Chargers Blog

(Injury update)
“I’ll give you the best update I can on injuries. Jeromey Clary has a ligament strain. It’s going to be a period of time before he’s able to play. I can’t give you an exact number because we don’t have one. They’re doing all the different tests right now and we’ll know how serious it is over the next couple of days. It’s his left ankle, opposite of the injury he had (last week). Luis Castillo has a strained calf and as we have with these, we’ll see where he is on Wednesday, what he’s able to do. It’ll be a late in the week decision I’m sure, Saturday or Sunday maybe even, if he’s able to play. Shawne Merriman came out and went back in with his foot but our guys feel that he’ll be pretty good, that he’ll be alright. Nick Hardwick I think will again practice some on Wednesday and we’ll just see how he’s progressing. (Brandyn) Dombrowski went in and played right tackle and I would expect that would be what we’ll do Sunday in the game for Clary. I thought Brandyn went in and played pretty well in the situation he was put in.”

(Introductory statement)
“Before I talk about the game, a couple of things that I found interesting, I’ve been coaching in this league a long time in the same division and you start believing some things that have been true. Sometimes you say it and you wonder if it still is true. A couple of the things that I’ve always talked about is how hard it is to play in Kansas City and the talent that Oakland has, particularly on their defensive front and their overall ability. When you go beat a team like that, sometimes people assume, ‘You went to Kansas City and you should beat them because they’re not very good,’ or ‘You beat Oakland because they aren’t (very good).’ Then you turn around and see Kansas City beat Pittsburgh and Oakland beat Cincinnati, two pretty good football teams, then it starts to reconfirm some of the things I believe. Maybe I haven’t lost it completely in terms of understanding completely what this league is all about.”

“From a standpoint of our game, as I said after the game, it’s the most complete game we’ve played. It was nice to be in that situation in the fourth quarter that we’ve talked about. I think Kevin (Acee) asked me last week about the running game. ‘Is that what we want to get out of the running game?’ I said, ‘What I’d love to do is get in a game where we have that type of lead where we can just grind on them and pound and wear someone down. We were able to do that and our offensive line appreciates it and our backs appreciate it and our defense appreciates it. I think that was good. I think you get into games like that by playing great in the kicking game like we did. Obviously we were hurt in the first game against these guys. I thought our coverage was outstanding. You play defense the way we did. We created big plays. We got the sack/fumble at the beginning of the game that changed the game dramatically. We got the fumble down in there (near the goal line), those things do happen. Then offensively, we continue to play better. I think we’ve gotten comfortable with the changes we had to make at the beginning of the season. Scott Mruczkowski has continued to play well. Louis Vasquez has played well at the right guard spot. That combination of things has really helped us.”

(on what the Chargers have proved about the NFL with their turnaround)
“The biggest thing to me is we have a serious situation with Jeromey Clary’s injury. We’re going to have to handle that. (It’s) a combination of how Brandyn plays and how we manage it. After the Oakland game, the opener, we have five of those situations. We had our running back out, we had our right guard out, we had our center out, we had our nose man out and we had a couple other guys that certainly weren’t at full speed and able to play. Then we were trying to bring in new people. That’s a process. It’s not going to happen overnight. I think we can get to where people want us to be. To me it takes everyone believing that we can do that. This has shown and what it should show our players and everyone involved is if you believe in something, you keep doing it over and over and you keep working to get better, then good things can happen for you. We’ve been fortunate. The win in New York was an amazing win. If you can win games like that along the way, you can continue to build momentum.”

(on his awareness of the AFC playoff picture)
“I think when you start getting to this point in the season around Thanksgiving you do, but I do a pretty good job of not falling into that trap. I know this is a hard week to prepare. I know there are teams that handle the Thanksgiving week better than others. I’ve been involved in a number of the Thanksgiving games. Sometimes I think you’re better off playing on Thanksgiving Day because you get right into it. We’ll practice earlier on Thursday. Our guys will be off in the afternoon for Thanksgiving. There’s a lot going on around our team right now with the honoring the Greatest Chargers. A lot of our guys are involved in that. We just came off a big win, so there are a lot of things that could distract us. My focus is going to be on making sure that doesn’t happen.”

(on the challenges involved in maintaining success)
“The best thing about it is that we’re not anywhere near where we can be. We’ve got a lot of young players that I think get better each week. A week ago I thought Marcus McNeill played his best game of the year. He came back and had an equally as good performance. Louis Vasquez missed 2 ½ games so, what’s he, playing in his seventh NFL game? There are a lot of areas where we can just continue to get better. We keep trying to grow from a scheme standpoint. I think some of the things we’re doing with our different guys are helping us get better. We’re finding different ways to get different people the football. We’re finding different ways to use all our talented guys and get them in positions where they can make plays.”

(on Kansas City’s play Sunday being a good reminder for the Chargers)
“A team coming off two big wins like Kansas City is, I think helps our guys. The most important thing for them is to put the film on and when we watch our first game, there are some physical matchups and there are some plays that we made because we were in the right place at the right time. There were some plays that they made. We had some very positive things happen for us in that game. Again, this league is such a one or two play league. The great example is the fumble in the red zone that Denver had. If they score there, it’s a 13-7 game and it’s going to be a barn burner. They didn’t score. We were fortunate on that play and it changed the game completely.”

(on the possibility of Clary being out for the year)
“I think that would be premature, but that is a concern of mine, yes.”

(on his comfort with the depth at offensive tackle)
“It’s crazy how things happen. Dombrowski took all the snaps last week and we were prepared to play with Brandyn. Once Jeromey was able to go Friday, obviously we were going to go that route. It bought a week for Brandyn. He’ll be a week better. He’ll prepare again this week the same way and he’ll be ready to play.”

(on what he likes about Dombrowski)
“He actually played on the left side all preseason. He’s a talented, physical young player. If you would have asked me that question in August, I would have said he’s a year away from playing, but that changes. It changed the first night of the season. He’s handled things extremely well. He gets a lot of help and encouragement from the offensive linemen and he’s just done what we’ve asked him to do.”

(on LaDainian Tomlinson’s health)
“I haven’t talked to LT yet. I think he feels pretty good. He took a pretty good shot in the ribs but I think he’ll be fine by the end of the week.”

(on how his play calling is affected by what running back is in the game)
“I really try not to let it affect it. We’re tied into situational football and what’s happening in the game. We have a pretty good plan in terms of what we’re trying to get done. I don’t put limitations on Darren Sproles. He can do the things we need him to do and he’s a great change of pace guy for LT. I know there are some thoughts that he shouldn’t be in there on 3rd-and-1, but he’s actually a very good short-yardage runner when we block the play properly. The problem we get is when we get too many guys in there he’s obviously not going to move the pile. There’s some thought with Jacob (Hester) and Tolbert with the way they ran yesterday that we can mix them in a little bit in those situations.”

(on how much he’s personally considered Hester and Tolbert as short-yardage runners)
“No question. We talked about it this morning. My first choice obviously is LT. Darren has done a good job with it. He’s been in a couple difficult situations where he had no chance, but both Jacob and Michael Tolbert have a bigger body. They can move the pile a little bit and find a crease and still get some extra yardage I think.”

(on Tolbert’s increased involvement in the offense)
“I think it’s just the way games came up. Against Philadelphia it was a specific play against something that we thought we could be from them in that situation. He and Jacob are almost going 50-50 in terms of snaps. It just happened he was in the game when the play was called. I don’t have a preference. I like them both and they’re both capable of doing the things we need to do. What’s really helped us by playing both of them on offense, they both make great contributions on special teams. That combination, we’re getting the most out of those two guys. Michael has always shown that he’s got great ability with the ball in his hands. I don’t like his dance in the end zone. He’s a little loose down there doing that dance, but if he keeps getting in there I guess we’ve got to keep letting him do it.”

(on Tolbert’s strengths versus those of Hester and vice versa)
“I think they’re very similar. They’re both very, very competitive guys.”

(on his use of trick plays)
“We’re trying. We try to have two or three up every week whether they get called or not. When LT throws the ball, it’s a good thing. When he’s throwing it to Philip and Philip gets to throw it, it’s even a better thing. When you’re throwing to Gates it makes it outstanding.”

(on the play being a reaction to the onside kick Denver tried)
“No, it really wasn’t. It’s something that we wanted to use in that area of the field. We had two drives kind of stall out in that 30-yard line area. We kicked a 48-yard field goal. I thought it gave us a chance to get down inside the 10 and it did. It got us to the two.”

(on how off the field distractions can impact a team)
“The reason I chose not to comment on it, and I will at the right time, is there are some facts being gathered and unfortunately sometimes these reports are correct and sometimes they aren’t. We’re lucky. We have a mature group of guys. We have an intelligent group of guys and we have great leadership. Unfortunately you have these issues. Our guys have done a great job of not letting them distract them from doing what they need to do in terms of football.”

(on what he tells his players in situations like this)
“It starts to me with the NFL. The NFL has done a great job for a number of years now with the rookies with the rookie symposium, with player programs. We try to follow up in terms of everything we can. There are decisions that we all have to make on a daily basis. We try to give our guys as much information as we can.”

(on having his players work Monday)
“We’ve had a couple of Mondays off. I don’t like doing it too many weeks in a row. I know our guys would have loved to have today off, but I thought it was important to get our guys back in. We have a complicated week. There’s a lot going on. There’s a Charger Blood Drive tomorrow that our guys take part in and have forever. It’s a big deal to them. They’ll spend a lot of their day tomorrow there. Obviously we’ve got Thanksgiving. We’ve got a short schedule. Friday there is a Block Party where they’re honoring the Greatest Chargers so I just thought getting in here today, getting started on the week and giving them a plan for what we need to get done this week was important.

(on if he talks to opposing players before games)
“Not a group. I have some guys that I’ve always talked to in a friendly way. Troy Vincent, when we’d try to beat him on a double move route, he’d always look over at me and say, ‘Why are you wasting your time, Norv?’ Never before a game I don’t think.”

(on if he “owns” any guys)
“I don’t own my own kids.”

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