GREEN BAY – The Packers' three coordinators met with the media on Thursday. Here are highlights from their news conferences.
Defensive coordinator Joe Barry
Who will wear the communication helmet if De'Vondre Campbell (knee) can't play in Detroit?
"Quay (Walker). He's done it the last couple of days in practice. We did that periodically in camp, for really no other reason of just you want other guys to be able have that experience in the huddle, and then also in the preseason, Quay had to do it. What I was getting at, Quay had I think four or five days during training camp where we specifically had him do it. And then, with Dre not playing in any preseason games and Quay playing in three, he did it yesterday and today and would do it in the game if Dre can't go."
On having inside linebackers wear the communication helmet:
"I don't think it necessarily has to be a linebacker, but usually that's kind of the most conventional. But then of course when you have a kid playing as a rookie, but like I said, at least we've gotten prep work with him through training camp, and then he actually did experience it exclusively when he played in the preseason. You know, I think any time that you use the quarterback and the captain of your defense, when we lost Dre, it hurts. It's not optimal. But I have all the faith in the world that Quay will do a great job."
On the defense at the midway point:
"I think we haven't been as consistent as I hope we will be. I think we've played periods of games, quarters of games, where we've played dominant and then, for whatever reason, it's fallen off. Matt (LaFleur) talks to us all the time, talks to the team all the time, about complimentary football. I think that's evident. So, but, specifically with us, we've just got to find a way to consistently put 60 minutes together and we haven't done that yet. It hasn't been one aspect of our game, it hasn't been one position. It's been something here or something there, something that we haven't been able to put our specific finger on."
Offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich
On receiver Romeo Doubs' performance in Buffalo:
"Romeo's always a guy who practices the right way, he's dialed in, and sometimes you have a bad game and you've got to learn from it. And I think he did. Whatever he needed to tweak in his preparation, you could definitely see it last week with the big plays he made and the consistency. So yeah, again, very encouraged by that performance. We've just got to make sure we're as consistent as possible every time we go out there."
On the challenge injuries have created on offensive line:
"We were just talking about this. The only consistency right now is inconsistency in, who's going to be out there? Where are we going to play our guys? I mean, it's tough, having guys at certain spots to get certain experience. You know, just work together and just get the jelling and the meshing of the unit, that's always tough when you can't have that. So, it's just, you've just got to make sure you're coaching them, getting them prepared and just again, keeping it as simple as we can so guys can just go out there and play fast wherever they're playing at."
On rushing for 208 yards in Buffalo:
"For me, I'm always a run-first guy anyways. Anytime you ask me what play we should run, it's always going to be a run play. that's my bias. But for me, it's like you said, you want to be as balanced as possible. And as you go into a game plan, you have your shots, you've got your runs, you've got your different plays, and as it goes, you're, 'OK, what are we doing well? What aren't we doing well? How is this game progressing?' and as you could see, the run game was working. We were hitting them, we were hitting them, we were hitting them—and we just kept leaning on it. So that's kind of how that game went. I always go into a game ready to run for 250 yards. That's like my mindset every single time. So yeah, it's just one of those things that as it goes, if it keeps working, we lose a couple receivers, now yeah, that's got to be our main thing. But as you can see, we run the ball for however many yards, controlled the clock, but we still have to score points. That's where we still need those explosive plays down the field, you still need to be good in the red zone, stuff like that, that I think we're missing. It just being a holistic offense right now is what we just need to improve on."
Special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia
On what can Kylin Hill bring to special teams:
"Well, we'll just have to see if he's up. We put him in a lot of different positions for us. Nothing to pinpoint right at this particular time but he's done a bunch of different things. If he's up, we're going to try to find a role for him, if we can."
On where the special-teams unit is at midway through the season:
"We're never going to be as good as we want to be. Statistically, I really haven't looked at it. We kind of look at the end of the game, what did we do field-position wise. How did we set our defense in coverage and how did we set our offense in returns? We're really looking to try to improve in everything we're trying to do. Our job is to protect the punter, protect the kicker, protect the ball. At times, we've done that and at times we've been poor in all three of those particular areas. We're just looking forward to another opportunity to see if we can improve, grow and play a little bit better than we did the week before. We'll see how it turns out on Monday after the game on Sunday."
On the state of the Packers' return game:
"We're a work in a progress in every area; certainly, that area. I think we've had a little bit of a jolt with Keisean (Nixon) going back there on kickoff return but again we've missed blocks. We've played a good team. We just got done playing the No. 1 kickoff team in Buffalo and they kicked it to us every time but one. We had the big one and then we had the penalty on it. Their hangs were like 4.28, almost 4.3 at times and put it over there in the corner. Those are tough to return. We just need to do a better job blocking, as well."
