Opening remarks: "Alright, injuries. (RB Keithon) Flemming has a hamstring strain; he did not practice today. (DE) Victor Abiamiri with the knee, (LB) Omar Gaither had the foot surgery, (C) Jamaal Jackson had the knee surgery and then (G) Max (Jean-Gilles) had the gastric band. They did not practice today. Flemming practiced the first day and wasn't able to go the rest. It was, again, good to get everybody back in here and have an opportunity to meet with them and, particularly, teach the new guys the offense, defense and special teams. I thought they picked it up well. Sometimes you get a massive overload and guys aren't functioning very well, but it looked like things went fairly smooth out there. Guys knew their assignments and were able to maintain a fast pace in practice. When guys don't know what they're doing, they have a tendency to slow down and be a mess. It went well and we have plenty of room for improvement. We'll continue to do that with all positions, veterans and young guys, so we'll continue to work on that over the next few months here."
On whether he feels he has to be more hands on because of the high number of rookies on the team: "I've always tried to jump in and I enjoy that part of it. I got in this business to be a coach and so I enjoy that part of it. I mean, I like meeting with you guys. Is (Philadelphia Daily News beat writer) Les (Bowen) still alive? Where is Les? I was worried about him. That's the first thing I thought about when I heard that."
On whether his thought process has changed about winning with veterans given the amount of young players on the team: "I still feel that way. This is what I told the team, it's got a neat blend of veteran players and young guys. There's an energy, even with some of the veteran players. It's brought out a little of that youth in them. I like that."
On whether all the young players give the team a different look: "I think it does. I think you see that with the coaches. You can't help it when you get caught up in that energy that they have. It's fun to teach the new guys, it's fun to have an offseason to go back and study the veteran players and give them a little something that even makes them better than what they are now. Those are very satisfying things as a coach."
On whether the plan was for DE Brandon Graham to come back today: "Yes."
On LB Stewart Bradley's return: "I thought he moved around well. He made a lot of plays and I thought he was covering a lot of ground. I thought he did very well. I think he'll keep getting better particularly when we put the pads on. I think that will be another test when people are leaning on him and he'll have to be able to extend and shed and all those things. This is a passing camp, so he didn't have to do all that."
On how Graham did, given the fact that he went back to Michigan for his graduation: "Well, he's a smart kid. Listen, I believe he's the first one to graduate from his family, so it was a very important day. (President Barack) Obama was speaking at the graduation. There were a lot of things involved there and he was really looking forward to that. It's been a great weekend for him; last couple of weekends, actually. I think he picked everything up fine."
On WR Chad Hall's progress: "He made a play out there today. He's a unique story. He's not the biggest guy, not the fastest guy; tremendously quick and strong. Having been in the Air Force, he really hadn't played a whole lot the last couple years. Then if you look at his last year at the Air Force Academy, I believe there were four or five games there where he played wide receiver; he had been a running back. Then he comes back and plays running back and (rushes) for 1,400 yards after missing five games. He's a pretty talented kid and we'll just see how he does as time goes on here. It's a new system for him to learn and all that. (He's a) sharp kid and we'll see how he does."
On whether this mini-camp acted as a test run after guys were shuffled around at different positions: "You put them there and then you can go back and re-evaluate. Right now I'm going to go up and have a staff meeting with the coaches and we're going to talk through all that stuff. We'll just see what the projection is. I waited a couple days just for that reason. You have a (DE Ricky) Sapp or a (LB Alex) Hall who haven't played that position for a while and so you get a clean evaluation. You can't do off of a two hour practice or four hours, two practices. You wait a little bit of time and see if things soak in and it makes them improve."
On Mike McGlynn's progress and taking snaps at center: "It looked like he did a nice job. He did some good things."
On whether there is something he needs to do to make McGlynn more comfortable: "That was the idea behind this, just to give him some reps and see how he handled it. (Offensive line coach) Juan (Castillo) asks those guys to do a lot of things there. It looked like he handled that very well. He was able to kind of keep everything in perspective. He always reminds the huddle of the downs and distance and situations, so he's got his own little role there that he has to command. I thought he handled everything very well."
On QB Mike Kafka's progress this weekend: "He looked good. He did a nice job in the red zone today. He showed me some things."
On how challenging it is for a quarterback to come in from a different system: "You look how he picks it up and then if he can function. Not so much the first day, but as you get into this third day here, that he can handle all the plays and calls and defenses that he's seeing. I thought he was able to digest everything fairly well."
On how much of a difference he sees in QB Michael Vick after being able to work out all offseason: "I think he looks great. You saw him today. He's working with the second group. Any time he gets into trouble, he's out of there. You see his quickness and speed back. He's throwing the ball confidently. He's very hard on himself. Both (Vick and Kolb) are. They beat themselves up over an incomplete ball. Those things are going to happen. At the same time, they don't want that to happen. I like that. I think that's important."
On whether he wants Vick to harness that mentality: "This is what I think he does well. (He and Kolb) both do this well. They're letting the offense work for them. If it's not there, if the route is covered, they have the ability to take off and go. Michael does that very well. If there's a breakdown, all the movements, I'm good with, as long as your eyes are down the field when you're doing that. He's doing all the moving in that pocket and things are constricted, but he's always looking for the throw down the field. He's working the offense the way it's supposed to work."
On how much he enjoyed getting out on the field with all the players this weekend: "I like that part. That's an exciting part of the business. I think for all of us as coaches, that's why we got into it."
On whether he would like Kolb not to beat himself up too much over mistakes and forget the last play: "He forgets the last play but he's going to beat himself up over (mistakes). That's okay, that'll make him good. He's got drive. He is put in a position with great expectations. As long as your expectations are greater than those around you, that's a good thing. He puts pressure on himself and there's nothing wrong with that. You need to be able to do that at that position. He handles that very well, and he gets better. You don't see the same mistake. If he makes a mistake, it's not happening again."
