OPENING STATEMENT: “Alright, there are no injuries to mention. Listen, the Lions did a heck of a job, capitalized on a couple things and we’ve got to fix those so. I like some of the efforts. I like what I saw on the defensive side for the most part and there were some good things on offense, we’ve just got to be more consistent to keep that and I’ll take this – the offensive part of that. We did have some good plays in there but disappointing loss. Good football team we lost to. We’ve got to play better and we’ve got to coach better, so that’s what we’ll do. With that, time’s yours.”
Q: On the dropped passes tonight.
REID: “Yeah it’s unusual for us to drop that many passes, anywhere, anytime. So, we’ll go back and work on that. You know, but you’ve got to take care of business and these guys know that and so we’ve got to fix that.”
Q: On the sequence before the two-minute warning. Can you talk about those decisions to go for it?
REID: “Yeah, I thought that we needed to do that at that particular time. They drove the ball on us and so I thought it was important that we gave that a shot, while we still had some time on the clock.”
Q: On the other fourth down decisions.
REID: “Yeah, we lost ground on both of those. So, we’ve got to do a better job there so, I’ve got to take care of that. I mean we work like crazy on our short yardage so for it to happen like that is not good.”
Q: Did you consider going for it on either of those fourth downs?
REID: “No, we went backwards there so I thought we were okay.”
Q: How would you evaluate the offensive line?
REID: “Listen there are some good things. I thought we did some – we protected pretty well throughout the day. We can always do better though.”
Q: How did the decision come about for Travis Kelce to not play?
REID: “He just wasn’t feeling right so I wasn’t going to put him out there with that and he was honest with me and we talked. So, just not enough time there.”
Q: How much of an impact was it to not have Travis Kelce out there?
REID: “No excuses, at all. We’ve got guys who can play that right there to take care of business. They’ve got us on special teams and continued the drive, they got us on the tipped ball. So I mean, listen it’s
unusual of the guys that dropped the ball to drop the ball. That’s not what I’ve seen from them and I wasn’t expecting them to do that so you do that, you take care of business there and you’ll be alright.”
Q: How much did you change the gameplan after deciding Travis Kelce wasn’t going to play?
REID: “We really didn’t have to. We kept the gameplan basically the same. They did a nice job of mixing their coverages and that but our guys handled it fairly well.”
Q: On the fourth-and-25.
REID: “It was designed to complete the son-of-a-gun. It didn’t’ work that way but I mean we were trying to – the best we could – to get a completion and keep things going.”
Q: It seems the offense has been historically good on third-and-long and struggle on third-and-short. Why do you think that is?
REID: “We’ve worked hard on that so, we’ve got to do – we’ve got to get better. We weren’t very good last year at it and we spent a lot of time working on that so we’ve got to keep going here and make sure we take care of it. I’ll take that. That’s my responsibility to get that taken care of.”
Q: Is it a credit to the Lions for being ready for some of what you threw at them in those short yardage situations?
REID: “Yeah, listen, I don’t want to take anything away from them. We didn’t handle it the right way and I’ve got to make sure I make the right calls to handle it and we’ve got to make sure we do it.”
Q: You were aware, I’m sure of Lions Head Coach Dan Campbell’s tendency to use fakes but he’d never done it inside his own 20-yard-line. Did that surprise you?
REID: “No, we mentioned it to the guys. We were ready for everything – special teams. I mentioned it to the guys. They were double the amount of fakes than anybody else in the league last year. So, they got us on it.”
Q: Are you any more optimistic on the Chris Jones situation?
REID: “Listen, no excuses. I thought the defense did some good things. You know that’s a whole separate deal that will work itself out whatever direction it goes but I thought our guys – I don’t want to take anything away from the guys up front – they busted their tail tonight and it didn’t come up the way we wanted but I thought they did some good things there.”