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NEW ORLEANS SAINTS DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR GREGG WILLIAMS PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

Written by Justin Macione (New Orleans Saints)

New Orleans Saints Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Q: What is your take on Chris McAlister?

A: I’ve known him for a long time and knew him when he was coming out, would have loved the opportunity to draft him when he was coming out, didn’t get that opportunity. I’ve competed against him a long time. He’s another guy for us to try to get ready to go. When he’s ready, I can’t tell you that. A lot of it will be dependent upon the health of the guys in front of him. I think it’s another compliment to the organization that I’m learning about being involved with this organization. I’ve been at places where you just did without. All of a sudden you get one of those defensive tackles to play corner or something like that. We always have a short list. I think Ryan Pace and his group upstairs do a tremendous job on who’s on the short list and bringing them in. I selfishly like veterans at this time of the year because I don’t have to catch them up as much. There are certain things he already knows about the National Football League, so we’ll just have to wait and see. He fits in well.

Q: Could he be physically ready to play on Sunday?

A: Probably, but I can’t tell that yet. We’ll have to wait and see how he is day by day by day. Again, with a veteran, I also lean on him a little bit to know, but we’ve got guys that have been training here all spring and summer we’re ready to go with. He’s been a good addition.

Q: How did Malcolm Jenkins do?

A: He did well. He really did well. I teased him a little bit this week about rookie cornerback against rookie corner. We’ll see who steps up the most and how they do. He’s progressing very well. He’s stayed healthy. What I hope you and the fans get to see is that he’s one of those rare corners that’s physical like a safety. Not only can he play the corner position, but he plays it like a safety or a smaller linebacker. He plays it in his style, his framework, but he’s got an aggressive style about it and that’s what attracted me to him when I started watching the college film.

Q: Does that make him an ideal matchup against Kellen Winslow?

A: I don’t know how many times we’ll be able to do that. They do so many things formation wise. Sometimes it could happen depending upon the formation, but we’re not going to…this year we haven’t delved into a lot of the matchup types of things where we try to go and have guys trap guys. We haven’t done that as much. Sometimes we do that, but we haven’t done it yet.

Q: Did you use Usama Young at corner or could you?

A: We could. He’s a guy too that we cross train every week. Several of our guys have to play. As you go back to earlier in the spring when you guys were asking, I like tackles that play end, ends that play tackle, linebackers that play end, some ends can play linebackers and safeties and corners have to be able to mix too. So, yes and he’s one of those guys with corner experience that we can do that to get out of a game with what we need to do. Pierson’s (Prioleau) got a lot of flexibility. He came in the league as a corner into the league and I’ve done that a lot with him in the slot, him on the edge and those kinds of things too and if you see, we’ve had every one of our corners, every single one of our corners at some point in time have played safety in a ballgame. We’ve had them drop and play in the safety position too. So that interchangeable part of the position and how we go about doing it has been helpful.

Q: Do you anticipate a cleaner performance against the run?

A: Here’s what we’ll do. We have to do a better job of not having one squirt out on us, because we play so physical and play so well on the other parts of the game. We’ll see. They’re a talented group. I’m pretty familiar with this group of guys. I thought they were in the NFC East all those years but in the last, I think, this will be the seventh time I’ve gone against them in six years. It might be the eighth. I know the personnel pretty well over there. I have a lot of respect for their front. I think their front’s very physical and they got some really good backs. So, we’re going to have to do a really good job. We are going to have to tackle well. We are going to have to fit it well and try to get them into some third downs that we like to play. Obviously you’ll see all the other packages come when we play well against the run.

Q: It seems like you’ve defended the run better as games have gone on. Is that mental errors?

A: There hasn’t been a mental error once. It’s been a physical, where we’ve gotten guys cut and all of a sudden they’re on the ground and you can’t play defense on the ground in the National Football League. I tease them all the time. That’s why we do all the up downs in practice. They think it’s for punishment. It’s not. It’s so they can get their butts off the ground when we it happens in a game. We weren’t fast enough a couple times in the last two weeks. We fell on the ground and the ball cut back. We lost an extra defender here or there and give the backs credit. They’re talented. There’s a few backs in the league that can take it the distance. We have happened to go against those guys that can take it the distance. Cadillac’s (Williams) another one that’s that way. I’ve gone against him before the injury and after his injury, so we just have to do a good job of putting it up, doing a good job of gang tackling. Hopefully we can get the ball out. I think another thing with the second half stuff is a good testament to this staff being a short time with each other, I think it’s a talented staff. I said that when I came in here and inherited this stuff, but we’ve done a very good job of making the adjustments on the sideline and even at halftime we’ve done a good job of that and the players being receptive and confident. At no time since I’ve been here, has there ever been a player chew one of his coaches out. Sometimes I’ve been places where they think they know more. Obviously this is a good group, good locker room and they want to do right. They want to do right.