And we had another day where defensive coordinator Jim Haslett filled a notebook. Those days all end in Y. But today he was particularly good. Sadly, I, and many others, missed it while attending the Youth For Tomorrow ceremony so we could interview owner Daniel Snyder.
But through the miracles of transcripts, here’s what Haslett said. It’s all pretty good.
On if he has experienced a player dictating what he will play and what he will not play: “No, I don’t think I’ve ever had a player just tell me he didn’t want to play Okie defense, then later on he didn’t want to play nickel versus the run, just play me on third down. No, I’ve never had that before. We tried to accommodate him but it’s a shame because he’s athletic enough and he can do almost anything he wants, but obviously he didn’t want to do it. Good athletes can do a lot of different things. Basketball players – guards can play forward. They can play different positions. I watch throughout the league, I watch wide receivers do the Wildcat and I think to myself, if you’re a good enough athlete you can do almost anything you want. You just got to want to do it.”
On if he was asked for his opinion prior to the team suspending Haynesworth: “The suspension, not really, I think that was something that kind of came up. Being active, Mike [Shanahan] talked to me the night before [the game] about my thoughts and I told him what I thought. I told him my perspective from a defensive coordinator’s perspective and I also told him if I was in his seat what I would have thought.”
On if the different perspectives have different answers: “I think there’re two different answers.”
On if the defensive coordinator perspective would have wanted to use him Sunday: “You always want to use good players but they got to be willing to do what you want to do. Obviously, if a guy is not willing to do what you’re doing, and you’re the head coach and the guy doesn’t practice well on Thursday, about as poor as I have ever seen, and then Friday, a so-called illness that he doesn’t practice, then if I’m the head coach on a Saturday night getting ready for Sunday and you got to make a decision what’s best for the football club and I think Mike made the right decision to make him inactive based off of what he saw. We know over the years, based off of what we saw last year on film when he didn’t practice well or he doesn’t show up for Christmas or whatever the situation is, he doesn’t play well. I think Mike [Shanahan] made the right decision.”
On if he spoke with Haynesworth after being suspended: “I haven’t talked to him. I don’t think it’s right that I talk to him right now. At some point I would like to talk to him because he’s still a part of this football team, but I think it’s got to be a situation where he’s going to have to do what you want to do. For us to coexist there’s got to be some give and take here and more give than take because give on the other side has been giving a lot.”
On if the transition to the 3-4 defense may have been a mistake: “Last year I got here and the first thing I did, I watched all of the tapes. I saw a guy who just got $100 million played bad as a 3-technique and then at the end of the year when the defensive coordinator left I saw a guy that blasted him saying, ‘I didn’t like the defense, I didn’t like the 4-3, I didn’t like the way I was used.’ Can you ever make the guy happy? I don’t know. You do exactly what he did in Tennessee, you’re not happy. There are things in life you just don’t want to do and you’re grown up and you got to do it. My father told me there are things in the world you’re not going to want to do but if you want to get ahead in the world you’re going to have to do it. Well, I think we’re at that point. Not everybody in the National Football League is going to let Albert [Haynesworth] just do what he wants on the field. It doesn’t work that way. Wherever he goes or stays here, whatever, it’s going to be under the same constraints. He wasn’t happy this year with the 3-4. He wasn’t happy last year with the 4-3. What else do you want to do? You want to run a 2-5? I read the same stuff. I watched all of the films. I watched 16 films…. There are a lot of things being said by a lot of different sources but the reality is this, Thursday he had a bad practice. Friday he didn’t practice and he was inactive for the game. Whatever all of the stuff that built up over the last six months, Coach Shanahan decided enough is enough. I like Albert. I think he’s a talented football player. I really like the guy but sooner or later he’s going to have to grow up and understand what’s going on.”
On if he has sensed a different attitude among the coaching staff or players over the last couple of days: “No, our guys come out and work all of the time and they work hard, they like being out here. They like practicing. They’re good in the meetings. They ask questions. I’m not saying that’s not the case all of the time. If you come out and watch practice, our guys practice hard. Last Thursday we had one guy that didn’t practice hard. [He] didn’t run to the ball, didn’t do anything we asked him to do. That’s what started this whole thing.”
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