Transcript of Lions Head Coach Rod Marinelli from His Weekly Press Conference. Unlike Most Weeks, It Was After Practice and Not at a Podium.

LIONS HEAD COACH ROD MARINELLI
On any general changes that may take place in light of front office changes: "With lineups, I won't talk (about those) until Sunday. Overall approach, day to day it's the same. It's all the same. Martin (Mayhew) and Tom (Lewand) are here and they're just kind of following in. My routine has not changed for what I'm doing."

On his thoughts regarding Matt Millen's departure: "It's the nature of the business; we all know that. We understand that, and it's tough on everybody but then you move on. But that's what this business is about."

On how he would combat the perception that he is a "lame duck" coach: "You have to define that because people use clichés. Like you tell coaches they use clichés, now you're using one. Explain that to me - what it means."

On a "lame duck" meaning that his job may be over when the season ends because of new management: "I won't combat anything. I had a chance to talk to Mr. Ford and everything is zeroed in on the Chicago Bears, and that's what we're trying to do."

On how much it helped to have a week off to put things in perspective: "It was really good. I had a chance to sit back and went back through the last three films and looked at certain areas and was able to talk to the team about it today. I hope we get a new perspective on just going out and executing. It's not much to talk about; you just have to go do it."

On if he was surprised by Millen being fired three games into the season: "It is what it is. It happened, so you just move forward with it."

On how he personally felt the day of the change: "Any days like that are hectic for you. The biggest thing that's on your mind is getting your team refocused and moving forward."

On if he knows how long G Stephen Peterman will be out: "Not yet. It's going to be - I would think a week or two. That's what the trainer said. I think he's going to have (the cast) removed at the end of the week and then it's just as pain permits."

On if Peterman is out for this week's game: "Nothing's in concrete, right. Dean (Kleinschmidt) didn't feel good that he would have a chance to play. That's what Dean said this morning."

On if Peterman will have to play with a cast and what exactly is broken: "Yeah. Broken hand."

On the extent of CB Travis Fisher's injury: "He was running some today. We'll just wait. We'll see how he's doing and see how he progressed during the week."

On how all other injured players are doing: "Everybody else practiced today."

On if QB Jon Kitna is fine: "He practiced, yeah."

On how QB Drew Stanton is progressing: "Well, he's just rusty a little bit. He's got to get in the groove here and get practicing football again, but it's just getting used to gripping the ball and all that stuff again."

On if Stanton will get more reps now that he's healthy: "We rotate all three of them in practice, so it will be about the same rotation."

On if he will get more time with the first unit: "He'll get just what we've been doing."

On if he does not want to reveal what Stanton will get: "It's just the same as we've been doing, before he got hurt."
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On Stanton having been hurt the entire season and not having a full week of practice: "Yeah he did. (His) last preseason game (before he got injured)."

On Stanton having never had a full week of practice in the regular season: "No. I guess I should say, what he's done in preseason, how we worked the regular game plan week."

On what was said during his conversation with Mr. Ford: "Focus on how to get this team back and get ready to win a game. That's the whole focus."

On what was said about the rest of the season: "No, we just talked about beating Chicago."

On if he addressed the firing with the team: "You guys already addressed it, so they had a chance to see it. So you don't need to state the obvious. Now it's just get back to business, and business is to go win a game."

On if he told the team not to look back and to focus on Chicago: "You don't state the obvious. It was, 'He's not here. He's removed.' And I think everybody liked Matt, no questions, nature of the business, but now we have a job at hand and that's to win a game."

On if he took a break from football or used the bye to evaluate film: "A little bit of both."

On what non-football activities he did: "(I'll) keep it to myself."

On if he worked more on fundamentals today in practice: "We're like that every day, but we did. It was against ourselves. We tried to use a format of a morning training camp practice. We had 30 minutes of individual and then we had run drill again. The thing that's nice is Chicago is exactly the same system, exactly. Everything is just about the same. So as we worked against each other our offense was getting really a good look at some of the things they'll see."

On how T Gosder Cherilus performed against San Francisco: "Nobody graded great. Everything was just okay; some mental errors here and there that we still have to clean up. What I do love is his temperament and his fight. He's got great fight to him."

On if he expects to rotate running backs again and go with whoever gets the hot hand: "I think so, oh yeah. I think we have two guys really fighting and competing, so I'm excited about that."

On Martin Mayhew's comments that the team is two games from first place in the division: "You just don't want to look so far down the road, but you state the obvious - a game and a half, I think it is. And see your 13 games to go. Do the math. Go play, go win a game, and you have a chance to regenerate this whole thing. But it starts with the first game. That's the No. 1 thing, we've got to go out and we've got to carry our practice (into a game) - and we practiced very well again today. We have to put that energy on Sundays; it has to come out Sunday that way."