Rams QB Sam Bradford

Conference call - Arizona at St. Louis - 9/8/10

On his expectations for the first game:
“First off, I’m extremely excited. I’m excited for this opportunity. I feel like our coaching staff has given me a tremendous opportunity in allowing me to start this first game. I’m going to make the most of it. I’ve been trying hard to learn as much as I can during training camp. I’m starting to look at Arizona. Starting to look at what they do, just trying to pick up as much as possible. Overall, I would say that I’m just extremely excited for this opportunity and can’t wait to get out there and play on Sunday.”

On what his grasp is on the offense:
“I think I have a very good grasp on this offense. Obviously, the more I’m out there, the more reps I get, the more comfortable I become. I feel like I’ve made progress each week. Do I know the offense as well as somebody who’s been in it for five or six years? No, probably not, but I don’t think that I can really expect that of myself only being in this offense for however many weeks, however many practices we’ve had to this point. I do feel like I have enough of a grasp of this offense to come out and execute.”

On how prepared he thinks he is for what the Cardinals will throw at him on Sunday:
“We obviously understand that what we see on tape in the preseason is pretty basic. It seems to be the trend with a rookie quarterback to throw a lot at them, throw a lot of blitzes at them. I understand that. I’m working extremely hard with our coaching staff this week to try to get prepared for all the things that we can see. Are we going to be able to draw up or guess everything that they’re going to throw at me? No. At the same time, I’m comfortable in our schemes. I know where my protection is strong. I know where it’s weak. I feel comfortable enough knowing that I can get the ball out of my hand if they do decide to pressure me.”

On the feeling around town among the fans about the Rams:
“I can’t speak for the fans. I’m not one of them. But I know just being around this organization and being around this team everyday that we’re extremely excited in the direction that we’re going. I feel like just in the time that I’ve been here, I’ve seen a lot of improvement. I feel like we’re going in the right direction. I feel like as a football team as long as we continue to get better each week then good things will happen and good things are in the future for this organization.”

On if it’s hard to manage the high expectations of being the first overall pick and signing such a large contract:
“I think regardless of whether I was the first pick or not, I have always put a lot of pressure on myself to succeed and a lot of pressure on myself to play well, so I don’t think anything has changed. When I was at Oklahoma, I expected to go out every Saturday and play to the level that I knew I was capable of. All that other stuff, people might think that’s more pressure, but to me it’s still the same. It’s still a football game. When I step on the field on Sunday, I expect to play at a very high level and give this team an opportunity to win.”

On if the offense will lean more on RB Steven Jackson due to the overall inexperience on that side of the ball:
“People might think that, but I think we have a great group of wide receivers here. Obviously Steven Jackson is a great player and he is going to be a huge part of this offense, but to say that we’re going to lean on him more because of the inexperience at other positions, I don’t think that’s necessarily true.”

On the team’s progress from the first preseason game to now:
“I feel like we have made a lot of progress in the preseason. From week one to week four, I think you look at the mistakes that we made as an offense, they were much fewer and really it seemed like we didn’t really repeat any of the things that we had messed up in the prior week. I feel like our offensive line has really come together since week one. They’ve done a great job of protecting me and the other quarterbacks and they really sparked the run game in the past couple preseason games. I feel very good with the progress we’ve made as an offense in this preseason.”

On how comfortable he is playing under center:
“I’m very comfortable. People looked at what I did at Oklahoma and they really don’t understand that my first year, we were under center more than 50% of the time. It’s something that I’ve done. It’s something that I am comfortable with. The more that I’ve done it in this training camp, the more comfortable I’ve become with it.”