Nick Sirianni

Q. What led to the trade? (Jeff McLane)

Nick Sirianni: I think [Executive Vice President/General Manager] Howie [Roseman] does such a good job of continually trying to improve our football team. No one does it better than he does and we thought that was an opportunity to add some depth at corner. We feel good about our depth. Obviously, we’ll miss [DT Thomas Booker] Book and wish him the best. We feel good about our depth at defensive tackle, but just a way to add some depth there at corner.

Q. What’s the plan to onboard CB Jakorian Bennett and will he have a chance to compete for a starting job? (Dave Zangaro)

Nick Sirianni: We will get him going. We’ll get him going and we’ll see how that goes. Obviously, there’s a lot of meeting times that we have to make up. We’re getting him early in camp though, and so we’ll catch him up in some off time, catch him up during the meetings and have some other things to get him ready to go.

Q. What does CB Jakorian Bennett bring to this team? (Tim McManus)

Nick Sirianni: We liked his tape coming out. We liked his tape when he was with the Raiders, and just that he’s got speed, coverage ability, and special teams value, so we’re excited to have him.

Q. What’s your philosophy when a starter misses a long stretch of time with injury? When they come back, is it that they get their job back or how do you handle the situation? (Eliot Shorr-Parks)

Nick Sirianni: Every situation’s obviously a little bit different as far as that goes. We’re not to a point where we name starters on anything, but every situation’s a little bit different and every scenario is a little bit different, so I wouldn’t say we have a cold cut philosophy of what happens in those scenarios, but every situation’s a little different.

Q. CB Jakorian Bennett was dealing with a shoulder. Have you gotten a chance to evaluate him in the building yet and how does he look health-wise? (Brooks Kubena)

Nick Sirianni: They go through all that before anything’s made official, so I’m looking forward to having him out here and getting him going.

Q. [Regarding depth at DT and who’s standing out.] (Ed Kracz)

Nick Sirianni: Yeah, I think obviously you’ve seen [DT] Jordan Davis have a really good camp so far. You’ve seen [DT] Moro [Ojomo] have a really good camp. [DT] Jalen Carter’s back obviously and doing really well. I think [DT] Byron Young has done well. The whole group’s done well. [DT] Gabe [Hall]– again, I feel like that group’s done a really good job.

Howie does a great job, again, at getting guys in here, and I can’t say enough about our position coaches. [Senior Defensive Assistant/Defensive Line Coach] Clint Hurtt is one of the best position coaches in the NFL. Our job as coaches is to develop those guys. Get talented players in here, and then our job is to develop them. I think you’ve seen that from a lot of our guys, whether that’s [Inside Linebackers Coach] Bobby King, I’ve mentioned him before, Clint Hurtt, Stout [Run Game Coordinator/Offensive Line Coach Jeff Stoutland]. I think [Quarterbacks Coach] Scot Loeffler is doing an excellent job.

I’d love to go through every one of those guys, but I feel like we have position coaches that really do a good job of developing the talent. I don’t think that gets talked about enough, just the job that our assistant coaches and position coaches have done of getting these guys to play good football. It’s a team, so it’s getting the right guys in here, getting good players in here, the right guys in here, and then developing that talent. I think it’s worked really well. We’ll continue to try to do that.

Q. What does this say about CB Kelee Ringo and CB Adoree’ Jackson and what have you seen from that? (John McMullen)

Nick Sirianni: Again, just adding depth to that position. I think both of those guys have done an outstanding job and I know [Defensive Coordinator] Vic [Fangio] talked about that yesterday. That’s a battle. You love having battles and I think you can look out there and see Adoree’ make a play and you see Kelee make a play, and you guys have seen it. They’re doing a really nice job and [we’re] excited about how they worked and how they worked all offseason, how they worked all summer and came in here ready to compete.

Competition brings out the best in all our guys, and we’re looking forward to continuing those battles with those guys. I think what’s really obvious to me with this football team is how much they like to compete. That’s part of toughness is your competitive drive. I can’t tell you how many times [RB] Saquon [Barkley], [QB] Jalen Hurts, [DT] Jalen Carter have come up to me and said, ‘Hey, what’s the competition today?’ ‘Hey, what are we doing for the competition today?’ ‘Hey, why haven’t we done one of these yet?’ And it’s making me think about different ways we can compete against each other. We’ve got a new way we are going to do it today, but I love the competitive drive of this team.

Again, like I said, competition brings out the best in everybody and it gives you ideas, like we ran a fourth-down play the other day. It gives you confidence to be able to go for those things in the season. I also firmly believe that competition brings teams closer together. We say this all the time, if you think back to all the guys that you’re closest with, I bet in this sport, you’ve competed against a lot of them. So yeah, it’s been good competition, and I like what’s going on.

Q. What are you looking to see Thursday night, and defensively, do you let Defensive Coordinator Vic Fangio have a say in whether he wants to play guys or not? (Bob Brookover)

Nick Sirianni: Ultimately, at the end of the day, Howie and I have to make those decisions of who’s playing. Obviously, I listen to input from all our coaches, what they think and what they’re feeling, but at the end of the day, just like everything, I’ve got to make some final decisions. But yeah, we talk through everything.

I guess what you’re looking for when you play a game like this is that you’re looking at all your habits when the pressure’s high and the stakes are high, that all your habits come to life, and so you want to see good tackling, you want to see good ball security, you want to see good takeaway ability. You want to see good blocking, you want to see good block destruction, you want to see smart situational football. You want to see all those things, right? We want to see all those things right there.

Q. Are we right to look at it that CB Jakorian Bennett will be part of that battle for the outside spot? (Tim McManus)

Nick Sirianni: We’ll see. We’re excited to get him out there and start getting him going and see what he has.

Q. How big is the preseason game for guys trying for a roster spot that maybe you can’t really see? (Martin Frank)

Nick Sirianni: As you can see, our practice is highly, highly competitive. We’re out in the field. Our guys are highly competitive. We make an emphasis of being competitive. You see a lot out there. Obviously, there’s more. It’s live, which is different, and so you’ll see more live tackling. I think that’s the biggest thing is what you’ll see is that. But, like I said, you’re just looking for all your habits to come to fruition, come to life there.

Q. Have you made a decision about Thursday with playing? (Eliot Shorr-Parks)

Nick Sirianni: Yeah, still thinking through all those things. Everything’s discussed. We’ve spent a lot of time discussing it and we’ll see how that goes. And today’s practice, this will be our third day in a row in practice, and we’ll see how guys are feeling after this and go from there.

Q. [Regarding concern of LB Zack Baun and WR A.J. Brown’s injuries.] (Jeff McLane)

Nick Sirianni: Yeah, I don’t get too much into that. Obviously, we don’t have to put an injury report out right now. As you can see, they’re working through some things and when they get back out there, we’ll be excited to have them.

Q. Offensive Coordinator Kevin Patullo mentioned RB Saquon Barkley and QB Jalen Hurts being so invested in practice. In your experience, is it rare for superstars to be so invested in practice? (Bo Wulf)

Nick Sirianni: No, I think on good teams, your best players work the hardest and are the most competitive. Then everything else follows after that. So, I wouldn’t say that’s rare. I think that’s a staple of good football teams.

Q. With LB Jihaad Campbell, how do you make sure that you harness his aggressiveness in practice so that it doesn’t go over the line? (Dave Zangaro)

Nick Sirianni: Yeah, if an offensive lineman’s coming out to block him, he’s going to have to put his hands on him and get off that block. So, our practices are aggressive, our practices are high paced. He’s out there and ready to go.

Q. Have you called the competition in right guard? (Jeff McLane)

Nick Sirianni: Again, we don’t have to name any starters at this particular point. [G/T] Tyler [Steen]’s obviously been in there with the ones and he’s doing a really good job. I thought Tyler had a really good offseason the way he worked. I get reports, I talk to the strength staff every single day, and Tyler Steen seemed to come back every single time of how good he was doing in the weight room with his strength, with his agility, all those things. So, pleased with where he is right now and I look forward to continuing [seeing] him grow.

Q. Offensive Coordinator Kevin Patullo mentioned that against the Bengals, it’s not like a real game. Obviously, you guys aren’t scheming them up like you would in a week process. How are you kind of working towards a game day operation, just how you are working as an offense? You mentioned practice. (Brooks Kubena)

Nick Sirianni: Yeah, again, just the way we practice. We get a lot of work in at practice as far as our game day operation where the refs are spotting the ball, we’re making decisions on situations on the fly. We’ll look to do those same things in the game, give ourselves an opportunity to go through in a full game setting. But like I said, we’ve had a couple operations practices to date in practice, so it’ll just be good to continue to grow. We’ve got to work just like the players have got to work to be ready for the games as well. So, it’s just another opportunity for us to do so.

Q. Some of these past seasons, you’ve had two joint practices against two teams. Why only one this year for the second year in a row? (Zach Berman)

Nick Sirianni: I think if you look back at our history, I never want to do it the first week of preseason. I think there’s just too many things– and everybody does it a little differently. I just think you’re still going through installs. We just installed our backed up in four-minute yesterday, and so you’re still going through your installs and so you want to make sure you get everything in and still compete against each other.

The last two years we’ve played on Friday night and then this year on Thursday. So, a little too close for my comfort as far as a joint practice before that, and I know it’s only a couple of days, but that’s just the philosophy I have. Our work there this year is going to be against the Browns for two days and sometimes you get two days against the team, sometimes you get one day versus two teams. So, we’re still getting two joint practices, but that’s kind of the philosophy.

Q. What’s the practical effect, beyond just keeping good players, of the way Executive Vice President/General Manager Howie Roseman has gone about handing out contracts? (Mike Sielski)

Nick Sirianni: Again, Howie’s the best in the world at what he does, and it’s really awesome to work with him every day and to go through day-to-day things with him. I just think he does a great job, and it works for us.

Q. How valuable has the opportunity been for WR Johnny Wilson and WR Ainias Smith getting first team reps with WR A.J. Brown being out and WR DeVonta Smith before that? (Martin Frank)

Nick Sirianni: Obviously, the ones in our practices get more reps, so they’re getting more reps than they would get when they were with the twos. So anytime you get more reps, that’s huge. It builds trust with the quarterback, which is always big.

Johnny had a big third-down catch in a backed-up scenario yesterday, which again, builds confidence. So, I think those guys in that wide receiver room are doing a nice job. [WR] Jahan [Dotson]’s been good all offseason. Same thing like how I mentioned Tyler Steen. Jahan is another guy that’s really showed up, and then, it has been a good battle for that four or five spot. I think Ainias shows great quickness and acceleration. He’s scrappy.

Johnny, I think it’s probably underestimated how much Johnny did for us last year on that field. One of our better special teams players, a guy that was very powerful at the point of attack on the number one rushing team, and then looking forward to [WR] Terrace [Marshall] getting back out there. [WR] Elijah Cooks is doing a good job. [WR] Darius Cooper has got a lot of talent, and we’re excited to continue to work with those guys.

Q. How much have you learned from preseason games, live reps for guys that are not fully entrenched in getting all that playing? (John McMullen)

Nick Sirianni: Preseason games tell us a lot and we’re so excited to play those. It’s such a great evaluation tool, but we wouldn’t be doing our job in practice if we weren’t going about our practice the way we do, where we get to evaluate there. So, I think the only thing that’s different is that it’s live to the ground, but our offensive line, defensive line, linebackers, they’re essentially going live every single play that we have pads on. And so, we get that evaluation there.

So, [QB] Tanner [McKee]’s had a nice camp so far, and that’s just a good sign of when you have reps– like Tanner had been used to getting two reps at the end of the threes or three or four reps, whatever it was. Now he’s getting those extra reps with the twos and he’s done a nice job, and we’ll continue to evaluate him at practice and in preseason games. We just look to continue to develop him.

And like I said, Scot Loeffler is doing a great job. I know Jalen in that quarterback room; the guys get to learn from him. That’s huge. Kevin is in the quarterback room an awful lot, [Passing Game Coordinator] Parks Frazier’s in that quarterback room. So, there’s a lot of guys in there that are helping with that development.