ARIZONA CARDINALS

Arizona Cardinals training camp: All-Access with Bruce Arians

Aug 3, 2015, 1:09 PM

Arizona Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians...

Arizona Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians

GLENDALE, Ariz. – Head coach Bruce Arians, now in his third year with the Arizona Cardinals, meets the media each day during training camp.

Here, in this space, we’ll highlight many of the key topics and personnel conversations he has with reporters following the morning walk-through.

Getting started with the season…

“Very anxious to get football season started. FIFA is over. A lot of good things to evaluate (when we put the pads on). Some guys are outstanding in shorts and you can evaluate them and then when the noise level goes up, they disappear. Other guys that look ugly in shorts, they’re football players, so the real evaluations start now.”

Any guy that you can recall in your career who looked ugly in shorts and turned into a great player?

“Oh god, I can think about 15 or 20 linemen. It’s just the nature of the beast. There’s always been a couple of linebackers I’ve been around that it’s like, ‘this guy can’t help us’ but then when you put the pads on nobody could block him and he made every play, which you never get to see. Same thing with fullbacks, they traditionally look like (expletive) in shorts. They don’t get to hit anybody—not that we have any of those. But no, it’s too many to count, really; it really is.”

His recent comment of how proud he is of the Tyrann Mathieu draft pick…

“I’m a true believer in second chances and after having met Ty during the draft process, I knew how passionate he was and how much regretted the mistakes he had made and admitted to them and had a plan to how to fix it. And to give a guy like that an opportunity and then to see them blossom, to me, that’s what coaching is all about. I’m not one of those guys that turn your back on them, throw them to the wolves because public perception says they’re a bad guy. I was one of those bad guys. I mean I think I did OK.”

How do you plan to use Jermaine Gresham and Troy Niklas now that they are on the active list?

“They will strictly be walk-through until they’re football-ready. But by getting them off the list, they can actually take their mental reps and physical reps in the walk-through practices, so they got 20-30 reps this morning that they couldn’t have on those lists. Now, we’ll be very, very cautious as far as putting them in pads and practicing them. They’ll have to go through at least another week of training and maybe some individual (work).”

What are your thoughts on the virtual reality technology you are using in practice?

“I think it’s outstanding. I’ve been waiting 20 years for somebody to invent this. I always thought if you could put a headset on and play football in a room this size with live pictures how much better you could get without sweating. This young guy has done it. It’s not perfect, but it’s really, really good. A guy that didn’t get any reps, like Logan Thomas, can go in and watch the entire blitz drill and drop back and throw all of his ‘hots.”

“You put on these virtual reality goggles. It’s really cool. We’re going to probably have a setup here in the stadium and let the fans do it, let them go play quarterback.”

Have you tried it yet, personally?

“I wouldn’t have bought it if I hadn’t.”

During the offseason you challenged Calais Campbell to be more consistently dominant, how good do you think he can be?

“Just like that. I think he can be one of the best in the league playing all the time at his best. He worked very, very hard (in the) offseason training using his hand and to use them better. With his length and explosiveness, he should be unblockable.”

It looked like Carson Palmer was especially sharp on Sunday.

“He had an outstanding practice. He had two days in a row. He’s in top form right now and he really knows our offense and has a great rapport with those top five guys. It’s fun to watch them practice right now.”

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