Rex Ryan Has Lots Of Praise For Patriots
BOSTON (CBS) - Rex Ryan is great television and he his also great conference call material. Today he spoke on the phone about the Patriots and he had a lot of praise. He did not let on to whether Darrell Revis was going to be covering Wes Welker but he did mention number 83 is tough to defend.
"I think the big thing [with Welker] would be, he plays in the slot a lot of times and it's hard to get [at him]," Ryan said when asked why teams don't put their best cover corner on him more often. "He's not just an outside receiver, he's a slot receiver and, a lot of times, there's pick routes and all those type of things that are tough to defend."
Here are some other items Rex touched upon:
On his evaluation of the Patriots' pass rush: "The Haynesworth kid only played [two] game[s], but he was a dominant player. Then, obviously Vince -- I think Vince should probably move to safety, that might be the next move for Vince. They're doing a great job. They do what they do, they force takeaways, they're playing better in red zone. Their defense, statistically, it never ranked way up there. It's not like they were [No.] 1-2 in league in defense. They are effective, they make you make mistakes, they don't give up the run, they do great job playing the run, and they don't have ball shot over their heads -- that's what they do. Now, I expect them to come after us more because we didn't do a great job protecting our quarterback [last week and] I would expect more pressure from New England this week."
On DL Shaun Ellis' play in New England: "I think Shaun is an excellent player, no question about it. They brought in [Andre] Carter, they brought in Shaun, they brought in Haynesworth, all to add to what they already have. Obviously, it's an upgrade from what New England had. Shaun's an excellent player, he can play a 3-4 defensive end, play in a 4-3 defense... I think it was good move by Belichick to bring him in, he is a guy that can play any defense you've got."
