Q:How's having T.J. [Houshmandzadeh] out there today?
Palmer:It was good. He had a couple of reps and trying to get his feet wet again and get back into the swing of things. It was good to have him out here.
Q:Does it help you having a guy that you know where he's going to be, you've worked with so much, how much does that help you?
Palmer:It'll be nice. You know T.J. and I have a long history together, we played together for five or six years. We've been really working together for almost a decade now. In of seasons we've always worked out together and thrown together and met up at different places in California to work out with different guys. He was on a different team the last couple of years but there has been a lot of consistency over the last three or four years that we haven't played on the same team.
Q:How beneficial were the couple of days where they guys hung out and worked with you? Have you seen that in practice?
Palmer:Great, yes. Like I said before, it's just good that they're so hungry. It's guys that don't feel like they've accomplished everything yet and don't feel like they've made it or they've arrived. They're guys that continuously want to be better and want to be helped out, want to be coached and want to work. For them to stick around for me, I appreciate it tremendously. It'll benefit them, benefit myself and benefit the team in the long term.
Q:How much more game ready do you feel right now than you did two weeks ago?
Palmer:There's no comparison to last week, to last Wednesday. I'm comfortable with the entire play book. I'm comfortable with the guys. I'm comfortable with the snap count, and where to stand in the huddle. Every little bit that I've been around here, every second that I've had, I just learn more and more. So trying to compare this Wednesday to last Wednesday, there is no comparison.
Q: Carson, can you talk a little bit about the qualities that make T.J. a special receiver?
Palmer:There's a lot. T.J. has always been a tremendous competitor. He's got a chip on his shoulder, he doesn't ever want to be covered, he never wants to drop a ball, and he doesn't ever want to loose a game so he'll do whatever it takes to make sure those things don't happen. He's consistent and he's really another quarterback on the field. He knows more about offensive and defensive football than any non-quarterback I've ever been around. He understands concepts, he understands schemes, and he understands alignments, he understands all the little things that receivers overlook. He's a student of the game and it's going to be a really big help especially for these young guys to have a guy like him around. I think that in just the first day they were kind of taken aback by how much he knows. For him to know the play book at the first day out here, getting here late yesterday, shows a lot about his football knowledge.
*Q: *How much did you communicate about the decision to bring T.J. here?
Palmer:I didn't know until T.J. was coming up here. I found out when T.J. called me and told me he was coming in for a workout. I know that Coach Jackson had been looking to sign him, I think, before training camp or during training camp T.J. said. It never worked out, but fortunately it worked out this week.
*Q: *You said he has a 'chip on his shoulder,' did you two ever bump heads?
Palmer:Oh yes all of the time. You know, but you love it being a quarterback. He wants the ball on every single play, he knows the situation you're in and knows two minute situations, red zone situations, third down situations. He's a fiery guy, I'm a fiery guy and the important thing when you butt heads with the quarterback-receiver situation is that you always communicate about it and you always come back and talk about it. Things can fester and things can build up; it's like a marriage when you go to sleep without ever talking about the situation that you're in, it just kind of snowballs and turns into something bigger. Quarterback and receiver relationships are fairly similar; you need to talk things out. You need to find out why you're a little bit off on this or a little bit off on that and find a resolution and make sure you come to terms with why one person was wrong and why one person was right and move on.
*Q: *Carson you've had to play a couple of games within a period of two weeks. Hue was saying there is no pacing in the National Football League, but obviously there has to be some kind of recognition of what it is you're going to be up against these next two weeks?
*Palmer: *Yes, but I think more gets made of the situation outside the team than inside the team. We love to play football, we love game days. Work days are work days and game days are fun days. If they're closer together as opposed to farther apart, it doesn't matter because once game day gets here whether it's on Thursday or Sunday, it doesn't matter because it's game day. You know the soreness, the aches, the pains that you may have from the short turn around of playing on Sunday and then on Thursday seem to go away especially when you're playing at home and it's your fans and your stadium. I think that's something that kind of gets blown out of proportion.
*Q: *How much of an advantage do you feel having all the freshness of not having to play the first seven weeks?
Palmer:Yes, it's like a college football season really. Hopefully, with a couple bowl games, three or four bowl games at the end. But you know it's something you've got to deal with and we'll deal with it. The good thing is our team had a bye week this past week. So we had a really good chance to recover and then play two quick ones.
Q:Carson, did anybody take you up on your offer to come watch Monday Night Football at your house?
*Palmer: *I offered that? Oh, I offered that to you guys. [Laughs]
Q: There were reports that the receivers said that you had offered them to come hang and watch the game?
Palmer: I don't remember that but no I watched it by myself.
*Q: *T.J. said that when you signed that he noticed that he thought that this summer you were finally healthy from your elbow. Looking back now did it take that long for your elbow to get fully healed, when did you think you'd be back?
Palmer:I think that this offseason without the CBA, workouts, mini camps and OTAs and all those times when you're throwing five, six, seven days a week some weeks; I think getting the off-time there and not having to throw and throw and throw and throw and the things coaches put you in, and the positions they put you in that time, I think I had a great long healing process. I'm by far the healthiest I've ever felt and especially this far into the season.
