Jim Caldwell's quotes from Wednesday

Below is a look at what Detroit Lions head coach Jim Caldwell had to say on Wednesday. (Quotes provided by the Lions.)

Opening statement: "Obviously, we have one more opportunity to go out. This week, or today, is going to be a little bit more of a Saturday than anything else, it's more walk-through obviously with almost less than 24 hours away from kicking it off, it's just a little different. They guys' focus at practice yesterday was good and solid, good concentration. Today we think we'll have a similar sort of effort."

On what opportunities this early game provides for players to rest and recover: "This time of the year, obviously we had to get a pretty good break during our bye week. This may give us another day but we still continue to work. It's not like a real break for us for the most part. But, you may get an afternoon or so here somewhere down the line over the weekend. This stage of the season it's work from here on out."

On how he feels the players have responded after the two-game losing streak: "One of the things is, we have a lot of competitors, guys that love to play. It's distasteful for them to lose so, you get the kind of response you expect. But, the most important thing is how they respond out on the field when it's time to kick it off. We'll have to see about that."

On the captains: "Calvin (Johnson) is one of our captains offensively, special teams is Muhlbach (Don) and defensively we have Quin (Glover)."

On the similarities between the struggles offensively for both the Lions and the Bears: "You know, I think it's just two different situations, two different teams. It's tough to make a comparison in that regard."

On his team responding during a tough stretch: "I think it's obviously a unique opportunity. I think that's the great thing about our sport. That's the part I enjoy the most, is watching just the essence of the human spirit, particularly in some uncomfortable situations and see how an individual responds. I think that's always eye opening. This is a difficult strip, but not what I call a tough stretch. I've been through a lot tougher in that situation. But, I think our guys will respond accordingly."

On if there is any type of predictor or indicator in terms of response: "I haven't taken many classes from Nostradamus or any of those guys where I could get a good feel for that kind of thing. I think coaches often times get into a little bit of any issue when you do try to predict, it's tough you know. You got to go out and play the game and get your guys ready to go."

On how T Riley Reiff has responded the last couple of days: "Favorably, but we'll see."

On what conversations has he had with Suh about post football life: "I haven't had any deep discussions about post football life. He's still got a long career ahead of him number one, number two these guys all have a life outside of football, and often times it takes different twists and turns. They have different interests, different backgrounds, things of that nature, and we applaud that. He's a guy that you know he's a smart intelligent guy and he's a forward thinker."

On if performance is increased when players have their life in order outside of football: "I haven't made a determination of whether that's an indicator in general. There's a lot of players that find themselves fairly well set financially and it's tough to determine how they respond. You've seen some respond negatively and some respond positively, particularly some of the big contacts in the past years. There are a thousand examples you could point to, to probably tip the scales in one way or the other."

On the Bears' size on offense and what kind of challenge that presents: "When they can run and catch, it certainly creates some problems for you. It creates matchup problems. They certainly do a tremendous job in terms of running their routes. They have an unusual catching radius and it gives you all kinds of matchup problems."

On why the Lions' secondary has been so successful this season: "I think it's been overall a team defense effort, a unit effort. Rush helps the coverage, coverage helps the rush. I believe those things kind of tie hand in hand, but every game is different. Every game presents a new challenge, that's the great thing about this league. You may think you have certain areas solved and you'll run up against someone that'll do something a little bit different. They may attack an area that they deem to be a weakness and you have to make adjustments, so this will be a new challenge for us."

On his fondest Thanksgiving game coaching moment or moment he saw on TV: "Watching it, I probably don't have a real solid one. I don't remember one in particular because of the fact that I've been coaching for so long now, that our Thanksgiving Days have always been work days. College and the pros both, so I haven't had anything much outside of football, outside of the realm of what we do to garner good feelings about that particular day. That's just the fact of the matter for 15 years. I don't regret that because we've had some great opportunities. Every Thanksgiving Day game I've been involved in has been pretty pleasant."