Brian Billick Quotations

More than any defense we've had, this fits Ray's ability. That's scary. The 3-4 maybe didn't suit Ray as well as the other defenses, but he embraced it anyway. ... He's been asked to adjust because of what's gone on around him. That's asking a lot.

I was fortunate. A lot of it has to do with fate. I knew coming in we had a good talent base. And that this is a good organization. But there were fewer obstacles to winning here than I thought there would be.

Only if we let it, only if we actually believe what we read and see. I know the Jets don't think that way. I know that they are not feeling sorry for themselves.

Only if we let it. Only if we believe what we read and see. I know the Jets aren't feeling sorry for themselves. I know the resolve that team has. That's a good football team.

One of the nice things about Kyle and Anthony is they have similar attributes. They're both active in the pocket, they both have strong arms, they both move around decently, so we don't have to change a whole lot.

I would bet that Kyle is not ready to go this week; I'll wait on the doctors, but that one we're most assured of, ... What the time frame is beyond a week, I couldn't say. I can almost guarantee you -- without being a doctor -- that Kyle won't go this week.

I would bet that Kyle's not ready to go this week. I'll wait on the doctors, but that one we're most assured of. What the time frame is beyond the week I couldn't say, but I can almost guarantee without being a doctor that Kyle won't go this week.

Make no mistake, Kyle is responsible for the way he reacted,

Obviously we dodged a major bullet there, ... He seems to be doing fine.

No one's position is advanced ahead of the other's,

Nobody would walk in there and instantly restore credibility to their program faster than Denny Green. I would imagine he'd be a very attractive candidate for where Washington is right now.

Obviously it's hugely disappointing to play the way we did. All you can do is go back to work to correct it. There's no use in feeling sorry for ourselves.

Obviously it helps. But this is a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately league, so we'll see what he does this week, too. Can you follow up two good performances? It never seems to end.

I don't know who you compare him to. I think that makes people uncomfortable.

I don't know that Johnny wasn't looking at pictures of his kids in that little booth. I'm still an advocate of instant replay, but I've long been an advocate of taking it off the field. Let's take it upstairs. With the current system, I've got to expend a timeout, embarrass the officials and throw a red flag out on the field, let him go in and look at God knows what on the Internet and come out and tell me I didn't get a definitive view to overrule it.

If we're going to win, we're going to have to run the ball more, ... Therefore we'll have to be in games that are more controllable that we don't put ourselves in a position where we have to throw to catch up.

If we had Musa Smith and Chester Taylor in 2001, we might have gone back to the Super Bowl.

Last year, we felt we were a Super Bowl-caliber team. I think in just about every measure you can put out there, we're a better team than we were last year.

When you're 0-2, your whole world has to be about getting that first win and stopping that slide. A two-game losing streak to start the season, it can't get to that third game. That's a tough nut to crack if it does.

When you're a 2-4 football team, you go back to work and you work your way through. That's what's left of this team right now, ... What the rest of the year holds for us, we'll find out and we'll see what that means. This team will stay together, it will work and it will try to isolate the way that we can get better. That's the only approach I know how to take at this point.

So I hear they call you 'The Freak?' Wow, that's quite a coincidence. They call me 'The Brain.'

I hate to make the move, but Orlando understands that's what we need to do and hopefully his presence still being around will help us out.

Jamal clearly had that rhythm -- good, tough, physical running -- and he got stronger as he went, which is typical of what you see.

Jamal Lewis is a force to be reckoned with. When it's all said and done, barring injuries, he will have a huge effect our ability to run the ball.

I can only imagine how he must feel without that shadow, without that burden hanging over him. Just look in his eyes. I've never seen him more vibrant. There's more sparkle in his eyes, more energy.

I can't lock them up and put them away 24-7, ... He had free time, and I don't want to comment until we know exactly what happened. There are legal liabilities here. But anytime someone has free time, they have to act responsibly. You can't do it any other way.

Getting the ball in Jamal's hands more, which is always a point of interest for everybody, lends itself to the old adage that a back doesn't get cranked up until he gets to that 20th, 25th run. That may have something to do with it,

I can almost guarantee you, without being a doctor, that Kyle won't go this week.

I can do the math. You can't trade sevens for three, plain and simple.

I can do the math. You can't trade sevens for three, plain and simple. If you get an opportunity to score or stop them, you can't trade touchdowns for field goals, and that's what we did today.

For Todd, it's time to go after it, ... We'll be prudent about it.

If Anthony Wright has a chance of going some place as a starter, he should and we'll encourage and help him in all that we can. Short of someone totally committing to Anthony under those terms, we very much want Anthony back. He understands that.

I don't respond to that. That's the most common observation, and I don't know how you quite substantiate that.

For those that look at my or any other player, and say, 'Gee, I don't like the way he does this or that,' I can't have a bunch of robots, ... And I can't dictate to 53 individuals that they show their passion and love for this game in a very narrow, rigid perspective of a 51-year-old man.

For me to determine that one set of actions vs. another based on my limited perspective in the way that I grew up or the way that I've conducted myself, you've got to be very careful about (that),

But this year in the league, defense and running the ball seems to be the key. And this is coming from a guy who believes offense is the way to win a championship.

I don't know of a football field -- pup, community, Pop Warner, junior high, high school or college -- that that's not a touchdown, ... But evidently not in the NFL.

I don't know of a football field, pup, community, Pop Warner, junior high, high school or college that that's not a touchdown. But evidently not in the NFL.

I feel very good about the core of this team. We have some very good athletes here. We've got some very good character on this team. That's a good place to start, and we'll augment it over the next six months in every way that we can.

Because we have a lot of young players that find themselves in situations, if not exactly like Jamal's ... You never learn more than from your own mistakes.

I have a sense that what this league does to a guy who plays that brilliantly is beat up on him pretty good.

To draw too many conclusions about anybody this early in the season, I don?t know if that?s real functional.

Haven't seen much of you in a while, ... We're just sitting here kind of below the radar screen.

When he's allowed to show up here, we'll go forward. I'm not completely 100% certain when that is right now. God and the U.S. government only know.

When he's allowed to show up here, we'll go forward. I'm not completely 100 percent certain when that is right now. God and the U.S. government only know.

Hard to say. The high ankle sprain is always a concern. It would be ill-advised to project at this time.

I am afraid I'm not going to be much help to you right now. I am not prepared to give you a lot of observations until I absorb this and look at the film and decide what happened and how we are going to go forward.

He went 23 of 39. If he were 21 of 37 and not thrown two of those passes, it would have been a (heck) of a day and a win. This is why I'm anxious to see the next three games. I learned and saw a lot in yesterday's game, both good and bad, not just about Kyle but about this whole football team.

He did some very good things. It showed he was in command of the game. He was much more fundamentally sound, calmer in the pocket that allowed him to make the better throws that he made.

He has to calm his mechanics down. When he does, he's pretty darn good. Maybe if we can play enough games, the league will beat it out of him to the point where, out of necessity, he slows down a little bit in some of the key fundamentals.

He went two hard ones yesterday. We're trying to program what he needs, but at the same time not put him at risk.

He's got to look at what he wants to do.

He's here plenty early to make an impact.

He's been told that there's a possibility of surgery since the injury happened. There was always that possibility. I don't know if it's any more viable now than it was before.

Hopefully, we can run the ball equally as well, ... I'm sure Tennessee is focused on not letting that happen again.

He's been a joy to have, a great addition to this club. We'd love to have him back.

He is about defense . . . he is about passion, he is about winning,

He has the size, the accuracy and the throwing action. He's a spectacular talent, but he doesn't look like anybody. So that tends to make us all nervous.

He never lost his cool. He knew he had to make certain plays in order for us to keep going. He was everything you'd expect out of a veteran quarterback. He just calms me. His effect on me is calming. He did that for me in 1998, and he's done that here as well. There's always that sense of, 'You know what? We're OK. We're going to be OK.' It's not a lack of urgency by any stretch. It's just a calmness.

He looked fresh, which is what you would expect after not being here for the first week.

He looked fresh, which you'd expect after not being here for the first week, ... We'll continue to push him through it and put him through his paces and see if we can get him through that next level of conditioning.

Just make sure we walk across that street on Sunday,

Look, Fish, ... the only criminal behavior Kyle is capable of is quarterbacking. So, he is what we would call a 'hardened criminal.'

Mark brings the unique perspective to the position that only a former player can bring. Mark will bring the same toughness and tenacity to this staff that he brought to his teams during his 11-year career in the NFL.

Passion, emotion and intensity are good, but they've always got to be under control.

I saw a tremendous player in Dwight Freeney playing at the top of his game and as dynamic a presence on the outside rush as there is in the game.

I think what this defense did this season was diminished by people taking shots at who we played late in the season,

Kyle and Anthony are both athletic, and so is Josh. He fit our profile of what our team looks like. He's not a pure, drop-back passer, but that's not who we are right now.

Kyle has now started 16 games in his career. That's one season that he has behind him. So let's see where he goes from here. Let's just wait to judge this kid. The numbers aren't necessarily going to be there in our offense, with our formula of relying on the running game, defense and special teams. But the signs are there, and the kid is developing.

Kyle's, for instance, would've happened in a swimming pool. The way that thing got pinned and turned had nothing to do with the turf whatsoever, ... What we're examining very closely, quite frankly, are the shoes. The players all want, just like the padding, as little a shoe, as light a shoe, as fast a shoe as they can get. But the shoe also is a very strong support mechanism for the foot.

Kyle stepped up; it was his time to do it. Now, the challenge is to follow up.

Kyle surely would like to throw the ball more, but he understands who the bell cow on this team is. Even though the numbers don't look very good, I'm very comfortable thus far with his decision-making process.

Just a lack of focus. I don't know what to tell you. We'll work at it.

Just a lack of focus, ... We'll work at it, and the next time they won't try to do those things.

Jeff's done a great job, because he's already faced the biggest challenge a coach can face,

I think Marvin would have been the smarter hire, but I'm biased,

Jim was brought in to make the changes that needed to be made schematically, emotionally, strategically and fundamentally for us to go forward in conjunction with some very good coaches. They collectively and Jim individually deserve all the credit for the improvements that we've seen. We've got a lot of work ahead of us.

Life's great for me. Expectations are low. I've got a Super Bowl ring on one finger and a $14 million contract in the other hand. We're doing it, we're doing OK. Life's good.

I think they signed him at 12:01. It's amazing you can put a contract together in one minute because, of course, there was no contact before then. He's outstanding.

It is always disappointing to lose, especially the last game. You have to carry that with you the entire season. We did not have the intensity and could not match the momentum swing.

Our collective mind-set is to improve this team. We'll keep doing this through the draft, free agency and in other ways. It's a disappointment to not get T.O., but I'm confident in our abilities to raise the Ravens to the next level.

I think he really wants to be here. He really wants to be back with us. You never know, but I would certainly hope it happens for us. If we get Duane back, and you look at our defense, what we still have left, we're not starting at ground zero with that group. And that's the perception.

I think he is soaking up everything, ... I think he has a sense of everything going by for the last time. He enjoys the game and he has that veteran presence to know, 'You know what? This is kind of special. There's a chance I might have been out of football altogether, so I want to enjoy this.'

It doesn't take much of a minority of fans to make their presence heard.

I think the process is equitable. It's certainly not perfect. And management would be wise to be more inclusive in their perspective. But Marvin has been enriched by the fact that he has gotten to go through the process. I have no doubt in my mind that someone's going to wisely make him a head coach.

I think that's a quarterback trying to take on his share of responsibility,

It had great strength, the point where he could probably play, but, on reexamination, from the long-term perspective, they decided to go with the surgery. I think they went about it the right way.

I think we've done things fairly intelligently. We've rebuilt without drastically slipping back at any one point.

I think we're a better football team than we were last year, in every sense, ... This could very well be the best football team we've had since I've been here, which in essence says that we think we are capable, playoff, Super Bowl-caliber team. However, we did not make the playoffs last year. We don't have the right to talk in those terms. We've got a lot of work to do.

We need a consistency there, ... We've got to continue to find ways to get the ball in Mark's hands, which we'll do. It's not bad having Derrick Mason, Todd Heap, run the ball well. But to have another presence that people have to account for on the back side, with some consistency that the quarterbacks can rely on, that's the next step for us.

The quarterback's completion percentage -- even in the first two weeks -- is pretty good, ... That should lead to more productivity.

We'll find the right balance, ... We have great faith in both backs. It was great to see Jamal have the game he had. There's no reason to think he couldn't continue along that path. Until Chester is healthy, that's obviously the prudent way to go. But Chester is running real well, and we are anxious to get him back into the rotation.

I would like to limit the total number of reps for Deion -- which we do have to be aware of at 38 years old -- to the secondary.

That's up to Deion. Having him here, as I've said a thousand times, has been phenomenal. It's been a joy for me to be around such a professional, and to see a guy at this stage of his career prepare the way he does and pass that on to people around him is special. Our guys are better for it.

We've been down this road before, ... We are in negotiations, we have been in negotiations; it never goes as fast as you'd like.

You knew we were going to beat him up. He was just too good to be true.

The problem I see is I don't know who you compare Vince Young to - and I think that makes people uncomfortable. Young is a different breed.

Mike analyzes everything. He works at his trade. He came into it new, and spent countless hours learning the craft, talking with people around the league to find out what it is he needs to do, and given that opportunity, how he would approach being a head coach. He's very detailed in his preparation. Mike's a very deep thinker and very passionate about the game, and those are two pretty good qualities to become a head coach.

Whether it's opportunity, whether it's maturity on their part, all of a sudden they hit it. Some never do. It's just one of those positions that's very unique.

You act like a man, I'll treat you like a man.