Press Taylor

Q. With your additional responsibilities as pass game coordinator and taking over some of the coordinator responsibilities like running the meetings and calling plays out on the field, has that taken away from your direct contact with QB Carson Wentz, and since you have so many other senior assistants who have previously been co-quarterbacks coach allowed them to deal with him more, or is it still essentially the same with you primarily in his ear? (Jeff McLane)

PRESS TAYLOR: I would say in terms of our communication, still the same. We spend a lot of time together. We’re in constant communication throughout the week, throughout the day, in meetings, throughout meetings. So I would say from that standpoint, everything is the same. Obviously, we have a lot of great help around, and those guys have been invaluable for myself and Carson as we go and build this thing.

Q. Now that you’ve been through training camp, obviously, and we’re into week one and the preparation standpoint, can you take a step back and take us through how your role has changed, obviously not about specific game planning but just about your roles and the filtering process and how much things have changed on a daily basis for you? (John McMullen)

PRESS TAYLOR: I would say the day feels like it goes really quick. You feel like you’re constantly moving, and part of that’s just the schedule that we have. Maybe responsibility here in terms of scripting something for practice has changed a little bit, but still involved just as much as I ever have been in the quarterback meetings, in constant communication with [Eagles head coach] Doug [Pederson], with Carson, with all the other offensive coaches, as well, and this continues to be a collaborative effort. I don’t know that much has changed. Everybody has always had their piece of the puzzle, and then we all put it together and come together and all agree on what we’re doing, our philosophy in situations, how we’re going to attack each game plan, what we’re thinking in each situation within the game plan, so that hasn’t changed much I would say.

Q. Without this preseason and having a new coaching staff in Washington and a completely different looking secondary, what have you guys been studying in order to get a grasp of what they might do? (Mike Kaye)

PRESS TAYLOR: I mean, like anything, you always want to study the personnel, which has been — we’ve kind of known the personnel, knowing the people we’re playing, but at the same time you’re trying to study them within the scheme. We’ve spent a lot of time watching our experiences against Coach Del Rio [Washington defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio], against Coach Rivera [Washington head coach Ron Rivera], as well as what they’ve done in the past, what they were doing last year in Carolina, what they were doing the last couple years in Oakland, where those guys have been in their past. You want to go through and make sure you uncover everything that could possibly show up. You always look at how they’ve attacked you in the past, so every time our offenses have played against their schemes, we’ve gone through and made sure we’ve watched all those. Obviously we’ve known we were playing them for a long time, so we’ve been able to go back and do this work throughout the summer, make sure we’re uncovering everything and then put together what we believe it’s going to be based on the personnel they have. And then make sure we’re covering everything else, just what our standard operating procedure is versus all different looks. You don’t want to go chasing ghosts, but you want to be prepared on everything. That’s where I think it’s extremely valuable to have a veteran quarterback and a veteran center, the two guys in the middle of our offense that are really identifying things and calling things out. Those two are in constant communication. They do a great job identifying and making sure as an offense we’re all on the same page, and they’ve done a really good job of that this week, and we have a lot of confidence in them.

Q. In terms of the passing game, you have three rookie wide receivers that are trying to get on the same page as Carson. What have you seen from those young guys in terms of personality, in terms of kind of getting along and building that chemistry? (Daniel Gallen)

PRESS TAYLOR: They do a great job. They’re all extremely eager to learn, and that’s been the awesome part about it. [Wide receivers coach] Aaron [Moorehead] and Jason Avant and [assistant wide receivers coach] Matthew Harper, those guys have done a great job spending extra time with those young guys specifically. Obviously, we brought them in early before training camp. They were in before the vets. We were able to really pour into them, get a lot of reps. You’re never going to make up what you missed in the spring, but we were able to invest a lot of time in those guys, have the quarterbacks around them, be in communication with those guys throughout, and they’ve all done a great job attacking this thing, making sure they’re asking the right questions, making sure they’re getting reps they need, studying off other guys’ reps. That’s one of the most valuable things you can get out of this stuff, and I think those guys have done a great job being eager to learn.

Q. How does your game day responsibility change now and logistically is your location different in terms of the booth or the field? (Zach Berman)

PRESS TAYLOR: Right, I will be on the field, so I’ll be able to be down there. I’ll be able to communicate with Carson coming off, which in the past it was a phone call. It wasn’t a ton different, but we were able to sit there, go through the pictures together, communicate. Then other than that, we’re all on the headset to begin with as coaches, so we’re always communicating, whether you’re up, down, however it is. That won’t change much different. But yeah, excited to be down there and see what that’s about. I haven’t been downstairs in a long time, so it’ll be fun.

Q. You guys have always had a strong close-knit quarterback room, and QB Jalen Hurts comes in, another guy who is like-minded, similar beliefs as Carson and QB Nate Sudfeld. How do you see that quarterback room evolving right now, the camaraderie, the closeness, and as far as Carson’s leadership role, it seems like he’s taken it to another level this year? Are you seeing that? (Rob Maaddi)

PRESS TAYLOR: I would agree with that. I think it’s important that the quarterback room, the dynamics in the quarterback room all mesh well, and we believe it does. We really like what Jalen adds to our room. The skill set is one thing, but the personality like you say, it meshes really well together. He’s another kid like the other young receivers, he’s really eager to learn. He asks good questions. He’s very observant about things. So he’s done a good job of making himself a part of the group, and the other guys are doing a great job bringing him along. We’re all in there to put our best foot forward and help make this team better, and everybody has handled that the right way, gone about that the right way. Really proud of the way the other quarterbacks have all integrated Jalen and the way he has meshed with the group, as well. And then throwing [QB] Josh [McCown] back in the mix, that’s what Josh does well. Josh is a great person, fits in really well, asks a lot of great questions, offers a lot of great advice. It’s been a healthy dynamic.

And then as far as Carson’s leadership with the young guys, that has definitely been obvious. He is always in communication with all the skill guys around him — hey, I expect you to run this route this way, if this guy plays it like this, I see you leaning like this, keeping him here, I’m going to throw you — that’s always been a part of the communication. So you see that a lot, and that’s probably just — maybe last year the little run we had at the end of the year with some of the young guys, maybe that helped Carson even a little more of here’s what I need, here’s what this team needs out of me, and it’s going to change every single season, but he’s done a great job embracing that, and I think guys really respect him for that.

Q. You’ve got this Washington defensive line with all these first-round picks. Looks like you might be going into this with maybe three of the five offensive linemen you would have thought were starters back in May not there. Does that affect your approach to the passing game at all, what you really emphasize getting the ball out quickly? Does it curtail some of the things you might want to do? (Les Bowen)

PRESS TAYLOR: I think any time you’re going to game plan, when you first sit down and start, you think about what’s our personnel? What’s their personnel? Where are our good match-ups? Where are our bad match-ups? How do we accentuate a match-up? How do we protect a match-up? What fits us? You’re doing it across the board, from the inside out, our offensive line versus their defensive line, our tight ends against their backers, their safeties, their defensive ends, from the outside in, our receivers, how do they match up. Any time you’re putting together a plan, I think that comes into play. So obviously they have a very talented defensive line. They do a great job putting pressure on you with their front seven and then they do a good job in the back end, as well, so every game plan we ever put together I think that’s always something you take into account and try to find your match-ups and really put your advantage even further forward if you can.