Jaguars coach Doug Pederson says he has 'not lost the locker room,' and his players agree

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Jaguars coach Doug Pederson says he has 'not lost the locker room,' and his players agree

2024-10-03 06:08 Last Updated At：06:11

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) — Trevor Lawrence knows what a fractured locker room looks like. He experienced it as a rookie in 2021 under then-Jacksonville Jaguars coach Urban Meyer.

Lawrence said this season feels far from that debacle three years ago.

“I shouldn’t even have to answer it,” Lawrence said, responding to a report that coach Doug Pederson has lost the trust of his players. “Not at all, and I don’t know where that’s coming from, so I don’t even want to really expand on something that’s just not true.”

The Jaguars are the NFL’s only winless team. It’s the sixth 0-4 start in franchise history, and the first one that doesn’t include a head coach in his first or second season.

Pederson and the Jags have dropped nine of 10 going back to last season, and this year’s skid includes two late-game collapses and a prime-time embarrassment. But Pederson insists it's created no behind-the-scenes discord.

“Yeah, I would know. I talk to these guys every day,” Pederson said. “I see ’em every day and, no, I have not lost the locker room. I think these guys have done everything I’ve asked.

“They continue to play and practice hard and battle, and it’s a good group. It’s a good group. The right leaders are in there and they know what we need to do and they’re not making excuses for it, and I’m not going to make excuses; we just got to go do it.”

The Jaguars host Indianapolis (2-2) on Sunday and will try to extend their home-winning streak against the Colts to 10 games, including one matchup in London.

Pederson’s squad played better in a 24-20 loss at Houston last week, a setback that included several missed opportunities. Lawrence overthrew three receivers, including two for would-be touchdowns, and Gabe Davis let a pass in the end zone bounce off his facemask. Right guard Brandon Scherff whiffed on a fourth-and-goal draw, and the defense failed to get a stop in crunch time.

Pederson may have raised eyebrows when he said after the game, “As coaches, we can’t go out there and make the plays, right?”

But Pederson’s players have come to his defense since.

“I love playing for Coach Pederson; it’s the reason why I came here,” receiver Christian Kirk said. “I know everybody else can say the same. We have so much fun coming in here. He just creates an environment for us to go out there and own it.

“This is our team. It’s a player-run team. Doug has done a great job of just putting in our hands and helping facilitate that. We all know he wants the best for us.”

Tight end Evan Engram echoed that sentiment and called any talk about Pederson losing the locker room “just not true.”

“You go down this road, you’re not having success, you work your butt off all offseason and training camp and things aren’t going your way, a lot of human nature does point to why, saying why, asking why, being the victim," Engram said. "You can’t create an outcome that you want. You can’t choose to win.

“You have to go earn it, you have to work for it. You have to have faith in the unseeable result. That’s what this team does, that’s what this team is built on and we’re going to keep doing that until the results that we want eventually come.”

Lawrence and his teammates lost their first five games in 2021 before beating Miami in London. The season started to spiral two weeks earlier when Meyer chose to stay in Ohio following a Thursday night game at Cincinnati.

“Being a rookie and pretty naive, I didn’t really understand the situation either until obviously later in the season," Lawrence said. “That’s when it started to feel pretty grim. ... This is a much better team from a lot of standpoints, but we’ve just got to click and we’ve got to go prove it.”

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Bodies of the children and teachers who died in a Thai school bus fire return home for funeral

2024-10-03 06:08 Last Updated At：06:11

LAN SAK, Thailand (AP) — The bodies of almost two dozen young students and teachers who died in a bus fire in a suburb of Bangkok were returned late Wednesday to central Thailand, where they began their ill-fated school field trip.

Friends, relatives and Buddhist monks waited past midnight for the last of several convoys carrying remains, as well as relatives who had to travel to Bangkok to help with DNA identification of the severely burned victims.

The bodies were received at Wat Khao Phraya Sangkharam, the temple in this town in Uthai Thani province that houses the school attended by the victims. It is common in much of rural Thailand for Buddhist temples, which serve as community centers, to host schools.

A line of coffins with portraits of the deceased sat in a big assembly hall of the school where grief-stricken relatives huddled. Some went over to touch the portraits of many small children, or stood still in silence in front of them. Funeral services were to begin Thursday morning.

The tragedy has caused sadness as well as anger. On social media, parents have expressed nervousness about sending their children on school field trips, but more common was outrage about the apparent lack of safety measures. Thailand has long been infamous for having one of the highest rates of traffic fatalities in the world.

Thai police on Wednesday said they were investigating whether the fire was caused by negligence, and filed several initial charges against the driver.

The blaze on the bus carrying six teachers and 39 elementary and junior high school students on Tuesday spread so quickly that 23 were killed while only 22 were able to escape

Three students remained hospitalized, two in serious condition. A 7-year-old girl suffered burns on her face, and a surgeon said doctors were trying to save her eyesight.

The driver, Saman Chanput, was arrested several hours after the accident and charged with reckless driving causing deaths and injuries, failing to stop to help others and failing to report the accident, police said. He had fled the scene, but after being arrested told police he had run to try to get a fire extinguisher from another vehicle, but panicked and ran away when the fire went out of control before he could get any help.

Authorities were investigating if the fire might be caused by negligence by the bus company as well as the driver, and will press charges against all parties responsible, acting police chief Kitrat Phanphet said at a press conference.

While an initial investigation suggested that the driver was not speeding, police found 11 natural gas canisters inside the bus that had a permit to install only six, Kitrat said. Many Thai vehicles use NGV — also called CNG, compressed natural gas — for fuel.

Police have not officially concluded what was the cause of the fire, but have said the driver told investigators he was driving normally until a front tire malfunctioned and set the bus off balance, at which point it hit a car and then scraped against a concrete highway barrier. The sparks from the friction might have set off the highly flammable gas canisters, and ignited the blaze, police said.

Kitrat said the fact that the driver did not immediately stop after feeling he was losing control of the bus could be grounds for negligence.

An inspection of the bus found that its emergency exit could be opened, but it wasn't clear if it worked properly, said chief of police forensics Trairong Phiwpan. He also said they did not find any emergency window breakers.

In an interview with public broadcaster ThaiPBS, bus company owner Songwit Chinnaboot said the vehicle was inspected for safety twice a year as required and that the gas cylinders had passed safety standards.

Thailand's Department of Land Transport said it was implementing urgent inspections of all natural gas-fueled buses. The department also will upgrade its safety guidelines to require crisis management training for drivers and safety inspection every time such vehicles are to be commissioned by schools, said Seksom Akraphand, the agency's deputy director-general.