BAD BOY MOWERS PINSTRIPE BOWL: MINNESOTA VS. SYRACUSE

December 22, 2022

Jason Beck

Yankee Stadium

Syracuse Orange

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: We are joined by Jason Beck. Questions, please.

Q. Could you share a little bit about what the promotion conversation was like with Coach Babers and how you reacted.

JASON BECK: So I landed, I was out recruiting, my plane landed, I had a bunch of texts and missed calls from Coach Babers. I called him back. I was just waiting to exit the airplane. That's when he let me know.

Feel prepared, ready, confident, excited. So, yeah, great opportunity and excited to go forward.

Q. Now that you're fully in charge of this offense, where do you see this program going?

JASON BECK: Really we just want to keep building on the things we're doing well, the strength of our players, keep that vision and direction going.

I've been with Coach Anae coaching for the last 10 years. It's been a lot of work together. It won't be anything drastically different. Just more focusing on improving, getting better, helping to win games.

Q. I would say a broader question would be, how has your Syracuse experience been as a whole, being in the 3-1-5, coaching at Syracuse?

JASON BECK: It's been really great. My family and I have loved it here. We're kind of hitting full circle, coming up on almost a year ago. There's been some things lately that remind me of when I came out here to visit when the interest first came up.

No, my family and I, we really enjoy it here. Really enjoy working with the players here, being a part of the program. Everything's been great.

Q. Seeing that you've been with Coach Anae for such a long time, now can call the shots the way you want, what is that moment like for you in your history as a coach, how you envision stepping forward?

JASON BECK: Yeah, it's been something I've been prepared for and preparing for for a while. At Virginia, it was always a thing with Coach Mendenhall where if anything happened, I knew I was in a position to become the coordinator.

The way we've operated, worked together, it's a change but not a huge change. I've been really involved with game planning, organization, all those things.

I'm different, so I'll do things a little differently, but at the same time nothing too drastic. It really comes down to our staff. We have a great offensive staff. Each of those coaches and everybody involved, it's definitely a team effort, it's all of us working together to just keep getting better and giving our guys the best chance they can to be successful.

Q. Do you look to bring in a quarterback's coach with you or will you assume that?

JASON BECK: Yeah, I'll stick with the quarterbacks and keep that going, then bring in to fill in the other spot.

Q. We saw a lot of fans this year attribute a lot of the offensive success to Garrett Shrader's improvement. What have you seen from him this year?

JASON BECK: Most importantly Shrader is a confident person, he believes in himself and his abilities. He brings a great skill set. Just trying to play to those strengths, the things that he does well, the things that he does best, then organize the other people around him to utilize his strengths.

So he's worked really hard. Every day he shows up, he works hard. He has a real natural leadership to him that the guys rally around him and support him.

Yeah, he deserves a lot of the credit just for his approach, his work ethic, everything he's done to have the success that he has this year.

Q. With your increased role, how is that maybe going to affect or not affect at all your relationship with the eight guys in the QB room?

JASON BECK: I don't think it will affect anything. I can't foresee anything being different that way.

I'm excited to just keep helping him improve as a player and take strides forward to play at a higher level, definitely.

Q. You were Coach Anae's right-hand man. Now it's your show. What are some things you learned from him along the way?

JASON BECK: One of Coach Anae's biggest strengths is organizing and building on what the QB does best and what the other guys do best. He's not like this is the system and you plug into the system and do what we've been doing for years.

Man, this is going back a ways, but we've had points where we had Taysom Hill as our quarterback. When he went out, our backup was a true freshman pocket passer. They were totally different guys. That whole thing switched in that moment.

It's not a system. He's very flexible and builds to people's strengths. Taking that lesson from him, I feel like that's one of the things he does most. He doesn't get stuck in his own way. He's always looking to innovate, create, and play to the strengths of his players instead of his system or what have you.

Q. What's your spin on the offense? What are some of the things you want to implement?

JASON BECK: That's where I say there won't be a big change or anything very different because it's been a situation where I've had a lot of input and have a lot of big imprint on what's going on. Maybe in the course of a week of game plan, there may be something I've liked that he hasn't, or vice versa. It doesn't necessarily show up.

In terms of the overall structure and design, I've been so involved in it that, yeah, there's not like this whole other thing being held back in any way that is going to now be unleashed.

If anything, it will just come down to maybe a play or something that I'd prefer and maybe he did not, it wouldn't show up in the game plan that week.

I would think from a fan perspective or from an outside perspective, it would be hard to notice anything.

Q. In the short term, what is the adjustment without Sean Tucker, without Matthew Bergeron as you're a week away here from the matchup with Minnesota?

JASON BECK: Exactly. Kind of the next-man-up mode. Like when we lost Berge during the year for a game, other guys. It's the next man up. Now look for what they bring to the table, how you can utilize that in connection with being sound in protection, with what the quarterback does.

Q. How much in sync are you offensively with calling plays and stuff with Coach Babers? How much input does he have over the offensive coordinator job? How do you work hand-in-hand with him now?

JASON BECK: Yeah, I mean, Coach Babers has a great background as an offensive play-caller, as an offensive coordinator, brings a lot of great ideas and wisdom to the job. I look forward to working with him going forward.

Yeah, he'll definitely have input and an impact, help me as a coach. I can definitely say this past year I'm a better coach because of working with him and just the way he thinks about things and exchange that information. It's improved me as a coach. Now with this as a coordinator, it will be definitely more of that.

Q. It's been a whirlwind for you, but what is the biggest learning curve for you for making that jump?

JASON BECK: Man, I'd say overall pretty seamless transition. Can't really think of anything off the top of my head. Yeah, nothing really jumps out to me.

Q. What are you seeing from Minnesota's defense on film? What areas do you think you can attack next week?

JASON BECK: They're a really good defense. Their 4-2-5 structure, really aggressive, really physical. They have really good players. It's going to be a great matchup for us to be able to put our guys in successful situations, to be able to move the ball and score points.

They've obviously limited opponents to pretty few amount of points. Part of that is their design on offense with occupying time and possessions and shrinking the game. A big part of that is how stout and solid their defense is and how good they are in coverage on the perimeter.

Yeah, it's just a matter of finding those matchups or those things that put our guys in success to be able to score points to give us the best chance to win.