On the run game: "What you saw on Sunday is we did a better job of having consistent runs with less negative runs. It was good to see with both not only Darren [McFadden], but Goody [Mike Goodson] to share the wealth a little in the run game. I was pleased with [Stefen] Wisniewski's performance and certainly, with him and Willie [Smith], getting more reps in our offense, you're hoping to get that kind of continuity and that progression and success. That's worked out well the last couple weeks."
On the Jacksonville defense: "Kind of a bend but don't break. They'll play wide ends and try to funnel everything inside. They're missing their number one linebacker Daryl Smith who's coming off injury, who I understand is practicing this week. They fly to the ball. They do a good job in disguising their coverages. They're simplistic but they play very fast."
On Goodson: "He's actually caught a couple good breaks in the screen game. We got a perfect defense for that screen he caught down near our sideline with an overload blitz. He's done well in the pass game, taken advantage of a couple screen plays, and then he hit a big outside zone for us I think it was that second-to-last drive when we were in a backed up situation. He did a good job of creating a seam for himself and made that safety miss in the open field."
On QB Carson Palmer's reaction to the interception: "I'm glad you brought that up because I told the group on Monday, and it started with him, how proud we are as coaches because that's probably the toughest scenario you can put an offense through and that's to turn the ball over on the road against an undefeated team and still come back and tie the game with less than three minutes. His initial reaction, to answer your question, was all right, it's over with and a phrase we use, short-term memory, he applied it. Made a mistake, didn't want to dwell on it, wanted to get ready for the two-minute offense because we were going to get the ball back. So he did a great job rallying the troops, let it go. Then afterwards of course took full credit for it. That's the standup guy that he is."
On if they talked about the mistake right after it happened: "You don't even dwell on it because there's going to be a PAT and a kickoff and you go right down and say, 'this is what we're going to have to do now in two minute to get the ball down the field.' We start talking about our two-minute offense."
On if WR Denarius Moore is fully back: "Yeah, that play he made after the catch was nice to see how he made the one guy miss and Brandon Myers did a great job making a block down the field. That showed me a little explosion and YAC [yards after catch] after contact. You can see some of the separation in his routes showing he's getting back. He's not quite 100 percent, but he's getting back closer to it."
On chemistry between Palmer and Moore:"Yeah, working through the routes and different coverage looks. It's showing up in practice and it carried over into this last week's game."
On Coach Knapp getting after the offensive line in the 2nd half: "I was told I got a little animated there. I believe it followed two holding calls and a hit on the quarterback in succession and we always preach about let's not allow our own mistakes to slow us down. Maybe if they have a unique blitz or unique defensive look and they got a good look and it happens every now and then, that's one thing. But when we self-inflict wounds and put ourselves in long distance situations, we have to correct that right now. They responded real well because think about what they had to do after that was going on in the middle of the 4th quarter. We actually put two nice drives together in a situation where the defense knew we were going to throw the ball and they protected the quarterback really well and that's tough against John Abraham and Ray Edwards on the other side. I was very happy to see how they responded."
On Coach Knapp's knack for calling screen plays: "I have to give credit to players. They're executing at a high level in that area of the game. They've done a fine job in terms of the timing of the screen with the linemen, with the backs showing pass protection before releasing or the tight ends. But it's something I've believed in as far as a change up to help offset a pass rush. For us this year, it's been pretty effective."
On knowing when to call a screen: "It's a feel thing. I can't say there's a certain down and distance or a certain time, but we've put enough in the game plan that we feel comfortable that we can pull from based on the looks we're seeing from a certain team. Maybe this end is a fast pass rusher and he's not playing the screen at all or maybe a play fake is a better screen than just a drop-back screen. We'll look at those tendencies. We have enough in the game plan that we can pull which once might be working best based on what we're seeing the defense do."
On if T Willie Smith will be better having faced guys like Elvis Dumervil: "No doubt. Think what he went through…he went through a crash course. He jumps in here week 2 of the regular season and starts playing and gets live reps with our first group and then has to go against that opponent, those types of opponents early on. That's tough. You saw what they did on Monday night. That's an elite two pass rushers you have off the edges. And he learned from that and it showed up in handling Abraham. No Abraham still had his couple good plays, but that's elite sack rushers we're going to get. I thought Willie really improved his game as the game progressed in this last game."
On if Smith's game against Atlanta was better than against Denver: "Yes, no doubt."
On if the run scheme changed against Atlanta: "We did some more one-back power and we emphasized, instead of wide zone, we did some tight zone as change ups, but it was still pretty good mix in 35 or 33 rushes. It was a pretty good mix of both. Keep in mind too, this is really the first game we've really had a chance to keep the run game going throughout the four quarters so it gave us a lot more opportunities to use the whole run game package. That helped keep the defense honest."
