Vikings Quotes - Frazier - January 20
Posted Jan 20, 2011
THURSDAY, JANUARY 20, 2011
Vikings Head Coach Leslie Frazier
Good morning. It’s good to see everybody here this morning. I think for all Vikings fans, this is a good day. We’ve gone through a thorough process in trying to make the right decision regarding our coaching staff and are very thankful that today we can talk a little bit about some people that are going to help us in achieving our goal as an organization, which is to bring a world championship to Minnesota. That’s what I’ve been implored to help make sure happens and I think with this process that we’ve gone through we’ve done some of the right things and taken some of the right steps to insure that that’s going to happen. We’re really excited about the people that we’ve added to our staff.
I’d also like to thank the people behind the scenes who helped to orchestrate and really get the logistics done regarding acquiring the right people for our staff. Our front office did a terrific job. It helps to have the support of ownership; very fortunate that the Wilf family has been so supportive throughout this process. Rick Spielman, Kevin Warren, Rob Brzezinski did a terrific job behind the scenes just making sure that things were in place and then being patient. I was asked the question by a few people along the way, ‘Is there a time frame in getting this done?’ I maintained throughout that the most important thing for us was to get it right and not to feel pressure to make a move that would not be in the best interest of our football team in the long term and that’s how we approached this process throughout. It was more important that we were thorough and doing a good job to ascertain who was going to give us the best chance to reach our goal as an organization.
One of the most important hires for me was the offensive coordinator position. After much thought and deliberation and going through a process and making sure that we were doing the right things, I think the gentleman that we settled on in Bill Musgrave will do a great job for us. With my background being more so on defense, it was important to me to make sure that we get that position right and I think we have. Bill has had success in our league, most recently with the Atlanta Falcons. He’s done a great job of developing a young quarterback in Matt Ryan and we’re in a position where we’re going to have to do something similar, at least we expect to. We’re going to need to develop a young quarterback, whether it be Joe Webb or whoever it is, over the course of this next season. Bill has proven that he’s more than capable of helping to get that done but also being able to bring in some new ideas from an offense that has been very successful in Atlanta. He’s been around some very influential and successful coaches, whether it be Mike Shanahan, Mike Holmgren, going all the way back to Joe Gibbs as well. He’s been around some very successful coaches and because of that I think he gives us a great opportunity to be successful on offense as well and get us to the place that we need to be.
We were fortunate to acquire Jeff Davidson as our offensive line coach. He’s a gentleman who was most recently the offensive coordinator with Carolina. They did a terrific job in the run game, which has been his forte going back to his time as a player, as an offensive lineman in our league and then coaching with New England as well as Cleveland before he got to Carolina. One of the things I really liked about Jeff is that they were able to find a way with DeAngelo Williams along with Jonathan Stewart, to have two 1,000-yard rushers in the same backfield. As you know, we have two outstanding backs in our minds with Adrian being the premier back in the National Football League and then Toby Gerhart, who’s a guy we have high hopes for. To be able to find a guy who understands and knows how to incorporate two very good backs in the run game was something that really kind of got my interest and I think it’s going to be a plus for us, the success they had running the football down in Carolina.
One of the other additions will be Craig Johnson, who’s done a very good job developing quarterbacks with the Tennessee Titans. Most recently he worked with the running backs there but prior to that he had been their quarterbacks coach. He’s done a good job over the course of his career and I’m looking forward to him being a great addition to our staff.
One of the other guys that I’m extremely excited about is someone that I’ve worked with for the last four years in Minnesota, being able to move Fred Pagac up to the defensive coordinator position. I have a lot of respect for Fred, what he’s meant to me in that room when I was the coordinator. I really enjoyed watching his maturation over that six-week span while I was the interim coach and some of the things that he was able to get done and just the energy he brought to our defensive side of the room. I look forward to watching him continue to help our defense evolve and get us to the point where we are a championship group throughout our football team, particularly on the defensive side.
Of course, adding our Special Assistant to the Head Coach Mike Singletary is a great coup for our organization. Mike and I have a long history together, going back to our playing days. We’ve always stayed in touch, even when he wasn’t coaching. Going back to my early college coaching career I can remember Mike and I doing football camps together, the Leslie Frazier and Mike Singletary Football Camp, and I remember telling him a number of times, I’d say when we were at the camp and he was working with the kids, ‘If you wanted to go into coaching you’d be a good football coach.’ At the time that really wasn’t on his heart and I’m looking forward to getting the chance to work with him. I have a guy now who has head coaching experience that I can use as a sounding board as I’m making decisions regarding our team and our personnel. It should be a great addition to our football team. Of course a great player in his own right, but his experience should really help me as a coach as well.
Our special teams’ coordinator is Mike Priefer, a guy that I’ve had a lot of respect for over the years as I’ve watched his special teams. Of course, his dad was a long-time special teams coach in our league and had a ton of success and Mike is from that background where he understands the importance of attacking and being aggressive and having a desire to score on special teams. We really believe that our special teams are not any less that our offense or defense. They’re just as important and Mike understands that and I really look forward to working with him. He knows exactly what we want to get done, just like all our other coaches do. I think every guy knows and understands what our role and what our purpose is, and that’s to work towards bringing a championship to Minnesota; pure and simple. That’s the way that we’re going to approach it and we want to be able to do whatever we can to make our fans proud. I think today our fans can be at rest knowing that we put together a very good staff that will have a tremendous impact on our football team and get us in the position that we need to be in to get back to being NFC North champs. I’m excited about our group; very excited.
Q: What did Bill Musgrave present to you schematically in terms of what he’d like to do with the offense?
A: The fact that Bill has been in a variety of systems, although I think some of his best success as a player was in the West Coast system with Shanahan, to be able to combine the things that he learned in the West Coast system along with the things he picked up with Joe Gibbs and some of the other coaches he’s been around. When we sit and talk, and we’ve talked for a number of years about the potential of being able to work together, the fact that he wasn’t just tied to one system, that he could see globally, that was important to me because we have a multitude of weapons on our offense. Sometimes you can get so tied up in a system that you don’t see the forest from the trees and it was important to me that he understood the importance of utilizing the strengths of our players on our offense. He was able to exemplify that in our conversation. I’ve seen him do it in Atlanta with Mike Mularkey so I knew that he had an idea of how it could happen and once we sat down and talked about it I was convinced that he was the right man for the job.
Q: What did you see from him that makes you think he’s better equipped to have success as an offensive coordinator after his two previous stints with Carolina and Jacksonville?
A: One of the things that was really impressive when I talked with Bill was the fact that he was able to look at the past and do the things that were necessary to continue to improve in our profession. If you look around our league there have been a number of successful coaches that along the way had some bumps in the road. In some ways he’s no different in that regard, but the fact that he’s learned from each experience and he’s gotten better and better as a football coach to the point where he was the assistant head coach in Atlanta, he was the next guy in waiting there for their offensive coordinator position, just his history during his time in Atlanta has convinced me that Bill is going to do a great job for us as an offensive coordinator.
Q: How important was it that he has the track record of developing young quarterbacks?
A: That was extremely important. The success that he’s had in doing that, whether it be working with Matt Schaub (at the University of Virginia) or most recently with Matt Ryan (in Atlanta). That was important knowing our situation and knowing how important this draft is going to be in our being able to hopefully develop a young quarterback, because our goal is to secure that position and find a guy that hopefully we can build our organization around. That being the case, why not go after the guy who has a proven track record in having success and doing that? It played a major factor.
Q: How important is it that he can bring some similar West Coast schemes to the offense since there is a possibility that you won’t have much time to work with the team due to a potential lockout?
A: There are so many unknowns regarding the lockout. But the fact that he can integrate some of the things and some of the principles of the West Coast system definitely made a difference so we don’t have to completely overhaul our offense. Those things mattered as well.
Q: Why’d you move away from Darrell Bevell? What was it that he lacked?
A: I really like a lot of things that Darrell did for our football team and for our offense in particular. I don’t know if there was any one specific thing. I have a lot of respect for him as a coach and as a person. We talked this morning and he’s going to do a great job in the next position that he’s in and I fully expect him to have success. There wasn’t any one thing that I could look at and say, ‘This is why we’re going in this direction.’
Q: Can you give some clarity to the situation with both Darrell and Brian Murphy, as they seemed to be kind of in coaching limbo?
A: In reality, both Darrell and Brian, when we began this process I mentioned to the both of them that if they had an opportunity during this time, I would not stand in their way from talking to people. But I felt like coming in as the head coach I had to treat it as if I were a new coach coming in and starting anew. I didn’t want to assume anything; therefore I wanted to make sure at the coordinators’ positions that we did everything necessary to put in place the things I thought were going to be necessary for us to win a championship. The choice could have been, ‘You guys are out the door and I’m going to just start this process anew and if you find something you find something.’ I didn’t want to take that approach, and they didn’t want me to. They would have rather been in the role that there were in, knowing that if someone called I wasn’t going to stop someone from talking to them. Things have worked out for the both of them and I think we’ve tried to do the right things for our team.
Q: Did they have the option to stay, perhaps in a reduced role, if they didn’t find something else?
A: I won’t get into the specifics of that, but both of them know that there were opportunities in Minnesota. I think things have worked out for all included.
Q: Do you anticipate any major changes schematically on the defensive side?
A: I don’t think there will be anything dramatic, not at all. There are going to be some things that schematically we’ll take a look at but it’s going to be important that we improve in certain areas, without question. There won’t be a dramatic overhaul by any means.
Q: The defense’s most successful game last season was in Philadelphia where you ran a lot of slot blitzes. Could you move away some from the Cover-2 or will that still be your base defense?
A: Some of what we do on defense, similar to offense, your personnel dictates what you can do; how aggressive you can be, whether or not you need to play a little bit more zone. Some of the things we do this offseason with personnel will determine how aggressive we can be or whether or not we need to be able to do some things we’ve done in the past, and that’s rushing four and have success. A lot of that will depend on our personnel.
Q: Safe to say you’re going to stick with a 4-3 front?
A: Very safe to say it will be a 4-3. You’ll see Jared Allen coming off the edge.
Q: Did Singletary even have to interview, knowing how close you are?
A: I called him up and interviewed him on the phone. I said, ‘Hey man, you want to come out here and help me out, help us win a championship?’ Mike Singletary, that was his interview.
Q: How close were things with Josh McDaniels?
A: The most important thing for our football team and our organization, and it’s almost the same thing I talked to our players about when I took over the role as interim head coach, you really don’t look back at things that you don’t have a lot of control over. Regarding our coaching hires, the most important thing for us are the guys that are here. Those are the guys that you want to talk about. I’m excited about the guys that have said, ‘I want to help the Minnesota Vikings win a championship.’ That’s what gets me excited. It’s hard to look back at games or people and think about ‘What if?’ or what could have been. The most important thing for us is the fact that the guys that are a part of the Vikings staff today have chosen to be Minnesota Vikings coaches for one reason: they want to make the fans in Minnesota proud of the Minnesota Vikings and bring them a championship. That gets me excited.
Q: With Jeff Davidson coming in to coach the offensive line and his past experience, will he have more duties in the run game while Musgrave handles the passing game?
A: No, it’s Bill’s baby. It’s his offense. He’s going to run our offense and he’s going to determine what we’re going to do in the run game. Obviously he’ll get input from his coaches, whether it be George Stewart at wide receivers, or in Jeff’s case with the run game. He’ll get input regarding the passing game and the run game from his assistant coaches, but he’s going to orchestrate our offense and put together the game plan with the assistance of our offensive coaches.
Q: Will you continue to go with a zone-heavy blocking scheme in the run game?
A: There’s a very good chance of that, without tipping too much off six months ahead of time. When you’ve got Adrian Peterson, you’re going to do what Adrian Peterson does best, and that’s no secret.
Q: How involved are you going to be on the offensive side?
A: One of the things I talked to Bill about, and Fred as well and Mike, as a philosophy regarding our team and our offense and defense and special teams, that those guys are clear on what I’m hoping to see happen and what I expect to see happen. My involvement will be to support him, just like I’ll support Fred, just like I’ll support Mike Priefer, and trying to give them everything they need to be successful. My involvement won’t inhibit what he has to get done, but I will be involved with our defense, with our special teams, with our offense, but not to the point where I’m micromanaging our staff. Those guys are highly qualified to be successful. I’ll only be there to assist them and give them direction.
Q: Do you feel like you need to go after a veteran quarterback?
A: Now that we have assembled our staff, we’ll get together and begin to talk about what steps need to be taken regarding the quarterback position. Is it a veteran guy to bridge the gap as you’re developing a young guy? Or do you get a young guy and say take it and run with it? We’ve got to go through that and talk about it. As a matter of fact, our scouts are at the East-West Shrine game taking a look at players. We’ve got to make that determination and we’ll get that done.
Q: Was this difficult for you to be the one hiring and firing these positions?
A: It’s a difficult process, especially in this case where you’ve worked with guys for a number of years like I have. Now you’re making decisions that are going to affect people’s lives. It’s a part of our profession; I’ve been on the other side of it. I know what’s required and I know that my purpose in being here is to bring a championship to Minnesota. Anything less than that, we’ll be parting ways down the road; that’s the way this business is. It’s hard. You have feelings. These are friends. It’s a tough deal. It’s the business we’ve chosen.
Q: How far back does your relationship with Musgrave go back?
A: I remember him as a player and the success that he had in our league. Probably about 10 years ago when I was working in Philadelphia we got a chance to converse and just talk about some things way back then. We just kind of kept a relationship over the years, bouncing ideas off of one another and talking about various situations.
Q: Have you gotten clarification from Darrell that he is going to Seattle?
A: I really can’t speak to that. I’m sure there will be an announcement relatively soon, but I can’t really speak to it.
Q: How close are you to filling the running back coach position?
A: We’re real close to getting that done. No particular guy. I’m not naming any names, but we’re close to getting some things done at the running back position.
Q: Are Karl Dunbar and Joe Woods retaining their positions?
A: With the exception of Mike on defense, there are no additions or deletions on defense. The one move we made, Ryan Silverfield, who was in a backup role as an assistant quality control guy is now going to move and be an assistant offensive line coach to Jeff.
Q: And George Stewart is staying as well?
A: Staying at wide receivers. Jimmie Johnson’s staying at tight ends.
Q: Is the running back position the only one left you want to fill? And the idea with Ryan is that he is assisting Jeff?
A: Yes, running back is still the one position remaining. Ryan will be the assistant to Jeff on the offensive line.
Q: Did any players end up having offseason surgeries?
A: Other than the guys we talked about in our final meeting, Anthony Herrera had postseason surgery, no new guys. Pat Williams had to have something done on his elbow. I can’t even recall some of the other guys that had to have things done. Nothing major though; nothing where we don’t expect our guys to be ready for the first game of the season.
Q: If you had your choice, would you like to get a young guy in and start developing him right away?
A: I guess it depends on that young guy. Ideally you’d like to find the Matt Ryan’s of the world, the Joe Flacco’s of the world and ride with one of those guys. It doesn’t always happen that way. Just have to kind of see where things fall. If we find someone like that, you’d like to build around them because that really gives you a chance for the long term. As I mentioned it doesn’t always happen that way. If we have to go with a veteran guy as we’re developing that young guy, I’m not opposed to that either. But ideally, yes, find a young guy, build around him and know that you’re going to have him for the next 9-10 years as your starting quarterback. Those guys are sometimes hard to find.
Q: How does it work in free agency in the next two months between you and Rick Spielman? If you see a veteran quarterback that you like will you lobby to Rick?
A: It’s a long process. We will all work together to try to come to the right conclusion. I think between Bill, Rick, his staff, myself, we’re just going to work as a cohesive unit and try to find the right guy. Whether it be a veteran guy or a young guy, it’s so hard to determine right now because we’re so early in the process. We’ve got a lot of work to do. There’s a lot of film that has to be evaluated. There are a lot of campus visits that have to be made. It’s going to be a long process, because this is one that we need to get right. We need to get it right. It’s going to be quite a process.
Q: How much did you and Bill discuss Adrian being the cornerstone here? Atlanta runs the ball a lot.
A: It played a role, without question. They’ve had a ton of success running the football with Michael Turner. That was a great addition for them, getting him from San Diego. The fact that we had Adrian in our backfield really got Bill excited about the opportunity to call plays for Adrian. Having a plan for Adrian, as well as Toby, was an important part of the conversation. We want to be able to run the ball, but we don’t want to exclude Percy or Sidney or Bernard or Shiancoe. Being able to spread the ball around will hopefully be a big part of our future success. But the fact that Adrian is in our backfield definitely played a role in Bill being our offensive coordinator.