On who the number one kick returner is: "Right now it's going to be (S) Quintin Demps. We're still going to rep (RB Lorenzo) Booker back there, but we're going to try and get Quintin a majority of the reps."
On whether the difference between practice and games is just too much right now for Booker: "Yeah, I think so. The weather conditions didn't help on things there, but it was just poor positioning up under the ball. Booker has to make sure he factors in the weather conditions, know that there's a bit of a wind that's going to move the ball a bit, so it's going to change that setup point for you. But that's just a matter of experience and the more reps he can get at it the better. Simulate that in practice situations, get some windy days and we'll catch some balls."
On whether he was hoping that RB Lorenzo Booker would be the kick returner: "We kind of had a feeling that it was either going to be Lorenzo or Quintin. We're happy with either guy. Quintin did it in college there, and he had a lot of success there in college, so we feel like he can get us something back there. But again, we're going to continue to rep both of those guys, and as the season goes along we'll probably end up using both of them before it's over with."
On whether he has any fears that there might be a repeat of what happened at the beginning of last season: "We've moved on. We went 15 games after that first game where we didn't have any ball security issues, so I think we are well on track to where we need to be. We've brought in two guys that we feel very confident in, with both (WR) DeSean (Jackson) and Quintin Demps catching punts back there. Again, we've moved on, we feel confident in what we've got. We're ready to go forward from here."
On how close he is to having the final special teams units selected for the season: "You know it's really difficult to evaluate certain things at this point because of all the guys that we're rotating in on the field. We're working double teams in certain areas and those guys may or may not have repped it very much during the course of practice. There may be a different guy beside him repping that double team. We're trying to get a lot of guys evaluated at this point. We try and start the game with our starters there on special teams, but at the same time we are trying to throw a few guys in there as starters who we are trying to take a look at as a starter. He may not necessarily be, but we want to evaluate him against the best competition."
On whether he will have the special teams units selected by the fourth preseason game: "We'll just see how that goes. I know for this game we're going to start off with some young guys out there on a couple of starting units and see how they fair. We'll just play it by ear on that last game, kind of what (head) Coach (Andy) Reid wants to do in terms of personnel substitutions."
On whether DE Chris Clemons' injury is affecting what they are trying to do on special teams: "Again, at this point we have a lot of guys that we are trying to evaluate. We would like for him to be getting some reps. He's got some improvements to make in some areas on things. It is what it is right now. He's injured and unable to participate on things so we have some other guys that we are rotating in there, but we would like to get him back out as soon as we could and get him some reps."
On LB Andy Studebaker's performance on special teams so far: "He's doing a nice job. As a matter of fact, this past game he had a really good game there. He had a couple of blocks that he made both on punt return and kick return there and he did a nice job of sustaining those, so we're pleased with where he is at this point."
On whether he was pleased to see S Quintin Demps do well at safety so that he would have a better opportunity to be activated during games for special teams: "We were pleased to see him do well at safety, obviously, that helps on things there. When we brought him in, again, it was kind of one of those deals where we felt like he was going to be a potential returner for us either in the punt return game or kick return game. So we kind of factored him in from day one, and he's just kind of making the progress right where he needed to be."
On how encouraging it was to see WR/PR DeSean Jackson make that punt return even though he fumbled at the end: "We know he's capable, and right now he's still kind of feeling his way through. He had a couple of other return situations where we felt like he had plenty of room to go and let the ball move him a little bit but he didn't quite get set up fast enough to catch and get going up the field. But it was good to see him have a little success there. He's definitely got the talent, and we feel like we're going to continue to see big returns from him throughout the season."
On whether there was a missed block on the punt return that caused the fumble: "No. It was just a normal pursuit."
On whether he is concerned about K David Akers and the missed field goal he had in the last preseason game: "No, not at this point. Dave is hitting well over 90 percent of his kicks during practice. Obviously, you have to have that carry over from practice to game settings. I think he's fine at this point. He just took a little bit of poor aim there during that last 40-yard kick or 45-yard kick. I feel like he'll be in good shape."
On what RB Tony Hunt has shown on special teams: "Tony made a couple of tackles last week on the kickoff coverage units. He's kind of shown the importance of it. He's obviously taken more of an initiative to do well on special teams, and that's one of the main areas that we have to have our fullback able to contribute there. With Tony having the level of success that he had, we feel like he could also help us at fullback, so we're going to give him a shot there and see how it works out."
On whether he communicates with Andy Reid about personnel: "He and I have talked personnel even through last year and things there. That's just one of the areas that we sat down and looked at where we've got to have more contributions and one of the positions was our fullback position. You look across the league and you've got a lot of teams that have a fullback as one of their major contributors there, and we had a guy who was just played sparingly, so we're trying to put that emphasis there. And we've got guys that we're trying to figure out who can give us the best option at both positions, both on special teams and at fullback, and try and make a decision from there."
On how hard it is to convince rookies that special teams are important: "You face the same thing every year with a bunch of rookies that come in and they really put a lot of emphasis on their offensive and defensive positions. And again, they haven't had a lot of roles on special teams and now all of a sudden that's going to be their first step on the field, for the most part, for a lot of these rookies. And as time goes along they begin to understand that, they begin to take it more seriously. We have a lot of guys right now who are figuring it out early and they realize that they have to make a contribution on special teams if they are going to make the football team. It's a learning process each year for them, but I think they are out there getting that understanding down and they are putting forth good effort on special teams for us."
On whether he thinks that DeSean's fumble was a result of the fast pace of the NFL that he's not necessarily used to: "No, I don't think so. He was actually protecting the ball fairly well at that point. He was trying to make a defender miss there in front of him, and the guy just took a nice angle on the ball and took a good shot at it. Fumbles are going to occur, obviously, but that's something that we want to make sure that we stress to him that you have to protect the football in all situations, whether or not you're making the defender miss or whether you're out in the open field, whatever the case might be. I think that it was just that one situation there, he just happened to hit the ball just right and knock it loose."
On what LB Akeem Jordan's role on special teams will be: "Akeem didn't start on special teams for about six or seven games last year into the season. He was not active, but once he actually took over that role of starting on special teams he ended up being one of our top production point leaders. He's just a guy who knows how to play football. He ends up in the right spot, he takes coaching well, he always has a high motor and does things the way you ask him to do it. I'm expecting him to be one of our special teams leaders this year. He could do a great job for us."
On whether he will try any more shovel passes after the failed fake field goal attempt: "That's the thing about running a fake or any type of onside kick or anything like that; it makes you look real good when it works but it makes you look not so good when it doesn't. We had a backside guard pulling a kick out that front side corner and they just got penetration on us on the front side there and tripped up our puller, so the guy that we intentionally had to kick out that corner ended up getting tripped up and never got to him. We have to execute a little better I guess next time around."
On whether the play failed because Carolina's cornerback picked something up: "I don't think so. We felt like he was going to rush on the play and whether or not he saw (P) Sav (Rocca) or (TE) Brent (Celek) – the bottom line is it was actually there if we had gotten that puller around on him. We had a great seam, and it was easily a touchdown for us if we get that one block, but we got tripped out and again, it just didn't quite work out for us on that rep."
On whether that play will be crossed out of the playbook: "We're going to carry in fakes every week. You obviously want to make sure you call them at the right time. You want to make sure you execute them when you call them the way you initially planned to. We want to stay aggressive in our approach, and we always want to have that threat every time we go out both in punt situations, field goal situations and again, it just comes down to execution a lot of times and making the call at the right time."
