RGIII On Vick, His Health And Bounties

Robert Griffin III talked with Philadelphia reporters Wednesday via conference call. The topics included his health, Michael Vick and even bounties.

Some highlights:

On whether he will be able to play at a high level right away despite not playing at all this preseason:

“My mindset is that it will come right back immediately. You always have to prepare as if you were never gone, so game day is just another game, you have fun and you trust your preparation,” he said.

Redskins head coach Mike Shanahan added that RGIII has been going full speed “in game-type situations” for the past several weeks, and feels very good about where his quarterback is right now.

Griffin, who tore his ACL last season, said he recognizes the importance of staying on the field and will try to avoid unnecessary punishment.

On playing against the new look Eagles: 

“Totally different team. Lot of new faces, new coach,” said Griffin. “They are trying to bring in a lot of change into that organization and start winning football games. You really can’t take too much (from last season). We’re not taking them lightly at all. We’re going to prepare and are going to put our best foot forward.”

But what do you prepare for, seeing as there is no regular-season tape to go off with this team under this coaching staff?

“It is hard to study,” he conceded. “You can’t go off the four preseason games, we understand that. So we know we have to go out and execute whatever our gameplan is and be able to adjust on the fly. That’s one benefit of having a new coaching staff and not really having anything on tape. We realize that, so it’s not going to catch us off guard if we see something that we didn’t see on tape.”

On his admiration for Vick:

“Vick was definitely a guy where it was hard not to watch him,” said Griffin. “He was a lot of fun to watch out there playing, doing a lot of good things, not just running but also throwing the ball. He has paved the way for a lot of quarterbacks like myself and he’ll tell you the same thing that guys before him paved the way for him. You always have a lot of respect for the guy. He’s been through a lot in his life and came out and is still a starting quarterback in the NFL so you tip your hat to Mike on that, and I look forward to playing against him.”

On defenses potentially targeting QBs to slow down the read option:

“I don’t know what to expect from defenses. They are always going to try to throw something special at you, but you’ve got to be careful when you talk about targeting quarterbacks because that sounds a whole lot like a bounty to me.”