Northwestern University Athletics
ON THE RECORD with Mike Kafka, Part One
8/10/2009 12:00:00 AM | General
Aug. 10, 2009
In the first half of a two-part conversation with NUsports.com's Skip Myslenski, senior quarterback Mike Kafka discusses how his offseason workouts with former NU great Brett Basanez have helped him prepare for the 2009 campaign.
After he graduated, (Brett Basanez) and I always kept in touch, but this summer we got more intense. He called and I mentioned I wanted to work out with him. It worked out perfectly for me. We got some good solid workouts in. It was a great deal.
We were going like twice-a-week. We'd go out there, warm up, go through some footwork drills like Coach (Mick) McCall puts us through and then we'd go watch film. We'd go over the spring (practice), pick a pass concept and talk it over in depth. Where're the hots? What's the protection? What's the read? I learned a ton from him.
One of the biggest things I learned was just to relax in the pocket.
Sometimes you get kind of flustered when there's a lot of people around you.
I think one of the biggest things was my footwork wasn't always consistent. My footwork would always kind of screw me up and make me rush my pass. I'd be in the drop faster than I should have been and that makes it look like (the receivers) aren't open. But if I took my full drop, I was able to deliver the ball better and on time and give the receivers time to get out of their routes.
There were other, little things, but the biggest thing was being comfortable in my drop. That helped me be more patient.
Impatience? I don't know if that's the word. I think what it was I was rushing myself to get the ball out quicker. I was just rushing myself too much, getting to my drop too fast and thinking it wasn't open. If I had just taken my full drop, the timing would have been perfect.
When you get in a game, things speed up a lot and you tend, you want to speed yourself up also. But if you just do what you do in practices, things will come easier.
When Coach McCall's around and we're going through practices, there's a million different things going on. It was a little bit easier to sit back and take, like, just the footwork aspect of it and having Brett there one-on-one for an hour just talking about footwork. It was just a different person out there, an NFL quarterback obviously. I think that was a little bit more productive than the craziness that happens at practice where you've got all these snaps, put run game in, put pass game in. There's a lot of things going around. You don't get a lot of time to focus directly on one aspect for a specific period of time.
Brett didn't want to change a lot of the mechanical stuff because in the game it's not going to happen if it's not natural. So whatever was natural, he tried to tweak, give me a little pointer. Keep the ball a little bit higher, stuff like that, to help me get the ball off quicker.
In the film room, he helped me understand what the defense was going to do, how to anticipate it more. That was cool, just the little tips he showed me to help eliminate choices quicker.
Eliminate my choices, understand what coverage it's going to be. If the safeties are wide, it's Cover Two. If the safeties are rocking, that's going to be single safety man. You can anticipate that. So if it's single safety, you know the flats are going to be open. If it's Cover Two, you know the middle of the field's going to be open.
I know the system, I know the plays. It's not like I had trouble knowing what the defense was. But he made it a lot easier to anticipate.
The demeanor of the linebackers, the demeanor of the cornerbacks, that tells a lot too. If they're pressed up, usually it's going to be man. If they're backed up, it's probably going to be zone. When the safeties are rocking and the linebackers are kind of up, you get a feel for them. Just watching film you get a feel for when they're going to blitz.
The more you get in there, the more you look at it, the more it gets relevant. So once you're playing, you just feel everything going on and it's more comfortable playing.
The game has really slowed down since my freshman year. I feel so comfortable back there. I feel the game moving at my pace.
When you get to that level, then you really understand that's where you need to be and that's where the offense needs to be. In the past, personally, I wasn't there. Maybe that was the reason why we weren't so successful. The quarterback wasn't ready to take that role on and the game wasn't slowed down for him enough. I wasn't really comfortable back there.
I can remember thinking way too much my freshman year (when he started four games before an injury sidelined him), thinking what if they do this, what if they do that, go here if they do this, go there if they do that. Now it's more of just reaction. I just know it's there. It's happened so many times over the years, it's just more-or-less reaction.
It's so beyond thinking. You already know what's going to happen.
It was like NASCAR my freshman year. Now, I don't know how to explain it. I understand it. I understand what the coaches are saying. It's definitely slower.
Slow motion? It's getting there. It's not slo-o-ow motion. But it's pretty slow.
I get a lot of scrutiny.
Obviously, I had a good running game (last season against Minnesota when he rushed for 217 yards while starting in place of the injured C.J. Bachér). So I get a lot of scrutiny, Will he be able to pass? I hope teams really think about that. I hope teams think I am one dimensional.
If they do that, they're in for a treat. Our offense is going to do a lot of different things beyond just running the quarterback.
No. I really don't. I think I put too much pressure on myself back freshman year, sophomore year, to go and play and do well. I had all these different goals. This year, it's my last year, I'm going to just let it loose, just play and have fun.
Check NUsports.com on Tuesday, Aug. 11, for the second half of Kafka's conversation with Skip Myslenski.
