Hogs' Sam Pittman on Road Trip to Florida

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Arkansas Razorbacks coach Sam Pittman on equipment going to Florida, status of Raheim "Rocket" Sanders and expectations with new offensive coordinator Kenny Guiton ahead of Saturday morning's game with the Gators at The Swamp in Gainesville, Fla.
Transcript
00:00 in fall camp and do you take the big fans on the for the sidelines on the equipment
00:04 truck and stuff like that?
00:06 I don't think so this time.
00:08 I think we think it's going to be around 76 to 78 and that should be we should be fine
00:13 there in that in that temperature.
00:15 It may get up to 80 by the end of the game or something but we've talked about hydration
00:20 and just making sure we're ready to go.
00:23 It'll be fun to go out there.
00:25 It'll be great atmosphere and great weather for November.
00:30 I know you've talked in the past and maybe this week too about you know you'd recruited
00:35 Josh Braun when you were in Georgia and obviously he went to Florida.
00:39 When a guy goes to a different school especially now with the portal how important is it to
00:44 maintain your relationship so if they decide they want to make a move that you know you're
00:49 somebody they're going to consider?
00:51 I think Bob I think it's more important that just when you leave like you're recruiting
00:58 somebody and then they decide to go to another.
01:01 Think it's more important of how you are when that happens to you.
01:05 You know I mean mine was different because I got the head coaching job at Arkansas and
01:11 I don't know maybe a couple days later he decommitted from Georgia and went to Florida
01:17 but I think it all depends on how you handle the situation when you're the loser in the
01:23 recruiting process.
01:24 If you handle it the right way you obviously have a chance to get them back and this was
01:29 a little bit different.
01:30 I had a really good relationship with him and his family and right when he went in the
01:35 portal he called and we said sure we certainly would be interested in having you here and
01:42 he's worked out well for us.
01:45 Thanks.
01:46 Great.
01:47 Thank you.
01:48 Yeah coach Florida's got two offensive line coaches it looks like.
01:53 I was just looking at their list and Rob Sale is also offensive coordinator.
01:57 I was just curious your thoughts on that.
02:00 You don't see that very often.
02:02 You don't anymore Trey.
02:03 I mean there was a phase there and I'm going to say in the late 90s, mid to late 90s where
02:11 you would have a tackle tight end coach and you would have an interior guy.
02:17 Actually when I got hired in 96 at Cincinnati I was a tackle and tight end coach and Bob
02:25 Riley was the offensive line coach and so those things are not as you know I was selfish
02:34 whenever I was the old line coach I wanted to coach them all thought I could and all
02:38 those type things but you do see that sparingly out there.
02:43 I'd be interested to see how all that works you know who handles the meetings.
02:48 Are there two separate meetings because I think it would be hard to have two separate
02:52 meetings but I can see with him being a coordinator maybe that's you know he may need to be at
02:57 the beginning of some meetings with the skill players and he has an old line coach to handle
03:04 the rest of them.
03:05 I'd be interested.
03:06 I may ask him about that.
03:07 It's a really interesting topic.
03:08 I may ask him about that on Saturday.
03:11 He's a good friend of mine.
03:13 Yeah, I was going to ask you, do you have any kind of connection with anybody on their
03:17 staff and what you mentioned Sale, what is your background with him?
03:22 Well with Rob you know and it was uncomfortable for him.
03:25 Well, it was uncomfortable for me too but he handled it like a champion and when I went
03:32 to Georgia he was the offensive line coach there that I was you know that they had gotten
03:40 let go and we went there.
03:42 Kirby asked us to go in there and watch them during their bowl prep for Penn State that
03:47 year and we went in there and obviously he was a coach and you know we were professional
03:53 and talked and he told me about his guys there and things of that nature and then he was
03:59 able to work with at Louisiana a guy named DJ Looney who was my GA at Georgia who wonderful,
04:08 wonderful person and DJ was the tight end coach there.
04:13 Rob was running the offense at Louisiana and then coaching the offensive line.
04:19 DJ you know unfortunately had the heart attack there at practice and passed but we got closer
04:26 in that relationship too because you know I was checking on him and the player and the
04:33 coaches there at Louisiana and obviously we had a similar love for DJ Looney.
04:40 And with your offensive line you mentioned Devon Manuel and Andrew Shambly you know going
04:45 at it.
04:46 I was curious just with the time off is Shambly back or excuse me not Shambly but Manuel is
04:50 he back 100% or as close to health as you can get?
04:56 Yes I think he's back as close to health as he can get.
05:00 You know obviously the time he's still got some rust he's got to get off and things of
05:03 that nature but he's I don't think he's quite he's close to back to where he was in two
05:09 days and those things in that time Shambly's obviously improved and things so we'll be
05:15 able to play both of them but he is the stingers that he's been having have not reoccurred
05:22 over the last two weeks.
05:25 What causes that?
05:26 I don't know I mean I don't know I just know that it must be painful because when it and
05:32 then it becomes reoccurring and really from what I'm understanding the only thing that
05:37 can really help you is just rest and strengthen whatever that area is there that the stinger
05:46 comes from.
05:47 I don't know a whole lot about it I just know that it's a recovery and it takes some time
05:51 and rest.
05:52 Thanks coach.
05:53 Jackson.
05:54 Hey Sam you mentioned on Monday that you really needed to stay out of third and long against
06:04 this defense I'm just curious you know what about I mean that's the same pretty much in
06:08 any offensive philosophy but what about Florida makes that a particular focal point this week?
06:15 All the different looks that they give you you know of whom to declare the five most
06:22 dangerous guys they have a very exotic package changes seems to be weak there are some similarities
06:30 but does change via team weekly so you know you just got to locate the bigs first you
06:39 know who the guys that you don't want the back on and then go from there but they just
06:45 have so many different looks that they're very hard to prepare for just who whom to
06:52 block and then you obviously have to block the guys obviously we think they've got two
06:58 really good defensive ends and any linebacker they got big linebackers so you know we don't
07:04 want to be in that third and long where we're sitting there having to drop back all the
07:08 time maybe we can roll maybe we can run it maybe we can naked maybe we can do some things
07:13 other than just drop back.
07:16 You said they were similar to George's defense are they similar to anyone that you've you
07:20 know faced this year schematically?
07:23 Ole Miss there's some similarities there Ole Miss Alabama would be another one you know
07:34 their third down package is different than those guys but your first normal down and
07:41 distance probably those two teams more probably even more so Alabama.
07:47 Gotcha and talking to some of the players yesterday you know they mentioned bowl eligibility
07:52 but said that there's a lot of other motivation for this game aside from that I'm just wondering
07:57 there's a long way to go obviously but are you talking with your guys already kind of
08:01 about you know bowl eligibility and what's on the line?
08:04 We haven't talked a whole lot this week about that we've talked a lot about passion and
08:12 getting our pride back and getting our respect back we've talked we've never won in Florida
08:19 you know at in Gainesville we've got plenty of incentive but one of them is we need to
08:26 play better and we need to get the respect from the people of our state and our own the
08:32 university we've got to get our respect back and we've been playing hard and so I'm not
08:36 saying that we've lost respect from everybody we've been playing hard we've lost some close
08:42 games but we need to win one I think we'll all feel a lot better.
08:46 Thanks Sam.
08:48 Yeah Sam I know you mentioned this morning that that Rocket's been kind of limited at
08:53 practice I'm just curious what do you need to see from him today and the next couple
08:56 of days like what would you need to see to give you confidence that he's available on
09:00 Saturday?
09:01 Just another probably to be perfectly honest with you just another couple of days of consistency
09:09 flashes that I've seen I feel really good about him being able to play but just another
09:14 couple of days of consistency obviously today's a big third down day for us how's he going
09:20 to be able to protect and things of that nature just the whole week of what what the whole
09:28 Monday through Thursday encompasses and but the first two days I feel confident that he'll
09:36 be able to go out there and help us.
09:38 And if he is able to play I mean do you have him like on a snap count or would it be full
09:42 go like a like a regular game?
09:45 I think usually in in you know younger kids you probably protect them a little bit more
09:51 Rocket knows his own body and I think we'll just listen to him if it gets to that point
09:58 we'll just let him be the guy that you know decides whether he needs a break or not.
10:04 Bob.
10:05 Hey Sam something I forgot to ask you at the start there you said this morning you know
10:11 that you weren't surprised that the players had a positive reaction to Kenny taking over
10:15 as offensive coordinator but that they'd really rallied around him I was wondering was there
10:18 something in particular the players did that made you feel like they were rallying around
10:22 him?
10:23 Well the way that they practiced you know though would be the number one thing practices
10:32 are we're moving faster we're more physical that may have something to do with a lot of
10:43 other coaches as well but I think there was you can feel it a little bit that the kids
10:50 have embraced change and I'm saying a lot of that's probably because of Kenny.
10:56 Thanks.
10:57 Daniel.
10:58 You talked a lot about kind of how the quarterback's been adjusting just how are the running backs
11:05 adjusting to the new scheme and cutting back on certain things in the playbook?
11:12 Yeah I thought we were a little slow hesitant I thought that everything was but I thought
11:17 we were as well on the quarterback exchange from the running back so you know we can't
11:24 the holes that we've been opening up they've closed pretty fast for us and we've got to
11:29 get there faster and so they've adjusted that I believe and we haven't really changed anything
11:40 other than we've cut down we've tried to figure out what we can do well and we're going to
11:44 go try to do that so there's been positive about that had a really good team run period
11:49 yesterday on offense and and you know I'm hope I'm attributed to we're running less
11:57 plays and just hopefully we can run them better.
12:00 Thanks.
12:01 Well I actually was going to ask you something you touched on a little bit but it's but what
12:07 does it look like in action Kenny Collin plays when you've gone good on good what it's looked
12:13 like in action for you.
12:15 Yeah we've done a lot of non-scripted plays so Kenny can kind of get in a groove of moving
12:23 the ball and second in this and so he can have opportunities we've done several two
12:30 minutes yesterday we had a third and sixth situation with 22 seconds left just did a
12:37 situation so we could talk through that as well you know we ran no timeouts tour alert
12:44 what are you going to call and get the ball out of bounds are you going to call something
12:47 to get a first down and then are we going to kill it are we you know all these type
12:52 things that I think will help him and help his calmness we've been working on all those
12:58 things so he's been very very good in those situations very very good in the three two
13:04 minute periods that we've ran and in moving the ball moving to change it's easy to look
13:11 down on your piece of paper and call a play it's harder when you know it you just now
13:16 know it's second and eight what am I gonna call so we put him in those situations and
13:20 I think he's done really well.
13:23 You know communicating the blocking scheme the protection was that part of the maybe
13:30 too much offense was that part of it just as much as you know anything else.
13:36 Yeah it really was yeah I mean I don't want to get it I don't really want to go back too
13:48 far but yes I don't know what to say to that but I don't want to say anything else about
13:56 that to be honest with you okay right sorry I'm sorry it was a good question I just.
14:03 Sam this might be a better question maybe in two weeks but you know you got four games
14:10 left in the season is there any young guys that may be on the red shirt deal that you
14:14 may start playing a little bit since they've got that four game window you know I think
14:21 Maddox Lassiter we talked about him this morning I think he'll be a guy that at least comes
14:25 in and starts playing some special teams for us we've also talked about Malachi Singleton
14:31 and not only you know not as the quarterback necessarily right now but as something you
14:37 know whether it be help us on special teams or somewhere because he's a very talented
14:42 big athlete the rest of the guys we would have had either played them already or don't
14:51 have a lot of plans to get them involved at this time okay is Lassiter someone that's
14:58 a scholarship candidate somewhere down the road I know you bragged on him two or three
15:01 times this year a very good possibility of that I mean he comes from Warren Arkansas
15:07 and Bo Embry and those guys I mean they're tough down there and and he plays from ends
15:14 of state it means something to him and and Bo was very high on him out of high school
15:20 and Colton asked us to look at him we obviously did and and he's really he's a good play he's
15:28 tough you know and and and and very very very physical.