Carpenter Content with Spring Performance

For Rudy Carpenter spring practice was a time for improvement and learning some new offensive schemes. The Sun Devil quarterback told reporters after Thursday’s practice that he was pleased with his showing these last few weeks, and is excited for the offense’s prospects this upcoming season.

Q: What mechanics were you working on in spring practice?

Rudy Carpenter: “I’ve been trying to hold the ball a little higher, get it out of my hand a little bit faster and a little bit quicker. Obviously, sometimes I revert back to my old throwing style. I think I have changed a lot and I’ll obviously try to continue to get better.”

Q: Coach Erickson has mentioned your great performance in the spring. How do you feel you preformed?

Rudy Carpenter: “I think I’ve been pretty good. I think the number one thing I got better at is getting the ball out of my hands fast and being accurate. I just need to keep on getting better and obviously you can always improve on decision making and pure knowledge of the game, so I’m gonna continue to do those things.”

Q: How has it been with a young offensive line in front you that had to gel in the spring?

Rudy Carpenter: “It’s been good. I think our offensive line is a lot different than it was last year. They’re a little bit smaller, but probably more athletic and quicker. They’re less experienced but they have been getting a lot of experience in practice and will continue to get experience in (fall) camp. But they’ve definitely done well overall and I think they’re only gonna get better. Like I said before I think I can really help those guys out by getting the ball out fast, throwing the ball away, just little things like that.”

Q: Does the combination of what you just mentioned, plus the spread offense, lend you to be optimistic that you won’t get sacked as much?

Rudy Carpenter: “I hope so. We had a lot of issues last year on the offensive line, wideouts, quarterbacks, running backs…so it wasn’t just the offensive line. I’m not really thinking about it (the sacks). I’m just worried about getting myself better so I can help those guys out. I’m focusing on the things I can get better at to help our team out.”

Q: How much has it helped you having such an experienced group of running backs?

Rudy Carpenter: “It always helps. We have four good backs that we can play and on top of that our screen game is gonna help us – we have four guys that can run that. They all got better at pass protection, which was a problem for us last year.”

Q: Is it kind of back to the future for you with all these screen passes, that were the bread and butter of the offense two years ago?

Rudy Carpenter: “It’s kind of funny when I look back at all the screens we had, and we’re slowly starting to get back some of the screens back in. The screens help. For some reason people think we’re a run-first offense…you look at the stats and we threw way more than we ran. It’s (the screen game) is gonna help against the pass rush, keep defenses honest as far as blitzing…so it has been like back to the future I guess.”

Q: The spread formation you’ve been running seems pretty easy to grasp…

Rudy Carpenter: “I think it’s still easy. The reason I say that is we have so many good wideouts, it’s probably the strength of our team. With all those guys running around the field… with the more weapons out there and getting the ball out faster, the guys will make plays for me and for the team which will help. You look the screen passes, bubble screens, short routes, long routes…I think if you watch the scrimmages overall we’ve been pretty successful in the pass game.”

Q: From the offensive leader perspective, how do you feel the defense has preformed in the spring?

Rudy Carpenter: “I think they’re doing good. They have been a lot of guys who really surprised…Rodney Cox has had a really good spring and has been getting better. The defensive line is getting better, the linebackers…with our corners Omar (Bolden) is obviously a good player and hopefully Terell Carr and Travis (Smith) can step up. We’ve had some trouble with them (the defense) and we got them a couple of times too.”