Hobson's Choice Podcast: Zac Taylor

Bengals.com Senior Writer Geoff Hobson chats with head coach Zac Taylor about the offseason, assembling the coaching staff and the increased used of analytics.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is a very special editions of Hobson's choice, the
first one with head coach Zach Taylor. Coach, it's great
to have you in one place. That's been a rare
thing since you took this job. Yep, it's been a
whirl away in these last couple of weeks. But I
appreciate you having me on. You've got obviously very busy
and free agency. I thank you guys the first phase
of but I know there are several phases, but the

(00:21):
first phases look like you get done what you wanted
to get done as far as solidifying the offensive line
and getting some help on defense. Yep. We I think
we were able to address get a lot of our
own guys back, you know that we feel had a
great value for us, and then going out and just
help strengthen our roster with some other guys from some
other organizations. And so I felt like it was a

(00:43):
good free agency for us. We got we needed, you know,
with John Miller and Bobby Hike coming back on the
right side of the line, you and Brian Callahan and
offensive line coach Jim Turner are obviously going to be
using this guy. These guys probably a little bit differently
than they have been actually seemed to fit in to
what you want want to want to do. Bobby is

(01:04):
an athletic guy, and John Miller has been terrific I
guess in a running game up in Buffalo, right. We
spent a lot of time studying our own guys, our
own roster from office lion standpoint, studying a lot of
guys around the league, and we've got experience with a
lot of different people, and Phil like these guys were
good fits for what we wanted to do. Bobby has
a lot of the tools that we feel like um
will really help us in our run game and our

(01:25):
play actions. And you know, he's still a young guy
that's got a lot of potential left in him, and
so we're excited to have him back. And then John
has had a good career in Buffalo, you know, there's
last four years there and he's really stout at the
point of attack and brings us a lot of power
up front. So really excited to get those two guys
we signed and signed. I kind of like what coach
Tim said about Preston Brown, but you know, he's he's

(01:48):
a middle linebacker. There's much debate over where these guys
fit in the league. But if you saw how New
England won the Super Bowl, you saw it up close.
They you know, it would have been nicely a nice
big middle linebacker like Preston Brown having a There's no
doubt Preston is He's a very smart guy, plays the
right way. He'll help build the right culture over there
on our defense. And so he's one of those those

(02:10):
those guys who's got good experience, got good leadership qualities,
sees things before they happen, and just one of those
guys we felt like we needed back in this building.
It's the first time we've seen you since your finalize
your coaching staff and the very it's an intriguing staff.
Not only is an intriguing, it's the biggest, it's the
biggest one in Bengals history. Kind of talk about that
a little bit. I mean, these are guys obviously, you

(02:33):
know you've got jobs for everyone. Yes, what are some
of the things you take away from this staff? It's
a very diverse group. Well, the biggest thing we want
to do is be patient and find the right people.
And so I know it was regarded to the outside
the world is taking too long, But for us. It's
just about finding the right people and making sure eybody
fit and was going to buy into the culture that

(02:54):
we're building here and that everyone's a good teacher, good communicator,
has high standards for the room, and has experience. And
so all the guys that we ended up hiring, um,
they all come from different backgrounds, they've all coached a
lot of different places for good people, but at the
end of the day, they fit exactly the mold of
the type of coach that we wanted. And it was
a very thorough interview process for all of them, really

(03:16):
and very excited for the group that we ended up
getting inside this building. Defense is very intriguing from his
staff standpoint. The two secondaries that got guys are coming back. Uh,
In a linebackers coach, you've got a guy that's been
in the league, Tim and he's been in the league.
He's got a great background, smart guy, played at Colgate.

(03:36):
Then on then on the defensive line, you got a
guy who's played in the AFC North played one hundred
and seventeen NFL games. And then you've got you know,
the coordinator, you work with the coordinator with Louiana Rumo,
who's who's been a career a career, a career coach,
as as Mark Dufferin, who's a familiar guy that he's
you know, who's he go from sixty six years of

(03:57):
age to to you know, like thirty seven. It's it's
you know, it's a really interesting group. But what do
you what do you think Lewi and Tough bring to you? Well,
the experience for one, And I've coached with both those
guys and seen their coaching styles and now with their
philosophical background stem for him and so those are two
great fits for this organization. And I worked for the the
lou for four years and I've always been impressed with

(04:18):
his coaching ability. In the year that he coordinated for us,
he did a great job. And then Duffner I was
with him for a couple of years in Miami as well.
He came in as a linebacker coach and just brings
a wealth of experience. I think he's got a great
rapport with the guys he coaches. They play hard for him.
He's a very detailed coach, faith the role coach. So
excited to have both those guys on board. And then
like you mentioned Tim Luca Boom, Tim has coached a

(04:41):
lot of positions over his career. He's a he was
an award winning linebacker at Colgate. As you mentioned, he's
coached the defensive line before when he was in college.
He was the assistant dB coach when he was in
San Francisco, and then he was the linebacker coach the
Slashio in Missive State, so he's gotten good experience there.
And he worked under under UH coach Ciano in Tampa,

(05:02):
which he did, which is which is interesting, Yes he did.
And then, like you mentioned, Nick Eason has played a
lot of ball in this league. I actually coach can
say one of my first games when he was at
Arizona and I was at Miami. So um, he'd had
a great career as a player, did an excellent job
coaching up front Tennessee Titans for four years there, and
so excited to get him in the building. He brings
a lot of energy to the table. I was just

(05:23):
wonder what your reaction is, you know, working with the organization.
I mean it looks like you know, you got you
you know, you've got a lot of coaches and you're
certainly expanding. I mean you're literally expanding, not only you know,
with the with the with the positions, but you know,
your office space, you've completely turned this thing around. I
don't know if you had a minor an architecture or what,
but you see that, you've seen that you've kind of

(05:45):
expanded the place, and it's is there anything you had
in mind with the kind of you know, with the
office and what do you wanted them? Well, I think
everybody rebrought in, you know, as you mentioned, it's the
biggest staff they've had here. But everybody's got specific value
in a role that they're going to play that we
think is critical or else they wouldn't be here. And
you know, from it's it's hard for people to see
you listening right now, but from a building standpoint, it's

(06:07):
important if you guys, an assistant O line coach needs
to be next door to the offensive line coach, and
so we tried to structure it that way to where
guys are closest to where they need to be to
get their job done. And so I have no no
background in architecture or anything like that doing a great
It's been an interesting experience, but they're doing a great
job here. These guys have really getting a lot of
work done, very quickly. I mean he happy with the support.

(06:29):
I mean it seems like absolutely, you know, there's no question.
And that's why you come to a place like the Bengals.
It's it's they give you which you need and they
just want you to do your job or the best
of your buildings. And so it's it's been great working
with this whole organization. I've got a campo, make you
on your taste with the You've got a painting out there,
the office of Paul Brown on the sideline is a
nice paint thing there. That's right. Yeah, you know, his

(06:54):
hand print is all over this building. You know, it's
he obviously affected the game in a very positive way,
and so um, it's important to show that around the building.
It's also gotta let's say, you're gonna really kind of
heavily emphasized analytics. You've made some moves there, I'd say,
and I know you come from a place to yep,
Mike the analytics, Yep, we do. You know, it's anything
you can do to help yourself prepare and get an

(07:16):
edge before game starts. And sometimes analytics play a huge week,
huge role from week to week, and sometimes it's it's
it's not as big from week to week, but it's
important to have all the information you need. You take
that as best you can and try to go win
yourself a game with all that information. Would you say
you're an analytics guy? You know? Sometimes I mean I
know you're just win guy. So sure, that's that's the
best way to put it. Whatever helps us when I

(07:38):
am open to doing and so, um, if that week
analytics gives us a big jump started on an opponent,
then I'm open to it and it'll help us, help
us be successful. A few numbers here and there. I can't,
I can't, can't hurt. No, they do not know a coach.
One last thing you hay to be a first owner's
meeting out and out in Phoenix and you'll be you'll
be part of the coaches media breakfast out there and

(07:59):
there'll be some issues out there. And I don't know,
what do you standout? Instant replay? You've happened to be
in a game that was They've got a lot of focus. Sure,
I think instant replay has certainly evolved over the years.
Is everyone's it's well documented. Um, you know, at some
point you've got to be careful. It gets almost too
confusing of what you can, challenge on what you can
and slows down the game. So I think we're at

(08:20):
a good point right now in my opinion, that we're
at a good point of how we use it, and
everyone's got a good understanding of how we're using it,
and so I'm satisfied for us at right now. So
you're not looking for an eye in the sky or
something like that, I'm open to hearing whatever you suggestions
anyone's got, but right now, I'm comfortable with the way
it's being used. You've you've never been to one of these.
It's kind of an interesting to you. I don't know

(08:41):
if anybody's talking about it at all, or you just
plan on hooking up with some of your role some
of your roll mentors. Coachman veya from one. That's right. Yeah,
there will be a lot of people out there that
I know, and so it'll be a good experience for
me in my first time around. You're great. We'll be
able to get you one spot again. I know we'll
get great Tuesday out of the media media, I want
to media Breakfast. We look forward to that and we
thank you for taking the time today and see on
Arizona travel safe thanks to appreciate US