Not practicing, Tom Compton, Alex Lewis and Demaryius Thomas. We’ll kind of see tomorrow, how those guys are feeling, see if we can get them out at practice at all. It’s just kind of up in the air right now. Kelvin Beachum, Henry Anderson, Robby Anderson will be limited. Robby just has some leg tightness, so we’re just trying to be smart with that. But, everyone else, should be pretty good to go.

Yeah, we’re just trying to make sure that he feels good going into Sunday.

I think every practice, every game, every time we get a chance to do meetings where he’s learning and he’s preparing, that’s a good thing for us because he’s just building that library up, he’s building that knowledge up every time he takes a snap in a live game, it’s more experience for him. He’s seeing things that he might’ve saw earlier in the year and it looks cleaner to him now, it slows down, he knows what to do, he knows what his problems are, he knows what his outs are. I just think, especially his communication has improved so much from, like, we go back, especially it’s kind of weird playing a team Week 17 compared to Week One. We’re watching a lot of that stuff and now, he’s able to say, “Hey, we should’ve done this,” or, “We should do this,” and “I’m looking at it like this.” It’s pretty cool to kind of see how far everything has come since then.

I think the Oakland game was one, where just some things pre-snap looked really good, just communication-wise. I think every game after that you see improvement each week. Usually, when I see him talking at the line of scrimmage and he’s moving fast and he’s getting set and there’s a lot of time left on the clock, that’s when I feel like he’s feeling really good.

I think it’s really just kind of the pre-snap looks, using his formation indicators, just kind of the location of where defenders are. This team is a tough team to go against as far as Sean McDermott does a great job with these overload blitzes, especially year three in their system. They have more players than what they had when they first started and guys that have been together now for three years. It’s just, they can do a good job disguising. They get lined up fast. They can call things. If you try to go hurry-up, they’re still getting to their stuff, it doesn’t affect them. (Darnold) has got to be able to see those type of things, make adjustments, change the MIKE point, where Jonotthan Harrison a lot of times can kind of make it really easy for him and then he’s got to kind of help work with him after they get the look.

I think, one, he understood kind of the system, why we were doing things, I think once he felt more comfortable with the base he had, the communication goes way up and it has gone way up. I think each week it gets more. (He’s) not afraid to say I don’t like this, not worried about hurting anybody’s feelings. If there is something that he wants to, “Hey, how can we throw this in?” Just little things like that that don’t seem like it would be a big deal, but if you’re around him, which you guys are all the time, you know how respectful he is. He’s an unbelievable kid, always just wants to make sure he’s doing everything for everybody else. It’s not as easy as you think to say, “Hey, I don’t like this.” He’s done a good job of getting to that point where now, he’s not afraid to say anything.

I think there was a point earlier in the season where it was like that. In his mind, he was like I’ll make whatever work and then I think he got to a point where he was like, “All right, this is what I really like and no matter what happens, I can make these plays work,” and, “Hey, can we lean on this when things get tight?” So, to me, that was always a big statement by him and each week, it’s just kind of built and built.

Well, to me, it’s just, one, obviously, kind of address them where (Buffalo is) at. That’s really not a concern of ours, with who’s playing. It’s all about kind of understanding their scheme and going into this game studying these guys like we didn’t know what they’re going to do at the time. So, we had to focus on all those guys we’re playing, which sounds like they are now. So, that was one of the big things that we talked about. Then, really, it’s about getting better. We have one week to get better, practice, game our gameflow and all those things, complimentary football against a good football team that’s going to be playing in the playoffs.

Yeah, you always want to be playing another week. That’s the toughest part about this week, you always want to play another week, you want to get a chance to get in the tournament and then see what happens because once you get in there, anything can happen. You’ve seen teams over the last decade or so that you get surprised when they kind of make a run. But, we just didn’t start out fast enough. Whatever reason that is, it’s irrelevant. We’ve played better here in the back half of the season. There’s a lot better complimentary football. I think guys understand kind of how we want to play from week to week. Last week was a really good example. I thought the guys did a phenomenal job playing exactly the way we wanted to play against (Pittsburgh). Hopefully, we can build off, just really, our experiences from this year and then kind of see how things shake out as the offseason goes. Then, when we hit next spring, we can keep building off of what we did here at the back half of the season.

It’s hard for me to think that far. That’s a long ways a way if you start thinking, ‘All right, Week One next year.’ I guess my brain always goes right to spring, kind of what’s that going to look like. What can we do offensively? What do I have to change defensively or offensively, special teams? That’s where my mindset goes. As players, they go right to the season sometimes and we’re still in this one right now. I love the fact that Jamal feels great about the direction we’re going and kind of how things are coming together and how guys are playing together. We’ll kind of see how everything goes and then once we start up, it’s all going to be about week to week. How do we stay healthy? Are we doing the right things? Do we have a good training camp? There are so many factors before we even hit that season.

I guess, I’ve known him for 10 years now. So, I’m not surprised by anything that he’s been able to do. I love the fact that he’s so steady as far as if somebody gets hurt, somebody gets replaced, he just kind of moves things around and finds the right defense to get to, to make sure that we’re in a good spot. It’s harder than what you think. You just never can tell with him. He just kind of sticks with his plan and puts guys in the right spot and just lets them go play.

I don’t think it’s ever been this many. It’s the continuity part. It’s kind of tough, but I think these guys, last week was a good example of Conor McDermott getting thrown in there and did a good job against a pretty good defense. If we’ve got to move some pieces around again this week, then it is what it is. I think those guys have handled it well. It makes it tough, whether it’s the running game, protection, just communication, everybody being on the same page, that’s always the thing you’re trying to make sure happens.

I think you have to look at everything. I love the fact that our guys kept battling, kept practicing hard, kept trying to find a way to improve and flip it around. I hate it for our fans and everybody, there were just high hopes going into the season. We didn’t play very well at the beginning of the year. We had too many negative things happen and we didn’t find a way to win games. We got going too late. That’s kind of what put us in this position