Bill Lazor excited for Ryan Tannehill’s potential in offense

Written by Matthew Cannata | Twitter: @PhinManiacs
Joe Philbin isn’t the only person excited to see what kind of strides Ryan Tannehill has made since the team started installing the new offense. Count Bill Lazor as another coach who is anxious to see how Tannehill manages the game and grasps the playbook in high-pressure situations. However, Lazor has plenty of confidence that Tannehill can get the job done.

 “You are talking about a guy that has the desire to be great and the desire to work at it,” Lazor said. “We ask him every day to be the most prepared player when he walks on the practice field. [His] work off the field, he’s done a great job with that. We need Ryan to continue to show a mastery of what we’re doing, decisions he makes, making them fast, being accurate with the football, spreading the ball around. We try to put him in really hard positions in practice to get him ready to do that in a game.”

### Where has Tannehill shown the most growth? “We’ve seen him work to be decisive and on time and get the ball out of his hands," Lazor said. "In the games, he’s proven he can do that. He’s getting the ball off on time. We’ve been pretty pleased how he’s done that in the game.”

Lazor declined to quantify his numerical goals but likes what he has seen: “Overall, we’re getting faster. We want guys who can play in space, when they get the ball in their hands, know what to do with it. And we want guys that can separate.

"Every guy that’s blocking has to block with a certain kind of attitude and every guy that’s running has to run with a certain kind of attitude. We expect to be productive when we run the ball. We think we have good backs. I think we have a good offensive line. I like how quickly they’ve learned to communicate together.

"I feel very good about the talent level we have. When you start new there is always that little bit of first couple games to see certain people. We have some new people we need to see operate real games. It’s time to put up some points.”

### Lazor said he will not call plays from the press box, but on the sidelines instead, because “it’s a comfort level for me and for some of the other coaches and for the players.”

Tannehill told Griese that he gets the play call 10 seconds faster when Lazor is on the sideline.

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