Q: Why indoor practices yesterday and today?

HERM EDWARDS: “We’ll go out tomorrow. I always look at getting up-tempo practices. I’ve been a player before, been an assistant coach before. Some people think you need to go outside to be tough. If you’re not tough going outside is not going to make you tough.”

Q: It’s not tough, but it could acclimate you to the weather?

EDWARDS: “We can do that tomorrow. What about those dome teams or teams that come from California that don’t play in the cold? They don’t get acclimated; they just play in the cold. I’ve always done it this way.

“I always get nervous when it’s bad weather and you’re going to practice and the ground’s slippery, all that kind of stuff and it becomes a bad practice. You’re worried about guys slipping and guys getting hurt. I’d rather get the rhythm of your offense and the defense and then one day out of the week you go out outside.”

Q: This is Thanksgiving so when you sit down with your family what are you thankful for?

EDWARDS: “That I have an opportunity to be with my family. I think that’s important and I think we lose sight of that sometimes. How fortunate we are to be Americans, to live in a country that allows us to have a lot of liberties, where people have given us a lot to have these opportunities. I think you should be thankful for that.

“My father was in the military and I knew what he did for this country and he always explained that to me. There’s a reason we salute that flag. Sometimes people don’t always agree but there’s probably not another place I’d want to live.

“Thanksgiving always reminds you of your family because when you were little you were the little kid running around, trying to get the dessert and you had your mother and father and maybe some sisters and brothers and uncles and cousins. Now, all of a sudden you become an adult and have children and you watch them and tell them Thanksgiving Day stories.

“Thanksgiving was always a day when I was growing up as a young guy where we had a football game. It was called the Turkey Bowl. We used to go play in the fields on Thanksgiving Day. I was remembering that today when I was actually going over to the practice. A long time ago you couldn’t wait to play on this day. You played football and then ate Thanksgiving dinner and they put that stuff on that turkey and you ate it and went to sleep for a couple of hours.

“I gave the team the Thanksgiving Day questions today. I said I know all you guys went to college, to these big universities, got higher education. My first question was how many Pilgrims? They were looking at me and some of them are going, ‘eight;’ others were going ‘ten.’ Whoa. I’m going, ‘you guys must have been in the student union; you couldn’t have gone to class.’ They’re laughing. I said there were 44 pilgrims.

“Then I said they have to get this one right: what was the ship? They all knew the Mayflower. They got the Mayflower. I said where did the journey start from? They were kind of puzzled. How about England? I said what was the date? Unbelievable. They’re saying 14-something or 15-something. I said, what? 1609.

“I said why did they leave? They all were looking around and had no idea. I said, for religious freedom. Sometimes people feel to realize that.”

Q: Did you give them any orders not to eat too much?

EDWARDS: “As you can see they don’t get fed today. I don’t feed them lunch. I took them indoors and I sweat them. I’ve prepared for Thanksgiving. They got cold cereal for breakfast.”

Q: Going back to your days as a corner and today as a coach, can you see what a receiver has going with a quarterback?

EDWARDS: “When they’ve got it? You can feel it and I’m hoping it can come to fruition with [Croyle] and our [Bowe.]

Q: Can you see that from that one game Croyle started?

EDWARDS: “You can see it in practice more than games. [Bowe’s] been going with the first group a lot during the course of the season thus far. It’s kind of funny when they come back to the huddle they’re constantly talking. Bowe’s saying, ‘don’t worry about the guy just throw it. Throw it up. I’ll out-jump the guy.’ He was telling Brodie that today: I’ll jump over the guy, or throw it here.”

Q: Bowe’s the kind of a guy that can make a quarterback look good, can’t he?

EDWARDS: “He can and that’s why I always like big receivers. Playing corner those were the guys that gave you fits. If you were a DB [defensive back] and you didn’t anticipate the ball and just played the receiver you were in trouble with a big guy. It’s like basketball. Even though it looked like you got the guy covered he can maneuver and catch the ball. That’s what Dwayne [Bowe] can do and that’s one of his traits.”

Q: Both of those guys were talking about a slant pattern they ran in Indianapolis the other day. That’s what I’m talking about. Isn’t it kind of early with one guy making his first start and the other guy halfway through his rookie year?

EDWARDS: “It started in camp. It started when Bowe got here. It was kind of unique because when we drafted him Brodie knew all about Dwayne Bowe because they played against each other. The first thing Brodie said was, ‘wow, coach, that guys is really good. He’s a football player.’ I’ve heard that from all kinds of quarterbacks about who the receiver is and how the receiver can make their job a whole lot easier. Yeah, they’re two young guys and I hope we’ll win a lot of games together.”

Q: Is there anything you can do to speed the process along?

EDWARDS: “The way you run certain routes that Dwayne likes running and Brodie likes throwing. The good thing about Dwayne is he can line up anywhere. He can line up at ‘Z’, can line up inside and outside and you can throw him any pass. The good thing about him is he’s big going across the middle. That’s what you want. You want a big receiver going across the middle because they never get lost. You can find them. That’s why Tony [Gonzalez] is such a big target over the middle. He’s big.”

Q: Bowe is mostly a ‘Z’ receiver though.

EDWARDS: “Couple of things: he can block, you can bring him in motion and you can do a lot of things with the ‘Z.’ Most teams are right-handed; most passes go to the strong side. They have three receivers over there. Marvin Harrison always plays ‘Z’ and lines up on the right side.”

Q: What about your defense halfway through the season? Are you where you thought you should be?

EDWARDS: “Certain areas, yeah. You’re talking about a team that’s only given up 14 touchdowns. There’s only one team that’s given up less and that’s Pittsburgh who’s given up 13.

“We’ve had more opponents have more chances on us. Of the 120 attempts of the other offense getting the ball they’ve only scored a touchdown 11.7 times in the course of a game and that is the best in the league. When you have a team that can keep the score down you have a chance.

“They’re playing very good in the Red Zone. They’re [ranked] number one. Those two things help. I think they’re getting better. Their third down percentage is pretty good also. I think they’re second or third in the league in most negative plays. That’s what you want your defense to do: create negative plays.

“I think the thing that I’d like to see is taking the ball away a little bit more, two or three times a game you would really like. I think we’re maturing and handling the pressure knowing that we can’t give up a lot of points because we’re still trying to find our way offensively and mature and now with a new quarterback and some runners in there we have to play to our strength and that’s our defense right now.”

Q: The Chiefs-Raiders game has sort of been put on a back burner with the hoopla about the Missouri-Kansas game this week. How do you feel about that?

EDWARDS: “Rightly so. You’ve got two universities that I don’t know the last time they’ve been ranked this high. It’s good for them, their staff, for the kids and good for the universities. It’s good for Kansas City, good for Arrowhead and the fans.

“That should be on the front page. They’ve done a great job of building programs at two schools that basically…I know that Missouri was a pretty good football school when I was coming up in college. We actually came out here and played. Way back, Kansas was a halfway decent program too. It’s taken a long time and they’ve come out of the ashes and have done a great job.

“The people of Missouri and Kansas should be excited. That’s how it goes. Look at the Raiders and they haven’t won a lot of games and we haven’t won a lot of games. But Sunday will come and people will show up and the Raider nation will come and our fans will be here and everybody will be excited and we’ll play.”

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