Josh McDaniels New England Patriots Offensive Coordinator Super Bowl XLIV Interview

Josh McDaniels, the New England Patriots Offensive Coordinator, said that using the short pass in combination with the run to control the ball was a key approach for them in Super Bowl XLIV. But what’s missing from the Q and A is any question about the use of something called “the jet sweep.” The Pats had never used that play before, so I was curious why it was installed for Super Bowl XLIV.

NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS OC/QBs JOSH McDANIELS (NFL Media transcript)

(on Tom Brady leading another game-winning drive) “He’s the best and showed it again tonight. He never got disappointed or discouraged when we had a couple of turnovers in the course of the game. He just kept fighting and demonstrated a lot of confidence on the sideline, a lot of confidence at halftime. I think our players fed off of that. I don’t think we ever felt like it was anything more than us needing to go out and execute. He was the guy that we put the ball in his hands and he really came through big in the fourth quarter.”

(on the gameplan to maneuver around Seattle’s cornerbacks) “We knew that the backs would catch a lot of balls. It’s a zone defense. They hardly played any man-to-man tonight and, when they did, Gronk (TE Rob Gronkowski) really had a big night on a few of those snaps. When they try to back out of there and give you a lot of space, we knew that the backs were going to eventually play a big role in it. We have a lot of trust in Shane (Vereen) and he did a great job tonight in his role.”

(on the use of the short passing game ) “There was some of that. I don’t think it was entirely that was. We knew that we were going to use the short passing game as a complement to whatever running game we were doing. We helped control the rush that way.”

(on Julian Edelman’s performance on the first touchdown drive of the fourth quarter) “Julian is one of the toughest players I’ve ever had a chance to coach and this is typical of Julian to fight the entire four quarters. He was physical, getting knocked down numerous times and taking a bunch of big hits, but he just kept playing and playing and playing. He returned punts and, ultimately, came through enormous in the fourth quarter. He’s a self-made player and he’s a tremendous guy for our team.”

(on if Julian Edelman looks wobbly after taking a big hit and whether anything happened on the sideline) “I don’t know. He never came over, I don’t believe, so I’m not sure exactly what that was. He just kept playing.”

(on if Tom Brady is the greatest ever) “It’s hard for me to compare him to other guys in other eras. I know this –it’s privilege to coach him and he’s definitely, to me, the best of this era. I don’t know where he ranks in history. Who’s done more than him? Who’s done more winning than him, with the team changes and the coach changes? Bill (Belichick) and him have been together for this entire and they deserve a tremendous amount of this credit.”

(on if he was surprised to see Russell Wilson passing at the goal line) “Darrell (Bevell) does a great job, so who am I to question him? They did a great job all night. It came down to one play. We made one more than they did.”

(on strategy of Patriots passing offense) “It’s a zone team and they played a lot more zone than man tonight. When they played the man, Gronk had a big night on some of those plays. You have to make them cover somebody and display somehow in the zone coverages and bring somebody else into that spot where somebody left. We tried to do it as much as we could. It’s a tremendous defense. This is as good of a unit as we’ve played in years. We knew we were going to have to fight for every yard. Our guys took a lot of big hits. They deserve a lot of a credit. This was a nip-and-tuck game and we had to make one more play at the end than they did.”

(on playing the Seahawks zone coverage) “You’ve got to try to make them move. If they all just settle back, the throwing lanes are so small that you can’t make any yards. You’ve got to make somebody chase something else and then bring somebody in behind. We had a little success with that and our guys deserve all the credit. They made a lot of big plays.

(on the impact of injury to Seattle DB Jeremy Lane) “Obviously, we were aware of when he went out. Look, (Richard) Sherman’s a tremendous player, so you’ve got to be smart when you go over there. We just tried to play the percentages there.”

(on his confidence going to RB Shane Vereen on third-down situations) “We’re confident going to all of our guys. There’s a reason Shane is in the game as much as he is. He’s a tremendous asset in blitz pickup and, obviously, he’s a great pass receiver out of the backfield.”

(on having success against the Seattle defense) “You have two weeks and we watched about two years worth of games against them and you just try to accumulate as many ideas as you can that might help you gain some yards. Look, they stopped us for a number of drives there in a row. I think it’s just a combination of trying to put our guys in a position to make plays and them going out there and making a bunch of big ones.”

(on how the flow of the game affected the usage of Gronkowski versus the original plan entering the game) “I think, more than anything, what they did on defense – it’s a zone team and, a lot of times, there’s not a lot of space. There were conscious of Gronk. He made a couple of huge plays and then the huge play on the crossing route in the fourth quarter to really get us down there in there end. We didn’t expect this to be some game where Gronk just came in and dominated the whole game, because they don’t play much man-to-man coverage. We were patient. He was patient and he made his plays when he had his opportunities.”

(on how confident he was in primarily throwing the ball in the 4th quarter) “With Tommy (Tom Brady)? As confident as you could possibly be. We’ve had to do this numerous times. We did it in the first playoff game against Baltimore. If it wasn’t him, I’m not sure that we would’ve had the luxury of saying, ‘You know what? Let’s use that as our version of the running game.’ But that’s who we have. He allows us to do so many things. We never consider that a deviation from the gameplan. We’re just like, ‘All right. We’re going to make it a bit more of a quick passing game, at times, to control the pass rush and then take our opportunities down the field.”

(on the third down and 11 when the Patriots were down 10 points) “I think that was the one where Julian (Edelman) caught the in-cut. We just tried to get as many guys past the sticks as we could. They played zone. I think the key to that play was that they ran the ends around the quarterback, so it cleared the middle and Tom had a chance to step up, which bought us some time there and the coverage kind of broke down a little bit. Julian was actually the last guy crossing the field and Tommy made a great throw and, obviously, Julian made an unbelievable catch and took a big hit.”

(on if he’s able to appreciate the moment) “I’ve appreciated every second of this trip. This is my sixth one and I think, sometimes, you can take things for granted. Win or loss, whatever it was, we had no regrets. We did everything we felt like we could to prepare for this game. Our families are here. I was just doing snow angels on the field with my two kids. This is a dream come true.”

(on if he noticed anything different about Julian Edelman after he took that big hit) “No. Like I said, I didn’t have any sense of that. I was just calling the game. Until they tell me that somebody is out, I don’t ever really change my thought process.”

(on how much patience it required to keep clearing those zones out) “It was a big word for us this week. We talked about having patience and poise. We knew we weren’t going to drop the ball in four plays. This is a great defense and they don’t give up many big plays and they tackle well and all the rest of it. It was an execution game. We needed to execute multiple games in a row and just continue to do that as many drives as we could. Our players did a great job.”

(on Danny Amendola’s role) “Danny’s a team guy. He’s unselfish and every week he prepares hard for his role and is ready to go for however much we use him or however much we don’t. That’s no issue to Danny. Whatever we ask him, he’s ready to go. He always comes up big in big situations for us. We’ve got a lot of confidence in him and, again, he played his butt off tonight. We played with that group – Danny, Julian (Edelman), Jo (Brandon LaFell), Gronk and Shane (Vereen). That was our group that we trusted all year in those situations and Danny’s certainly a big part of that.”

(on Tom Brady in the second half) “I’ve never seen somebody with more mental toughness than this guy. I’ve coached for 14 years and I’ve been around a lot of good players. I don’t know that anybody eliminates distractions and focuses on his job any better than Tom does, regardless of the outside circumstances that he’s dealing with. He’s done it numerous times over his career and he did it a lot this season. That’s why he’s one of the greatest players to ever play this game.”

(on Tom Brady joining Terry Bradshaw and Joe Montana with four Super Bowl wins) “This is a fitting end for him to this game, going through all he’s gone through, with a couple of opportunities over the last seven years and falling just short. To be able to come through in the fourth quarter, with two huge drives like that, I don’t know where he’s at. Who am I to say that? I know there’s a lot of great players that have played that position, but this guy is as good as they come.”

-SB XLIX-