HEAD COACH MIKE VRABEL
Press Conference
May 20, 2025
Q: Just curious about your early impressions of Drake Maye and how he's been adapting to learning a new system?
MV: Well, I think everybody's worked extremely hard, including Drake, to pick up what we want to do offensively and defensively. Now that has to start to translate onto the practice field in a spring setting without pads, and I think that we're off to a good start. We had a positive day. We're able to mix some speed stuff in and some competitive stuff to a point. Kept guys off the ground, got a bunch of looks and a bunch of reps, so I think we're off to a good start, and Drake's a part of that.
Q: As part of this stage, Mike, what are the things that you look for from your players to get better as they go about this stage of the process?
MV: I think that that's probably an interesting question. Just the dynamic through the spring is – the offensive line, I think you can maybe evaluate some pass protection or somewhat the footwork, but it's hard to evaluate the run game. Defensive line, it's a difficult time of year for them. They're wired a certain way, and they want to do things that affect the quarterback and create a new line of scrimmage, and you have to pull them back to a sense. This is a passing camp. This is a non-contact camp and time of year, but I think the receivers and the DBs can certainly look to mirror, shadow, react and still go make plays on the football and try to stay up. It's hard to – maybe the running backs you can evaluate. Are they picking up the right person in protection? Not necessarily sure if they're going to be able to block them, but are they getting to the right guy? Quarterbacks, operation, the urgency in which we practice are things that are important. Our tempo, the way that we finish plays, our effort and continue to build the identity. Are we taking care of the football? Are we running with it in the open field? Things like that.
Q: When you mention not wanting to take guys to the ground, how do you balance that–
MV: It's not that. I would love to take guys to the ground. I'm joking. These are the rules that everybody's come to live by in the National Football League, and that's great. It's just explaining to the players what it is that we have to do and what we have to try to get accomplished. So, go ahead and finish your question.
Q: How do you accomplish the physicality that you want at this stage while still making sure –
MV: I don't think that you can. I don't. I think that you can focus on pad level. You can focus on hand placement, but physicality is not something that's going to be identified over the course of the next four weeks.
Q: We'd be understanding that this is obviously a non-contact camp. We're talking about not being able to get a good sense of where maybe running backs are from a physical standpoint. Can you just talk about where Rhamondre [Stevenson] is at this stage? I know he's going through a personal thing, but maybe the overall value that he has to this franchise?
MV: Oh, we're extremely excited to have him with us. I've been in constant communication with him. Obviously, our thoughts and prayers with him and his family as they heal and they grieve. I want to be a part of that to help them and get to know him. I met him early on and then he went back, and now those conversations have just been over the telephone. So, when you start to evaluate this season and you watch the effort that he played with when he didn't have the football, he played extremely fast without the football. His ability to step up and protect is taking care of a teammate. It's protecting the guy with the ball. He did that on numerous occasions. You always saw him downfield when he didn't have the ball. So, he's going to be a large part of what we do, and we'll just have to determine where he's at when he's back here.
Q: What constitutes a good day for you at OTAs? What would make you happy at the end of today?
MV: Again, I'm going to set myself up for failure because you're going to look and read off every single one I say here. That we're in and out of the huddle, that there's clean substitution, that there's communication. You hear the defense making checks when somebody on the offense moves or motions. There's coordination, that the offense is moving with urgency and that the play clock isn't sitting at zero for four seconds. All the operational things. Then obviously, there's got to be a level of execution when we're in the speed. Then when we get to the jog through, can we practice at a tempo that's less than 100% and still get something out of it?
Q: Mike, when does the competition truly start from a positional standpoint and for guys trying to earn spots?
MV: I think that it already has. I hope that it already has. Life's a competition. Everything we do every day, we're trying to improve and we're trying to do better than the next person. But whether that's a competitiveness to know what to do, to be able to play more than one position, to go extra reps when somebody's down and take advantage of opportunities, young guys popping in there. Third group, they do a nice job, then they get elevated and get some reps with the twos, and you see how they do with those opportunities. So, I think that there's always a level of competition to what we do. It just may not be as physical as what it would be in training camp.
Q: Mike, related to that question, how much evaluation is going on for the coaching staff right now versus the installation and the teaching that obviously you're doing this spring?
MV: Well, there's certain things you have to change the way that you evaluate. Do they know their assignment? Can they adjust? Do they make the same mistake over and over? Then there's a level of physical ability that we have to be able to evaluate. So, I would say that there's still an evaluation even though we don't have pads on.
Q: There's been a lot of talk about the culture you're building. Just from early days of the team all being together, what are you noticing from them all coming together?
MV: I think there's an excitement. There's an energy. I think there's a willingness of players that walk in and want to improve, want to get to know the new players and the ones that they're familiar with from last year, the coaches and everything else. We're just constantly trying to build that each and every day.
Q: We know that Stefon Diggs has been dealing with last year's injury. Anyone else that we shouldn't expect to see based on coming back from something from last year?
MV: There'll be a group of guys that will be modified today or won't be doing stuff. So, it's a long list. I'm not going to go through it, but there'll be a few guys. They'll be doing some individual. They'll be doing some return to play. They may do some jog through stuff at the end.
Q: Mike, how would you describe the jump for a running back in pass protection from the college game to the NFL, and how important are these practices for TreVeyon [Henderson] in particular as a young back coming in?
MV: These are mental reps. These are seeing things at speed until – it's full speed to contact is really what we say. So, we want the blitzer to go as fast as he would, disguise the way he would and try to time it up the way that he would. Once he gets to the player that's blocking him, we're going to ask them to stop, and then be ready to go and sprint out of the stack and finish his play that way. So, they're good because there's disguises, there's moving parts, there's other bodies. It's not just a walkthrough pace. So, I think the tempo is going to allow them to identify the right person to protect and to block, and then we'll see in training camp if physically they'll be able to do it, which by all accounts, I think that they will.
Q: Mike, I know fans get excited about it. When the NFL schedule comes out, how do you look at that as a head coach?
MV: I just make sure that we've got 17 games. Nine of them are at home this year and eight of them are on the road, then we go from there. We're so far from looking at opponents right now at this point in the game. We're just really trying to focus on ourselves, individual improvement, continue to build the identity that we try to talk about, and that's where my focus is today.
Q: Have you guys finalized the joint practices yet with the Commanders and Vikings?
MV: I think for sure that the Washington Commanders will come here and then they'll play us, and then we are excited to go to Minnesota. It's a good setup that they have. It allows for great work. The Vikings have an excellent football team, and we have worked with them before, so we're excited to go back up there.
Q: Mike, do you think the young players need to see the field consistently or get first team reps consistently to become an effective leader in your locker room?
MV: No. I think that any player that comes here with a great attitude that knows what to do, plays a style with the demeanor that we expect, that does things the right way, that makes great decisions will have an ability to lead someone or have some sort of leadership qualities, whether that's with the third group, with the second group or with the first group. I don't think that a young player has to be on a starting unit to be considered somewhat of a leader.
Q: We tend to overanalyze lineups at this point in the season.
MV: That's fair.
Q: What's your philosophy when it comes to the depth chart? Is it veterans and then young guys earning it?
MV: It's just kind of what we put together. If you've got to go with 11, it's going to be very fluid. You'll see that a lot of people are getting a lot of different reps in a lot of different groupings. Wide receivers will rotate out of there, and some linemen will play a position and then we'll see if they can move over and play another position. Again, you have a job to do; we have a job to do. We're going to try to move guys around and put 11 out there every play.
Q: Milton Williams told us a story about how he enjoyed getting called out by you –
MV: First of all, that's not being called out by me. That was just an encouragement. If you have the ability to do something, I think you should try to maximize that ability. I think it sends a great message to the team. We're going to need our best players to play well every week for us to win, and that's just another example of leadership. I found when one guy runs fast, some other guys tend to run fast. The more and more you see, you've got a bunch of guys trying to push each other and compete, and that's what we're trying to do.
Q: With the wide receiver room, specifically, what are you looking for – because it's a very full room at the moment – what are you looking for specifically with them in these early days?
MV: When you say things like it's a full room, I would say that 31 other teams are going to have 11 or 12 wide receivers at this point in time. So, everybody's room is full. There's 11 or 12. I would say that the players that aren't available need to make sure that they're doing everything they can to stay up mentally and continue to work hard to get back. The young players that are coming onto this roster have to earn a role. The ones that are returning have a clean slate to go and compete, whether that's a carryover position from last year or a new position. We're very early on in the process, but we need that group to compete and have a willingness to go out there and help the quarterback through this spring process.
