? You know, get to the right leverage, run off the football. You know, combination blocks. Can you displace alignment from their gap and climb up to the second level? Play pass that you're, you know, firm on the inside, not getting beaten in the middle of the pocket. And then, you know, third down, it's about blocking the edge rusher or playing for the game or being able to slide out on pressure based on whatever the call is. There's, I think there's an assignment and there's an execution and then there's also a play style and a play demeanor that I think is important for offensive linemen. And just the way played. I know Jeffrey in the locker room after the game talked about wanting to see guys out there that want to fight and be out there. Do you have decisions like that to make at certain positions based on? Don't have a lot of options. Yeah. I mean, we don't, we got what we got right now. So my job this week is to show us, show them things that we've done that we can't win with and things that we have done that will be the reason why we win. Because there's, there's a lot of them. Yeah. The offensive line is struggled blocking all season long. It's not a new problem experience that last year. Why wasn't there more done in the off season to address that position group? Well, I would disagree that that's, they've struggled. They've struggled on third down. Hasn't been our best random football yesterday against a team that hadn't, you know, there hadn't been too many 10 and 12 yard runs on that clip. So I think we stood up to them and we blocked them. And you know, I thought the protection against Indy, if we can stay out of a dropback passing game, I think that that's really critical. I would say that that's a, that's a tall order for us and a lot of other teams. Is this when you get into a dropback passing game? So I think that that's, that's something that we certainly want to, you know, make sure that we compliment our run game and our offense with the ability to move the pocket, the ability to max up. And we saw a lot of those cool opportunities against Indy. Didn't have enough of them against Baltimore when we did have some of those play passes, but we'll have to be better on third down when they, when they do run games and pressure. So that's, that that's where we're at right now. You seem to report before in your time here and turned it into an AFC championship game appearance. So what do you have to do as a head coach to hold this locker room together and keep vibes high despite a challenging start? Well, anything starts this week, it starts tomorrow. It starts with, you know, my message of, you know, showing them the things that, you know, we've done well enough and then just showing them the things that we can't do and think that we'll win and making sure that the standard is it's coming to the work and being consistent and demanding, you know, the accountability is huge. But the ones that can have to do a little bit more and the ones that haven't have to improve. What do you think of Jeff's comments about just some guys, they just decide if they want to play and want to be here? I mean, Jeff's on the right to say a lot as he wants, but, you know, I don't think that that could go for a lot of guys. You know, we've hit the quarterback three times in the last two games, so we'd have to, you know, prepare there too. That's tough to win and it's tough to cause turnovers when you hit the quarterback twice in two games. Chris, do you have time there for Avery, excuse me, Avery in there for Fulton for a little bit, was that injury related? No, I may have wanted to try to give, you know, Trey, you know, a little bit of work and see how that went and, you know, I didn't think Christian was, you know, he was better, he wasn't as challenged as the Colts game and that's how it goes and he triggered and he ran some toss cracks and those corners have to show up and, you know, he was a willing participant in that and when they ran a toss crack and he tried to run a switch route or something, he communicated and pushed it off, you know, to the safety and so, again, you get beat in this league as a corner, you got to come back and, you know, compete and you can't let things spiral and that goes for all of us. You can't let, you know, a mistake turn into something that's detrimental and let your technique lag and your competitive spirit lag. I didn't get any of that from either of you, I apologize. I can't tell you what we're going to do tomorrow, let alone against the Falcons to just see who's available to practice, see who can improve, try to have a plan for each guy, guys that need some rest and recovery, some guys that are going to need some more reps, some speed reps that maybe they don't get a ton of during the season, some younger guys, try to figure that out each and every day and go from there. Are you frustrated with T.A.R. Tartt not being out there for multiple weeks now and taking to social media, things like that? I didn't see the social media, you know what I mean? I think that that's, you get, you know, back and forth conversations probably never do anybody any good on social media. Maybe I'll read the mean tweets tomorrow. That would be my introduction. I'll read all the funny stuff that they say about us or me. Specifically, I did that one year. I think we ended up winning 12 games. So this coach sucks. This guy stinks and, you know, ended up having a different tune. Guys all laughed about it. What I'm frustrated by is I'm frustrated when we lose. I am. Let me put a lot into this and again, we have to make sure that that we're doing everything we can, that when we're not out there that we're doing everything we can to get back out there. The other message that I try to tell them because, you know, again, this is not talking about my career. I played in Nashville. I got hurt, right? I went through injury, but just the, maybe the mentality or the appearance that you're doing everything that you can to get back out there. That you're as engaged as you possibly can in the meetings that you're doing as much conditioning or you're doing as much treatment as you possibly can. Because I think whether that makes you get back any quicker but at least leaves no doubt that you're doing everything that you possibly can. That's just a reminder that I try to tell all of them, knowing that they're we're going to deal with injuries throughout the course of the year. I hope that we can see him maybe even this week going with, you know, even being able to throw with Will and Malik figuring that Ryan probably is not going to throw this week and hopefully we can get him out in some capacity. But, you know, he looks good and, you know, keep progressing. Like you said yesterday, it's difficult to have an identity without winning. Are you confident that the message and the identity that you're pushing on this team to try to get them to have that they're completely bought in and still where they haven't been? I mean, I think they are. I mean, I thought we were going to win the game. We threw an interception. Quarterback couldn't push off. We threw in it. I thought we were going to win the game. Like we just ran for 13 yards. We ran for nine yards. We run on second and one. It was third and two. Ryan tried to throw the jig and he couldn't push off his ankle and we threw a pick. But up until then, I mean, I don't know, maybe teams go down there and fight one for six in a red zone. However the ball got down there, whether the defense did it, whether the punt team or whether the offense left in the ball down there. But I know we stood up there and stopped them however many times inside the 10, inside the five with Kyle Peco chasing guys down, making extra efforts, knocking guys back. I mean, we're going to fight. Like if you want our identity, we're going to fight. We're going to quit. Like we've been through this before. You could go down there and game like yesterday, 35 to three or whatever. Like we're going to fight. They're going to fight. And then our job is to, to eliminate some of the mistakes, try to get a little bit of the details better, be better on third down, you know, score these, these chances and we get the ball down there in a red zone. And I mean, you saw Derek, you know, scored from the 15 or whatever. And you know, got Chris Moore on a slip screen that looked really, really good until it wasn't and missed the block and on third and eight, you know, so it's like we're going to go through this red zone and make sure that we're doing everything that we can to put ourselves in favorable positions to score touchdowns. I, you guys know that, but you know, got to be better and going to run it better. Can't have third and eights in the red zone. There's like, it's no where form to cover, right? They're just going to just pack you in there. And then it's like, well, throw a slip scheme to throw a quick pass. I hope somebody, you know, breaks a tackle, but it's not a normal third and eight out in the field where, you know, there's going to be some more space. So third and eight is tough and, you know, we'll have to keep, keep working it, keep scheming it and keep practicing it. I don't know. I mean, I would imagine, you know, I mean, I don't want to misspeak, but I know that they've been evaluated. I've seen both of those guys for, for, you know, the sake of clarity. I would imagine that they're in the protocol. I think they're both doing well, spoke to them this morning and then saw them both when they came in here. So they were able to fly back with us. And I think that, you know, they're doing as well as they possibly could be doing. I don't want to like misspeak here, but they probably would imagine there is some form or fashion in the protocol. I think it's probably warranted. I mean, you know, the one with Wiley, I don't know, like kind of four on or whatever. Josh is, you know, he's a linear target and he's going to have to get his pads down and, you know, protect himself. You know, I would imagine that the one there in the past that defenseless and our players in this league have done a good job for the most part of trying to get that out of the game. And it's never going to be perfect as fast as it is and as quickly as it happens. And sometimes the body posture of where the football is and that, you know, these guys then kind of crunching down and then the target lowers, the head comes down. You know, we just talk to our guys about hitting at or below the football. And it's really all you can do is if you want to avoid one an injury to you or the other player, you know, or a penalty and a fine. What did you say to Kyle about the penalty? I mean, we just got to catch our punts and, you know, that's, and I've got to help him. I do. I have to transition better, you know, from the situation of what's going on. What's going for it. You know, Shane, what are, you know, hey, what do you like on the on third down? You know, what are they, what are they thinking about doing? And then being able to transition to, you know, our gray team, which is our defense D stay, you know, and telling them to, to stand in the end zone and not do anything. So I can help them. But that also, you know, we have to, we have to catch punts in the national, in the national football league. Yeah, I mean, exactly. Like just making sure like, guys, we got a great stop, you know, again. And so I have to transition more quickly from, from what was happening and continue to, to work a play ahead like I try to do. But in that particular case, you know, seeing what they're doing based on where they're at on the field, are they going to try to go for it? Making sure that we got, you know, our defensive personnel out there, as opposed to punt return or whatever substitution group. And, you know, just, just being better than everybody. And then, you know, being sound and not, you know, whether it's a long return, I'm a punt, like those, that's, those are, you know, can't happen. I mean, that's in life. You know what I mean? You can't make, you can't make yourself any taller. You know what I mean? I mean, it's like, so whatever we have, again, the issues that have come up, I've talked about is the third down on offense, the red zone. We have to be better on third down on defense. Our past defense has to be better. You know, we had cover and punts, like we got every gunner that we got out there. They're both undrafted free agent rookies and they're fighting us off. But if that is the case, I mean, should any decisions be made at all, looking more towards long-term than for just this year, if the problems... Well, I think we're always looking for this year. And, you know, problems, I mean, Anthony Kendall, Matt Jackson, like they earned a right to be on this team. And Anthony has done a fantastic job. And when they punted, Anthony took his guy in a single block and blocked him behind the line of scrimmage and knocked him on the ground. So, you know, we have to... You know, when we cover these punts, it's not just all on a gunner, right? We got to cast a net. We got to get our tails out of there. We got to go down there and limit the space that they have. And we didn't have that, you know, whether that was the gunners, the interior players. We're all at fault. The only guy that made anything right was Stoney. It was an unbelievable effort to get the guy on the ground and allow the defense to defend what they could and give up just three points there. So, you know, we're all... Everything works in unison. And then trying to get that unit execution is what we talked about earlier and this conversation with you guys is trying to get the players to understand it starts with yourself. It starts with me. It starts with the coaches. And then it's, you know, about our position and it's about our unit and then ultimately about the team's success. Mike, it's week seven. Maybe you would rather have the buy come later, but for this team at this moment, is this maybe a good time to have this buy? It's the only time when it was commentary. It wouldn't matter what, you know, this is what you make of it. And can we win this week? Can we win with our attitudes and our practice schedule and getting stuff done and being open-minded to improve and to get the information and translate it onto the field. That's all that matters. You know, they're clearly a fast team and I know speed, excuse me, the area that you wanted to improve on. After that game, how do you feel you improve in that area as opposed to last year? We can always be faster. I mean, I think I'll say that forever like we can always be faster. You anticipate making a change at punt returner giving Kyle's issues catching punt returner. I would imagine that we'll have as many guys that can catch a punt back there just like we have in the previous weeks. Imani Hooker had a cast on his thumb. He's the backup punt returner. So that's active on game day. So we only get 48 of them. We got to find some guys that have some versatility and whether that's catch punts, play other places, do other stuff, but it's not like we have six punt returners on a game day roster. Do you consider treating assets at the deadline and prioritizing a draft pick in next year's draft? I think we would always consider trying to strengthen the team, whether that's right now this week or in the future. Absolutely. Thanks. Gentry, what do you got? I mean, you got to get out there, Gentry. Get in there. You guys yesterday about identity, talking about you always wanted to be ever talking about physicality. There's nothing to the level that you would like. Well, there were times, at times, you know what I mean? And that's been the frustrating thing for me is because I'm going through these and watching the 375 clips on defense and you're like, wow, damn, I'm not moving the ball and the quarterback's being affected. And then there's other times where the quarterback's able to look over here and then progress and find a window or a zone or we stop the run and there's nowhere for him to go and guys are swarming and then guys are blocked or staying on blocks or they go fast on third down and one and we, you know, it's like we talked all week, like that's what they've done. They did it against the Colts and they did it against the Bengals and, you know, we have to be ready for these things. You only get so many opportunities to practice it, but then you have to, when you get it in the game, be ready to nail it. So it's just making sure now that, you know, we're getting all these little details and putting them all together because there are times, Gentry, where the identity's there, but to really hang your hat on it, you have to have some tangible results and some wins, but it's been there and it just hasn't been there at the level that we've needed it to be. Being an NFL quarterback and I think that's going to come in time and he's worked tremendously hard on it. So we look forward to him moving forward. With that growth, do you feel like that will allow the process to kind of speed up to where he's working through things faster? Yeah, you know, I think with anything, the more you do it, the more comfortable you get and he went in there. It was a tough situation. It's, you know, the game's on the line. It's kind of a two-minute situation, but I thought he did a good job for us and I just think as he continues to get more experience, continue to play and get his feet wet, I think you'll continue to see him grow. As a young player, like you feel like, you know, you put him in that situation, he knows he has to make a play for you guys. How do you manage, like, trying to keep him from pressing too much but still going out there and helping you out? You know, we just ask him to go in there, relax and don't force anything. Just go in there, take what the defense has given us, go through the reads, go through the progression and, you know, just try to execute the play the best of his ability. So we didn't want him to go out there and try to be Superman and try to do something that he couldn't do and we just impressed that upon him when he went into the game. How is that going to try to evaluate both on Monday and stuff like that? How has that gone? Deemed in that way in terms of the evaluation? Yeah, I think it's been great for those guys. You know, obviously we've done some work on Mondays. They do work after practice and they've both been really engaged in meetings. They both understand the game plan. They've both done a good job of asking good questions and understanding what their job is and it's really to be a good caddy to Ryan right now and they've done a good job of that and I just think we're continuing to find ways to develop them and get them reps and get them thrown to different guys and we'll continue to do that. How much difference is there for a guy like Malik or really anybody else between getting thrown into a game versus having a week, you know, first team reps, et cetera, et cetera, going into a game as a starter? Sure, you know, that's the life of a backup quarterback. He had to be ready at any point to be thrown in there and operate and the offense can't skip a beat. Now ideally in a perfect world would you like somebody to have a week's worth of prep and everything? Yeah, but that's not the life that those guys are living right now. So not only do they have to know the offense like the back of their hand but they also have to get our defense ready for the looks that we're going to see. So actually I told them when the season started their job gotten actually harder because they have to know our offense with minimal reps and then be able to help our defense out in both ways. So I think both of them have done a great job of bouncing that out. Your experience, how much can you really glean from guys in practice versus how they execute in games when practice is all you have? You know, from the guys that I've been around I think it's a good indicator where guys are going, you know, which way their trajectory is going. Like there's nothing like live game reps and you do the best that you can simulate in practice with pressures and different coverages and all the things you can do but the speed of the game is going to be different when it's out there and live builds are flying. But I think that both those guys have done a great job of just preparing each week and we ask them to prepare each week like they're a starter and they've done that. Will's injury increases. You got to a situation now where you had to go for it. Do you feel comfortable that you could do it on a Sunday? You know, we feel comfortable. Anybody that's on this roster right now we feel comfortable they can go out there and execute whatever job they're asked to do and whether that's Malik, whether that's Will, whether that's a guy in the defensive end. You know, that's why they're on this team for a reason. So we feel comfortable with everybody we have on our roster being able to go out there and operate whatever we ask them to do. What have you seen just from Will like since the season has started? It's obviously a unique situation, right? To have two young guys like that anyway. So what have you seen from him? Yeah, you know, it is a unique situation trying to develop two young quarterbacks and I think they've done a great job. I think you've continued to see Will grow. You know, whether it's his understanding of concepts which is understanding of what coverage is being thrown at him. You just see a guy who's getting more and more comfortable each week with what we're asking them to do and it's the same thing with Malik within the offense. So we're just going to keep pressing those guys, keep pressing them forward and then when they're asked to play they've got to go there and operate. We're not focused on the fundamentals as much as we need to be. So that'd be the number one thing is just fundamentally getting back to you know, eyes, hands and feet in both the protection and the run game and just going back to the basics as far as football goes fundamentally sound and working on all those things. What do you think Nick did? He's not as familiar with left or right. You know, Mike seemed like he was having a very battle with what's made him a challenge for him and trying to get comfortable there. How do you think he did it? Yeah, I mean, I thought he brought a lot of energy. You know, that's the one thing with Nick. You know, he's going to play hard. You know, and he goes out there. He goes 100 miles an hour, you know, and he's throwing his face in there and he's running his feet through blocks and just brings a ton of energy to the game. You know, whether it's in run game, pass game. As far as comfortability again, you'd have to ask him, but there were times he looked comfortable and probably someplace he liked and some that he'd want to have back. But at the end of the day, the guy plays the game the way it's supposed to be played. What did you guys seem to go ahead and make that move? Is it more about like your feeling that Nick was ready to take that jump or like, is there something with Andre that you saw that was like, OK, here we go? Yeah, no, just, you know, NPF having that ability to go in there and bring some energy and all those things. And, you know, he's a guy who's played before and done some good things. So just him being ready to go out there and do it. And, you know, timing was right there. And he went out there and he brought the energy and did some good things. Do you think change for your group if there's a change at quarterback? Excuse me? I'm sorry. Do you think change for your group if there's a change at quarterback as far as... No. You got to keep it healthy. Yeah, no. Yeah, I mean... Or if no one is a different guy back there. No, I mean, you know, as far as our guys go, we got to block the guys who are responsible for blocking. You know, we talk about protecting the quarterback all the time, protecting the guy with the ball. And we got to keep us in between the defender and the ball. And, you know, there might be some differences when it comes to launch points or where some guys like to escape the pocket and stuff. And that's just a general statement in football. And so I think you know who's back there. But the other day you got to do your job and keep your guy from getting near the ball. Yeah, back to being consistent with our fundamentals and technique overall. I mean, when you lose a couple of games and, you know, just look at it, we'll watch the film and make the corrections we need to make and start putting everything together. Because normally when we... After a game, you just look at the last game and make the corrections there, but now we got six games to kind of put it all together and figure out what we did well and what we need to fix. Have you gotten any clarity in the last week or so about Tiair's situation and when you expect to have him back on the field? I don't know. Honestly, I don't. I have no idea. So we'll... To your understandings, is it all health related at this point? He's injured, so that's why he's not playing. How much of you guys missed him? We've missed him because he's been a starter for us. But, you know, I think everybody looks at the last two games, which he didn't play and say, well, that's why we gave up rushing yards. But I remember vividly the New York Giants running for 250 yards against us in the opener last year and then Buffalo running for another 100 plus yards. So it's more about us just doing what we need to do, not necessarily who's in there.