Terry Donahue Quotations

Obviously all of us in the organization are concerned about the fact that the offense has not been able to be as productive as we anticipated it would be. But Steve and the coaches will go to work on that. It's their job, it's their responsibility, and they'll do it. They just have to figure it out. But when you're playing a high-powered offensive team like the Rams, obviously you go into that game feeling like you have to score some points.

I think we had a good young nucleus of players there. If you look at the team that beat the Rams, 10 of the guys on defense were the same guys who started last year, and nine on offense were starters last year.

Over the last two to three years, we had played the Rams very tough on a number of occasions. And I think there's some major differences this year in terms of the health of the team.

Our No. 1 priority was to keep our team intact, and we did that. I think the team feels it's good. It sees the talent level we have. You can't fool players. Players know players. I think our team feels we're going to be a good team.

I tell everybody that my time at the 49ers was a great flight, ... except for the crash landing.

I've said many times I felt the linebacker corps was in the top 25 percent in the league, thought the young players we assembled were certainly capable of winning.... I think Coach Erickson had a lot of bad luck; a lot of bad things happen.

That's when I said, 'We've got an issue here with this guy for sure.' And then I find out we had had 10 to 12 guys getting IV's. I'd say the team really responded and did a great job in that situation.

As we look back at it, none of us would have anticipated that we would come back as fast as we did. One of the primary reasons you can cite for that sudden rise really was the emergence of Jeff Garcia. I mean, if he doesn't play like he plays, we might be five years in the rebuilding.

I really didn't realize we had as many guys sick as we did,