Q: Did you stay up late watching the St. Louis game last night?
BB: I did see the end of the game.
What a game. What a game. What a catch. Well, I'm happy for Tony [La Russa].
I'm really happy for Tony. I know he works hard. The team plays hard. It was
a great series. Like I said, I'm not against anybody. I'm just for Tony.
Q: Is that shirt a good luck charm?
BB: Well, we have a lot of people in this building pulling for another
team. They will go nameless. We'll go nameless on that. I'm sure I'd be
looking at a whole lot of Mets gear though if that game had turned out
differently. But anyway, we're trying to focus a little more on football
today. What are you guys working on?
Q: How has the week been? A good week?
BB: Yes. [Buffalo is] a team that we know well and had a lot of problems with.
We started working on them a little bit last week and [we're] trying to do
some things just on our end that generically we need to do, but it has
certainly been more Buffalo-specific this week. We'll find out Sunday.
Q: Can you gauge during the week on how you'll be on Sunday?
BB: I wish I could. It's hard, but I do believe in practice and
preparation. I think the better that is, then I know the better chances we
have for success. That doesn't guarantee anything. The other team is
practicing hard. They're working hard, too. But I know when it's bad during
the week, it's never great during the game. It might be, you might get by
with one every now and then, but long term that's not the way to do it.
Q: How much does your regimen vary from road trip to road trip?
BB: We try to keep everything pretty much the same. We try to keep it
pretty much the same. Our Saturday schedule in the morning is usually the
same whether we travel or play at home. Then our Sunday schedule during the
day, it's basically as much the same as we can make it, if it's a one
o'clock game, a four o'clock game, 8 o'clock game, whatever. We have a night
meeting Saturday night, home or away. We have Saturday morning meetings and
walkthrough, home or away. It's just a question on Saturday afternoon
whether we travel or whether we're here at the home hotel. There are always a
couple of logistical things. For the most part we try to keep it as
consistent a week as we can, regardless of where the game is being played.
Q: Since you've been in the league, has there always been a constant with
road trips? Were they always broken down the same way?
BB: I've been with teams where it wasn't, where the home games were quite
a bit different than the away games. I've been in situations where the team
didn't stay at a hotel the night before the game on home games. They stayed
home and obviously that's different when you travel. There were things like
that. I don't think there's any necessarily right or wrong way to do it. I
think you can make anything work depending on what you believe in and what
your philosophy is and the team understands it and everybody is on the same
page with it. There's a lot of different ways to do it, but that's just kind
of the way we've done it. We're comfortable with it and it seems to work. It
works for me. I think it's the best way for me and it's the best way for us,
but we always talk about it. If there is something that we can do to improve
it, then we'll try to change it. We took the train down to New York a couple
of years ago. We did that on that trip. It's nothing set in stone. Sometimes
we've gone on Fridays instead of Saturdays on certain games. Like I said, I
don't think there's anything that we're locked in on, but for the most part
we try to maintain the consistency unless there's some reason to change it.
Q: Have you every had a problem with a guy sneaking out on a Saturday
night in your career?
BB: Well, I think anytime you have a large group of people you need to
have some type of way to manage that group within a certain set of rules
and/or policies. Usually situations are different. There's not necessarily
every situation is the same. It's hardly ever that way. Whatever it is, then
I deal with it accordingly. If there's a problem then we would address it.
I've been on teams where there have been problems on road trips. There have
been problems on home games and problems during the week. As they come up
then you deal with them.
Q: Is the reality is that different guys get different treatment? I'm
sure Lawrence Taylor kept a different schedule that others didn't get, but
you had to have that guy on the field, right?
BB: As an assistant coach, most of the time I wasn't involved in those
types of decisions. Those are handled between the player and the head coach.
Again, a lot of times there are circumstances that as an assistant coach
you're not totally aware of that could be involved when you have a lot of
players. I would just say that in situations where I've been a head coach,
I've tried to deal with the situations with regard to the team in the best
way that I could and to be as fair as I could to everybody involved.
Sometimes things come up, but on the other hand we all have a responsibility
and obligation to the team and that's how you try to manage it and balance
it. I don't know if there's any book on, 'This is the way you do it.'
because again there are some situations that are just gray, even though
there are policies and so forth. Sometimes there's some gray area in there
for one reason or other and sometimes there isn't. That makes the decision a
lot easier. A lot of times when you make a decision like that not everybody
is happy, but that's part of the decision and part of the job of the head
coach.
Q: Is it typically more of a headache in a place like Miami or New
Orleans versus Buffalo?
BB: No, I don't think so. I don't think there's any set formula for
anything. In my years as a head coach, overall, I don't really feel like
there have been very many problems. There's a lot of other things that I
spend a lot more time on that are a lot more of an issue for me than stuff
like that. I would say it's one percent, maybe if that, of the total picture
for me. Probably not even one percent. Whereas there's other things that are
10, 20 30 percent that are multiple times more time consuming and more of a
problem, more difficult than those. But, sometimes there could be an issue.
I think you have to have a policy and you have to handle it.
Q: Where would you put Buffalo in terms of the kicking game and being the
most challenging place to kick in the league?
BB: It's a tough place to kick. The conditions, we've played in all
different type of conditions there. We've played in snow. We've played in
rain. We've played in heavy winds. We've played in cold and we've had a
couple of hot, warm days there where the ball really carries. Buffalo is as
good as anybody in the kicking game. They're strong in every phase of the
game – kicking, coverage, returns, rushes, blocked a punt against Miami.
They've come very close to blocking four or five this year. They pretty much
either get one or are very close to getting one in every single game. Their
field goal rush is good. They're strong in every area. They have good
players. They're well coached. I think Bobby April continues to do a good
job there. They're strong every year in every phase of the game. That's a
big challenge for us and the conditions are also challenging too, especially
with a guy like [Brian] Moorman who can probably kick the ball as far as any
punter in the league. He can change field position on a 65-, 70-yard punt,
which very few guys can do. We've also seen situations with him where he can
take off and run on a fake and run for 20 or 30 yards. He's fast. There are
a lot of things when you put it all together, and Buffalo's special teams,
between their coaching their talent, and as you said the conditions in
Buffalo, that make it a very critical part of the game.
Q: Is it harder to kick in Buffalo than here?
BB: Well, it depends on the day. You could pick out some days here or some
days there. It depends what you're compare them against. But, they're a
challenge and it's almost never just a warm, still day. We had the opener
there, of course we never had a kick in that game, but you get a warm, still
day, there's not very many of those in Buffalo. Here we are early October
and they got two feet of snow last week. So you have to be ready for
anything. But it's almost always windy there, just like it's almost always
windy here and at The Meadowlands. Those are places where you can pretty
much count on some degree of wind. It's not always the same way either. A
lot of times there are crosswinds, but we've been in downfield winds as
well.
Q: How close is Chad Jackson to making an impact?
BB: He's the same as every other player on the team. He prepares every
week. He's ready to play. I couldn't tell you what any of our players are
going to do this week. That's why we're going to play the game. He'll be
ready to go.
Q: He said that knowing a play and executing it at game speed are two
different things. What kinds of strides has he made in that area?
BB: I think Chad has made good strides since he's been out on the field.
He basically missed the whole preseason and training camp and has been able
to practice on a regular basis and improve consistently since the start of
the regular season. He's certainly coming along a lot faster than he did in
training camp because he's been out on the field more consistently. Now he's
still learning the plays and was in the walkthroughs and I think it was
still valuable learning for him, but it's still not as good as being able to
actually go out there and do it. He's been able to do that. That's good.
It's good to have as many out there as possible and we've had more lately.
That's been a positive.
Q: Is he limited to any particular sets?
BB: Not that I know of. Again, there are certain things that by game plan
are set up one way or another, but no there isn't anything that, 'He can't
do this. He can't do that.' No. Again, by personnel groups and by play and
so forth, we have a number of players who we feel are talented and we
utilize them in certain formations and certain plays. It doesn't mean other
people can't do them. It just means that sometimes a play that Kevin Faulk is in there for doesn't mean that [Corey] Dillon or [Laurence] Maroney can't
do it. That's a play that we have Kevin Faulk in there for. Just because
Dillon is in there doesn't mean that Maroney or Faulk can't do it. It's the
same thing at receiver.
Q: Are you looking at him in one spot right now or is he able to do more?
BB: In any skill position, you don't have enough guys and everybody is
going to have know more than one spot. The tight end has to know both spots.
The receiver has to know at least two spots, in some cases he's responsible
for three. The guy that plays one spot is the quarterback.
Q: Are you guys going to be okay when [Bill] Polian comes here?
BB: Stacey, are you in charge of that? I'll refer that one over to you.
Q: Have you warned your personnel to keep their distance?
BB: No. I haven't talked to anybody about it.
Q: There was a report that you guys petitioned the league to provide
security or make sure that he stayed away.
BB: [Stacey's] your man.
Q: Do you see teams throwing a little bit more to [Terrence] McGee now?
Is that maybe a product of how Nate Clements is playing?
BB: They're both tough. It's like we've talked about before. You could
take any corner in the league and find some plays where passes were
completed. You can find every receiver that has dropped the ball or run a
bad route. But I think that McGee is a good football player. He's a good
tackler. He's a good cover player. He's fast. He's quick. Clements is a good
corner, too. They have two good corners that can tackle, that can support
the run, that are fast and cover the deep ball and they have the quickness
to break up the short and intermediate routes. Again, part of the problem
with the Buffalo's secondary is you run short routes and those guys are very
sure tacklers and they come up and there's not a lot of yards after the
catch. I think they have two really good corners. I think that McGee is a
really good corner. He is obviously the best kickoff returner in the league.
He adds a lot of value to their team. He's had a couple of plays that I'm
sure he'd like to have back. He's an aggressive player and he's been beaten
on a stop and go or a double move type of route. There's very few times
where he's not right there on a receiver. Even if you complete a pass
against Buffalo's corners, it has to be a good route, a good throw and a
good catch. There's very few times where they're very far off their
coverage.
Q: With that said, has Clements gotten to the level where he is the type
of corner that a team will avoid throwing at?
BB: In Buffalo's secondary, you have to be careful about any player you
throw on. You just have to be careful that you have a good read and you run
a good route. If you run a bad route against them or make a bad throw,
they're going to make you pay the price. That's just the way they are.
They're fast. They're quick and they make plays. If a receiver runs a crummy
route and the defender undercuts it and reads it, then they'll make the
play. If the quarterback makes a crummy throw, those guys, they have the
speed and quickness to make up for the coverage and get the ball. You need
to be sharp in the passing game against them if you're going to throw the
ball successfully. They're underneath coverage is fast. [Angelo] Crowell and
[Takeo] Spikes and [London] Fletcher – they cover a lot of ground underneath
there. In their zone coverages, it's the same thing. You have to have good
spacing, good distribution on the pattern and do a good job of throwing and
catching the ball. They really don't give up a lot a yards after the catch.
They're a good tackling secondary. They're a good tackling team. A lot of
times whatever the guy gets on the throw and the catch, that's pretty close
to the end of the play. They don't give up a lot of extra yards. I'm not
saying they don't give up any, but relative to other teams I'd say they give
up a lot less than most. They're a good tackling team.
Q: I know they didn't win any of them, but how impressive it is that Buffalo went to four straight Super Bowls? It hasn't been done by any other
team.
BB: I don't know. I guess it's good to be there and not be eliminated
earlier.
Q: How hard is it to set that standard in your conference? There's a lot
that goes into that.
BB: I guess that's good. But when you play in that game, there's only one
champion. I'm sure for whatever good feelings they have about getting there,
they had more disappointment about having not won those games. I'm not
saying it isn't better to be there. It's better to have loved and lost than
to not loved at all. I'm sure it's better to have been in the Super Bowl and
lost than to not be there at all. Anybody I've talked that has lost that
game, and I've been a part of that one time, it still doesn't give you a
very good feeling even in the offseason. You're so close, but then to come
up short, it's a tremendous disappointment when you're in that situation.
You want to get there, but that's when you don't want to lose.
Q: Is that maybe the best team that you saw that didn't win a Super Bowl
over a long period of time?
BB: I don't know. They had a talented team. Only one of those games was
really a competitive game though, right? The game against the Giants. The
rest of them, I don't even think it was [close]. 55-10. Whatever they were.
There were a couple of them though that weren't even really very
competitive.
Q: Was that one competitive game something you look back on?
BB: Sure. That was a tremendous season for us. I don't know that we were
the most talented team in the league that year, but we played the best and
that's what championships are about. We played well in some big games at
critical times. The win out in San Francisco the week before. That was
against a really good football team and then a one-week Super Bowl traveling
down to Tampa with everything that was going on with security and so forth.
There were a lot of distractions down there. Buffalo was a team that had
beaten us at the right end of the regular season in Giants Stadium and we
had a lot of respect for them and we played a really good football game all
the way around. We played well on defense. We played well on offense. We
controlled the ball. I'm not saying we totally shut them down defensively,
but again that's a very explosive offensive team. To hold them to 19 points
was hard. They had a good quarterback. A good running back. Good receivers.
Good tight end. A really good offensive line. It was a very talented
offensive team, as they continued to produce through the next four years as
well. It was a great feeling for our team, obviously, to win and like I
said, for those of us that have more than one child, they are all special.
Five Super Bowls, they've all been special. I wouldn't want to be without
any of them. It's hard to put one over the other because they're all
special, but that was a special year. Losing [Phil] Simms. We were 10-1, and
we lose Simms for the year. Who's your starting quarterback? [Jeff] Hostetler came in. It looked like it was going to be kind of a bumpy road
there toward the latter third of the season. We had some great players. They
were able to come through and make plays at critical times in the game and
we were able to win them. That's the way it always is if you win.
Q: What was your vantage point on the field goal kick at the end?
BB: I was right there at midfield. I couldn't really see whether it was
going to be in or not. It looked like it had the distance. Once I saw our
guys jumping around it was...that was the play when [Thurman] Thomas broke
the draw. Probably the biggest play for us was Everson Walls making that
tackle in the open field on Thomas. Everson was a good football player and
had 56 career interceptions and all of that, but I wouldn't say that he was
known necessarily for his tackling. I'm not saying it was bad, but I
wouldn't say that was the best thing that he did. That was a huge tackle on
Thomas. What was it 47 [yards]? How long was it? 47. Out there in practice
in ideal conditions, that's a pretty tough kick. Then you put everything
else into it and he didn't miss it by much. That's probably about what
separated the two teams. A few inches.
Q: Not to take anything away from that game, but subsequently how Buffalo played in that game, Thurman Thomas not having his helmet, just the
uncompetitive nature of some of those games, does that speak to what that
team was? Was it there something flawed about that Buffalo team?
BB: I don't know. You have to ask them about that. I don't know what all
happened. I'm sure that they had a lot higher expectations than what they
were able to produce in those other games. I'm sure they had higher
expectations in our game. Like I said, they beat us in Giants Stadium,
whatever it was, a month before that, or six weeks before, whatever it was.
They were a good football team. To come into Giants Stadium and win. We
didn't have too many of those games back in those days. We were pretty good
at home. We knew right away. We knew getting ready for them about the no
huddle offense. That was something that [Ted] Marchibroda just started
running during the year, that year, it had picked up and they had a lot of
success with it. As the years went on, at least you could kind prepare for
it and know it was coming. Not that we didn't know it was coming in the
Super Bowl, but again it was something they really had only been doing for
about eight or nine weeks or whatever it was. It was a very challenging
offensive team to prepare for.
Q: Were they at all similar to preparing for the Rams eleven years later?
BB: Well similar, but different. The Rams, they didn't run the huddle
attack, but they were every bit as explosive offensively as Buffalo was.
Absolutely. With their quarterback and the running back and the receiver
corps that they had, as fast as they were. They kind of had a different
style of game, but they were every bit as explosive. I felt like playing
against Buffalo in the '90 Super Bowl and then playing against the Rams in
'01, they could have the ball on their own two yard line and you'd feel like
they were about to score. Even though they're 98 yards away, one pass to
[Isaac] Bruce. One pass to James [Lofton]. One run by [Marshall] Faulk. One
pass to [André] Reed. One draw to Thurman Thomas. One seam to [Pete] Metzelaars. You felt like they were on their one-yard line even though they
were 80 yards away on every single snap. That's the way I felt with St.
Louis. Every play they were about to score, even though they could have been
65 yards away. That's the kind of offense they have. The difference with
Faulk is Faulk was really a great pass receiver. He was a wide receiver for
the Colts when he played for them and they split him out. He was their best
receiver. So you talk about a team's top receiver. I know they have Bruce
and [Ricky] Proehl and [Torry] Holt and all of those guys and Az-[Zahir] Hakim, but then you take a back that had the receiving skills that Faulk had
put him into the equation, as a back, and god, who do you double? Who do you
stop? It's hard. So those are two great offensive football teams. Two very
explosive offensive football teams that we faced. Yes, they're similar in
that way. |
