Brian Fleury - Head Coach, seahawks Event: Press Conference | Date: 2026-09-17 | Full transcript (primary source).
On September 17, 2026, Brian Fleury addressed the media in a press conference following the Seattle Seahawks' recent game. The session focused on the team's strategic adjustments and play-calling in response to their opponent's defensive schemes.
Transcript
Fleury: This stuff works you say like when you're having a conversation with Drew about what he's comfortable with. Is that still from the menu of plays that were in the game plan? Or would you ever go to something that is like so bread and butter?
Fleury: We did go to a couple things in the game plan that weren't originally in there. But it was not because of Drew, it was more because of how New England came out and played us in a four down Nickel package which was not what we expected. So we were able to adjust to that pretty quickly as a coaching staff.
Fleury: When it comes to what Drew was comfortable with, I go through an absurd amount of contingency plans. All those calls on the call sheet are if this and this happens, if A, B, and C happens, like these are the things I'm going to. So it's all thought out ahead of time in regard to the tragedies that can unfold.
Fleury: Been through losing quarterbacks and unfortunately challenging circumstances before, so what goes into sequencing plays? How much do you feel like you need to show something in order to get to something versus just get to it right away?
Fleury: I would say a lot goes into it. But there's definitely thought into the order that you want to call stuff more in terms of the effect it has on individual players and how they're seeing, reading their keys and the conflicts that you can create from that. It's more about those sorts of sequences than anything else.
Fleury: Is it more based off of what you see in the game that can adjust that from the defensive playing or how the offense is working?
Fleury: It's a combination of both. You know you have a thought going into it and then you have an order of maybe you want to get to say four plays in a certain order. But then after two you change your mind about three and four. And you have an idea of which ones can potentially be more explosive, so the circumstances of the game dictate to like that.
Fleury: Like what the score is if you need to like get down the field a little bit quicker than you expected at certain times.
Fleury: Are you satisfied with the reps he got especially in the first half?
Fleury: Yeah, that we were very deliberate about the reps that he was gonna get and how he was gonna be used. I mean he didn't play in the preseason, it was his very first NFL game, huge stage. And like we just wanted to be cautious in terms of his workload. He obviously earned more reps moving forward, and we'll continue to bring him along and develop him the right way.
Fleury: For sure it's not because of anything physical, it's just you know being a rookie.
Fleury: Yeah, they're obviously all controllable. You know there's the delay of games, the false starts, a couple of them are on me getting the play in sooner. A couple of them were just you know situational stuff. Obviously we have to call the AJ Barnard sneak, we have to coach that a little bit better in terms of how they're officiating that, so we've been working on that.
Fleury: And it's all stuff that we're able to address in practice, luckily they're all correctable.
Fleury: Play with that, I mean they kind of talked about that before the season right that they were gonna call that a little more tighter?
Fleury: Yeah, for sure and you know we did address it before the season. But you know obviously we did fail to get the message across appropriately, so we'll make sure that we're good on that moving forward.
Fleury: How's the continuity of your offensive line helping with change a quarterback and the new running back?
Fleury: Yeah, I mean it helps with everything. Obviously continuity at that position, it's four bodies functioning as one. You know like they have to have a hive mindset. And so when you have continuity there, it just makes it so much easier.
Fleury: Any time that there's a disruption, it just adds another layer of communication, so it's a huge luxury to have that.
Fleury: You mentioned previous instances where you've had to turn to backup quarterbacks in San Francisco. What have you learned from those experiences that maybe help prepare you for last week and this week?
Fleury: I mean, it just helped. I mean helped me know how to handle Drew in the situation like there's no reason to panic. You've obviously we've done a great job, Jake Pete's has done a great job preparing all of those guys. And so I didn't have any concerns handing it over to Drew. As you can see we got the result we wanted.
Fleury: For people that don't know Daniel Stern or don't get access to you know see how he does, where does he show up in and how you guys play offense?
Fleury: He does a great job just in terms of diving it into the far-reaching corners of how the opposite coordinator might be thinking. Tendencies that you might not have time in a normal week to dig up. He does a great job finding those and just kind of helping me choose the right plays within the game plan at the appropriate time to take advantage of something that he found.
Fleury: And you know when you're getting ready to game plan for a coming week, how much are you looking at numbers and for tendencies versus film for tendencies?
Fleury: I lean heavily on the film. You know I call plays more based on the techniques that I see players implementing as opposed to just what the coverages say to me. There's a whole nother world within like how different players play the same coverage and so that's more how I function.
Fleury: But there's other guys on staff who kind of we complement each other well in that regard. There's a little bit of both.
Fleury: Mike's talked about this is a rare situation where you have a new coaching staff in Arizona but they have the same defensive coordinator that they retained and the multiplicity that they have from week to week. Do you view this as kind of a season opener from that perspective just because of who you're going up against?
Fleury: Interestingly enough, there's been a lot of familiarity just in terms of this will be the seventh time that you know Nick and I have coached against each other. But every single time he comes out with some unscouted look.
Fleury: So, you know, you got to be prepared for anything. He does a great job using his personnel in creative ways and just mixing up packages and keeping you guessing.
Fleury: So whether he was being retained or not, that function is still gonna be the same in terms of games early in the season.
Fleury: One of the differences between Kyle Shanahan and Clint in terms of how they've called things is how many people they sent out into routes versus keeping for protection. Like what's your philosophy in general? Like how do you look at and making those decisions?
Fleury: Yeah, I would guess that for both of them that's more personnel based than anything. And so I would function the same way.
Fleury: Obviously Kyle feels comfortable based on the quarterback getting more people out into the routes especially with Christian there and he wants to get George involved.
Fleury: You know if that weren't the case, if you didn't have those two pieces and a quarterback that maybe needed a little bit more protection in the pocket, he would call it differently.
Fleury: So I know Clint thinks of it the same way and I think it's just more a reflection of the players they've had.
Fleury: When a play comes in late, is it usually just as simple as like you're sort of deciding between two calls or is there more to it than that?
Fleury: It's communication about the exact situation. Knowing what yard line, down, the distance, kind of functioning within what section of calls we want to be on and then just doing a better job of getting that communicated faster.
Fleury: Obviously Jaylen Miller moves up now as well. What do you how do you assess his kind of training camp and preseason?
Fleury: I thought he did a great job, you know at working on the things we asked him to work on. I thought he played really well in that Kansas City game. I'm excited to have him active now and it just allows him to get more work in practice and you know continue that path towards development.
Fleury: When it comes to getting the plays in a little bit quicker, like as the season goes on do you start to look at some ways that maybe you can shorten or abbreviate the verbiage a little bit so they can get those calls in a little bit quicker?
Fleury: Yeah, it's always a thought process. Also just different circumstances usually going on the road, you want to minimize the amount of motions and stuff that you have to communicate when it's going to be difficult to hear.
Fleury: Because anytime you have to repeat something, you're just adding five seconds to the play clock. So we try to shorten things on the road and make it easier regardless of those circumstances.
