Bill Belichick Playing Quotations

We're looking at another really good football team this week in Denver. They're probably one of the hotter teams in the league right now. They're playing very well in all three phases of the game. They've been a good team to watch just because they're executing so well. They haven't had a turnover in three games.

I don't care what happened last week, last year, last month, what the overall record between the two teams was going back to 1947 or whenever they started playing each other, or who wins when the wind is blowing in from the north. I pay attention to what the matchups are for each individual game.

I have all the respect in the world for Rodney Harrison. I told him that when we brought him here, and he's made great contributions to this team. There's no question about it. Unfortunately, he had a tough setback last weekend and so did the team, but that's the way it is. We're playing San Diego this week. Unfortunately, he won't be with us. I wish he was, but he's not.

He was a very good special teams player with the Giants when he came out. He runs well. He's pretty athletic in the open field. He has some playing strength and some power. He's a pretty instinctive special teams player.

He had some good players to go against in Kimo von Oelhoffen and Joey Porter. Some plays weren?t so good, but I thought he was competitive. He?s been playing both sides for us all year.

He has some experience playing in the league,

I think that Nick has done enough in his opportunities this year in preseason and in training camp to earn some playing time. Whether that continues or doesn't continue, I don't know. That will be determined by the way he plays, the way other people play, and again, that just builds a little bit of our versatility.

I think Wesly's experience in the kicking game has definitely showed up here in training camp. Between his experience and his playing ability, his toughness and his desire to be a good special teams player, all of those are weighing on the right side of the scale.

I think any player that hasn't played football for a while, and then comes back and tries to catch up to a lot of guys who have been playing on a regular basis, they're behind. They have to be. If they weren't, then we should cancel all the practices and just show up for the game.

Pittsburgh's one of the hottest, most formidable teams in the league. Right now we're up against one of the hottest teams in the league. Miami is playing as good as anybody is.

That always helps. More importantly than that, I think the players that are playing have played better.

I think he's been very productive in preseason. He's shown a lot of explosion and power. He looks a lot better in three-technique than he did as a 3-4 defensive end last year. He's probably playing with more confidence and maybe a little bit more energy. But when you have Ted Washington on one side and Kelly or Hamilton on the other side, (Sapp's) usually isolated on that guard and he's a handful.

I think they're doing a great job all the way across the board. I think there are a lot of positives in the way the team has played. Nick has done a great job after that Cleveland game, whatever he's done in bringing them together. They're playing well.

That's a tough position to play. It's a lot like playing corner. You're put there on an island. It's not all that easy to give a left tackle help. A lot of times you can't give him help . . . To play out there, on the blind side of the quarterback, and still be physical in the running game, it's a tough spot to play.

We need to play better. What else is there (to say)? We aren't going to win many games playing like this.

We thought it would be in the best interests of the team to be in here. This is probably similar to the conditions we'll be playing in, in terms of wind.

There are 11 people out there playing defense. What makes a difference is how those 11 people play. That's what defense is about. It's about team defense. You are always trying to isolate it into one player, one situation or one thing, and it just doesn't work that way.

There's probably more (quality) linebackers than we've had the last couple of years. Some of those guys have had a lot of production, have had a lot of playing time.

Right now, we're up against one of the hottest teams in the league. Miami is playing as good as anybody, and they've played very well lately, at home and on the road....We have our hands full.

Do you think we're going to win many games playing like this? ... This won't be good enough. It wasn't good enough today and it won't be good enough against anybody else either.

Do you think we're going to win any more games playing like this? We can't play like this. We have to play better. We have to coach better. This won't be good enough . . . against anyone we play.

Do you think we're going to win any more games playing like this? ... We can't play like this.

They're 12-4. If the playoffs weren't set up the way they were, they'd probably be playing at home, (but) they're in the same division as Indianapolis.

A lot of guys you?re looking at in college haven?t played on their feet and on first and second down, that?s probably where they would be playing for us. We?re looking at projecting guys who were down, to projecting them up to playing on their feet and that?s definitely a conversion.

It was kind of like basketball. We were playing for the last shot there. If we make it, we make it. If we don't, time expired and we're in overtime.

It was kind of like a basketball game. We were playing for the last shot.

I felt that once we got to the 31, 32 yard line, we were in field goal range. We didn't want to get in the situation where we throw a couple incomplete passes and Pittsburgh had another timeout. It's like basketball; we were playing for the last shot.

I appreciate a compliment, I'm not saying that, ... But what it comes down to is how our team performs against the opponent we're playing against. There's a lot of things in this game that I can't do. There's a lot of things in this game the players and other coaches can't do, either. They just have to do their jobs, and collectively we have to do ours a little better than Denver is going to do theirs, and that's a big challenge.

This is our best opportunity to pull everything together in terms of substitution, communication, execution, playing on the road, playing in a hostile environment, all of those kinds of things.