Bateman breaks down "good problem" at LB, talks fill-in CBs and tackling

The UNC defensive coordinator is pleased with what he's got at linebacker

Assessing Chazz Surrratt's debut at linebacker

I’d say initially, about like we thought it would be; it was moving a little fast on him, missed a couple of tackles early that he made later in the game. I think once he got into the flow, he played really well. He’s a really productive kid.

I thought that going in. When you’re a quarterback and you get to hand the ball off some and throw a bubble screen, all of a sudden, you’re taking on guards every play, it’s just different.

On the return of Dominique Ross and the linebacker rotation...

Dominique does a lot of things, so we have a problem that we anticipated having. I think Dominique will go out and play on the edge some, we can play them both together some and we have some packages where all three of them are in the game. There’s a lot of things we can expand upon now that Dominique is back.

On early missed tackles on Saturday...

I think going in, we kind of knew that was going to be the case. Myles missed a few tackles that I don’t think he misses; he was disappointed and I was disappointed, too. We knew once we got into the flow of it…

Tackling is a skill we work on a lot, but it’s one of those skills you work on and you never really do it until you go out and play in the game full speed and you launch your body. I think once we settled down, I thought we tackled really well.

On how he and the staff teach tackling...

I got after Trey Morrison yesterday because he should never had been injured if he tackled the way we want him to tackle. The old way of getting your head involved in the tackle, that’s asking for trouble nowadays; kids are too fast, too strong. Rugby tackling, we emphasize that, you can practice that more. We do that in the summer with them, I tell them, ‘When you’re out there in the summer doing player-led practice, man, go out there and get that rugby ring out and work on it.’ I think we’ve gotten better at it.

I think a lot of it is angles. We talk about bad misses vs. good misses; a couple of Dorn’s misses were good misses. A lot of times the safety, you’re coming down from a long distance to make that tackle and you’ve got to take a right angle and you’ve got to get the ball turned the right way. If everybody else is playing hard, it’s usually not a big deal if you miss, but if you miss on the wrong side, that’s a big deal.

On Cam Kelly's eligibility and how he'll be used this week...

It was hard last week, because if you give him a bunch of reps and he’s not able to go, you feel like you kind of cheated your defense a little bit. Now that he’ll be ready to go, there’s a couple of spots we’ll try to work him into, and he’s a really bright kid and he’s a good player. He’s going to play a lot here once he gets settled in.

I anticipate him, this week, being a full-go on defense — corner, nickel and safety.

On why he coaches on the sideline and not from the pressbox...

I’ve done it both ways, and I think two things. Number one, I can look in their eyes and they hear from me so much, they hear from me Sunday through Friday night, then Saturday I’m up in the press box and it’s getting filtered through somebody else’s mouth; it’s not quite the same. I can look in their eyes, I can tell when I need to get after them, when I need to love them up.

So much of the stuff we do now is checked from the sideline …I just think when I’m in the press box and I’ve got to get that down to the signaler, I’m not as good at it as I am when I’m on the sideline and I can see it faster.

On Aaron Crawford's performance...

Any time you’ve got an inside shade at defensive tackle who can consistently dominate, which I thought he did Saturday, it makes a lot of things work. Kind of like baseball, you’ve got to be good up the middle.

I think Aaron is a good player and I think Jason Strowbridge is a dynamic player. Having both of them makes me a really good player.

On Greg Ross stepping up at cornerback...

I’ve got a lot of confidence in Greg; I thought he played really well. In the first half, we were traveling Trey with 89 (Bryan Edwards), then trey obviously got injured and we put Greg over there. In the second half, I said to Dre (Bly), ‘What do you think?’ He said, ‘I kind of feel like leaving Greg on him,’ and we did and he played really well.

A lot of our coverages against South Carolina were tilted toward where that kid was a little bit so he had a lot more to process, because now you’ve got to play the field corner, the boundary corner and handle all the nickel adjustments, depending on what we’re doing. He did a really good job and I thought he made some big plays.

They threw the slant on us on the last drive and he made a really nice tackle … then he came back like two plays later and they tried to go up top on him, and he defended it really, really well. I don’t know if, a year ago, he would have handled that as well. I’m impressed with how he’s worked; I think he’s a good player.

On Storm Duck being forced to play...

He survived. We put him in the first play and we played man coverage; he played zone coverage, so that wasn’t very good. After that, he settled in pretty good.

After the game I said, ‘You’re ready to go now.’ Storm is going to be a good player; he’s really talented. I’m not sure he was quite ready for primetime yet, but he got in there and did a good job.

His assessment of Miami

How much time we got?

I think they’ve got some real, real skill at wide receiver and I think the two tight ends are both NFL guys and the tailback is a great player; tough, competitor. Willed them; you could just see him pulling the team along in the first game, (DeeJay) Dallas, No. 13, so we’ve got to do a great job covering him. The quarterback is really talented, he’s a young kid. Florida has got a bunch of really good players up front on defense and they played like it in that first game.

I think we’ve got a real challenge on our hands. I think the wide receivers are really skilled. That one kid, No. 2, (K.J.) Osborn, he was at Buffalo last year, we played him at Army and they threw a little now screen and I think everybody on our defense missed him. I’ve got a lot of respect for their skill.