Super Bowl XLVI – Tuesday, January 31, 2012(on if he could have imagined Tom Coughlin coaching the Giants after he turned them down once to stay at Boston College and then took the head coaching job with the Jacksonville Jaguars) “No, because he had success in Jacksonville so I thought we’d never have an opportunity to get him. But in this league, things have a funny way of working out sometimes. Coaches go from team to team and then all of a sudden they’re back with you.”
(on Coughlin epitomizing what a Giants coach should be in his mind) “Oh, I think he does. Too many people make too big a deal out of, ‘He brings discipline and everything.’ We just felt like he was a winner and he would work so hard and be so devoted to putting a winning team on the field and that’s what we were looking for: a guy who was that dedicated and that hard-working and didn’t care about his image and doing TV commercials or whatever. We wanted a guy that was devoted to the X’s and O’s and coaching and that’s what we got.”
(on NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith saying he was glad to see Mara and Robert Kraft’s teams in the Super Bowl given the role they played in the labor negotiations before the season) “Oh absolutely. I’m not necessarily happy to be playing Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, I’ll tell you that. But yeah, I’m very happy for Bob (Robert Kraft) because he put his heart and soul into those negotiations during a very difficult time for him and his family so I think the success they’ve had is well-deserved.”
(on Robert Kraft’s role in the CBA negotiations) “I don’t think we get to the finish line without Bob Kraft. The message that he kept delivering to the players, which I think really resonated, ‘We’re not going to let you do a bad deal. We need to do a deal that works for both of us and we need to make it a long-term deal because that has such a huge effect on our business which, in turn, helps you.’ That message came across over and over again and I think it made an impression on them and I think they all respected the amount of time he was putting in. Everybody knew what he was going through and he still found the time to be there with us. Like I said, I don’t think we get the deal done without him being there.”
(on running into Bill Belichick after the teams faced each other in the final regular season game of the 2007 season) “In the tunnel after they had defeated us, he was walking to his locker room, I was walking to mine, and I shook hands and congratulated him and he said, ‘We’ll play again.’ I remember not particularly believing him. I had a pretty strong sense that they were going to get there but I wasn’t so sure about us and sure enough it happened. Then he called me – I can’t remember after which game it was but it was late this season – just to say hello and congratulations for whatever game we had just won and he said, ‘We’ll play again.’ So again, I think that was met with the same bit of skepticism but he turned out to be right.”
(on if he remembers Ernie Accorsi’s scouting report on Eli Manning before the Giants acquired him) “I remember it very well. I can’t repeat all of it, to tell you the truth.”
(on the essence of Accorsi’s report on Manning) “Just that he has something that very few players have: the ability to put a team on his shoulders and carry them. The one line I remember from the report is, ‘He can’t really run with the football. It’s just not in them unless it comes from Olivia (Manning) and I never timed her.’ That’s what he put in the report.”
(on what it is that’s made this Giants team so special, especially late in the season) “I think I was struck just being in the locker room while we were waiting to come out here how much camaraderie there is with this team. These guys really get along. They really believe in one another and the work ethic all through the season has been tremendous. They never got down on themselves; they never stopped believing in themselves. I think that comes from the head coach and I think it permeates throughout the rest of the team and we’ve got a guy playing as well as number 10 has been playing, I think that gives the entire organization a great deal of confidence.”
(on why Mara has stayed confident in Tom Coughlin) “Well because we believe in him. We’ve had success with him in the past. We know that he is a winning head coach. We know that we can win a Super Bowl with him. We know that there’s nothing more important to him than getting his team prepared to win and going out and trying to win a championship. So our faith never wavered in him. In this business, it’s a week by week business. You’re on top of the world one week and you lose a couple games and you’re at the bottom, but you can’t let that affect your decision-making. You have to let the season play itself out because a lot of crazy things can happen. As long as you believe in the coaching staff, which we do, you have to have the faith to let them do their jobs. Fortunately, it’s worked out for us.”
(on where Patriots quarterback Tom Brady goes down for him in terms of all-time quarterbacks) “Well, I mean he’s obviously a first-ballot Hall of Famer. He’s maybe the last quarterback that I’d like to face this time around because he’s such a great player. It’s going to be a huge challenge for our defense but they believe in themselves and I think we have a chance.”
(on sticking his neck out for Eli Manning when the team made the draft day trade to acquire him and if he remembers that day) “I remember it very well. I remember the night before the draft, I don’t know how many phone conversations I had with Ernie (Accorsi) asking him, ‘Did (Chargers General Manager) A.J. (Smith) call yet?’ And there wasn’t. A.J. played it pretty cool and there wasn’t any communication the night before, until I think we were on the clock. So it really did go down to the wire. Our backup plan was Ben Roethlisberger, so either way we felt like we were in good shape but we had our hearts set on Eli at the time. I think mostly because of the level of competition he had played at and the fact that he really was that team at Ole Miss. He didn’t have a lot of talent around him and I think that’s what tipped the scales in his favor for us at that time.”
(on the stability of the franchise) “I am proud of that. That’s something that we strive for around here. I look at the other successful franchises in this league – the Patriots, the Steelers, Green Bay, Baltimore – that’s what they have. They have stability. They don’t make big changes every year. You try to get the right people in place and you try to let them do their jobs and then you try to have some sense of stability. There’s enough turnover in this league as it is and if you can keep your key people in place and have some confidence to let them do their jobs and ride out the ups and downs, then I think you have a chance to be successful. If you start making impulsive changes, I think that’s recipe for disaster. We’ve tried to avoid that.”
(on what he admires about Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick) “Just how smart he is, how dedicated he is, how prepared he is and he’s one of a kind. He did so much for our organization as our defensive coordinator and obviously the success he’s had here (at New England), there aren’t too many people, if any, that are in his class.”
(on both the Patriots and Giants being teams built for strong finishes and late-game comebacks) “I think it starts with having quarterbacks that you believe in and are cool under pressure. Obviously, both franchises have that. I can’t speak for the Patriots but our team is a very confident one that never believes it’s out of the game and we’ve had some terrific comebacks this year. I think a lot of that comes from the quarterback and our team’s feeling that the quarterback, no matter what situation we’re in, is going to figure out a way to get the job done. Our coach too. One of his biggest messages is always finish strong, finish strong. He emphasizes that all the time and he never gives up. We could be down by 20 points with under two minutes to go and he’s still taking timeouts because he wants the players to have that attitude of ‘Never give up.’”
(on looking back on the season and if he’s happy with how it’s ended with another appearance the Super Bowl) “Oh sure. That’s what makes this year a little more unique than the other times is that as I said before, when we were sitting there at 7-7, it’s hard for me to sit here and tell you that I expected us to be here as a participant. I also knew that if we could just get into the playoffs like we did in ’07 that anything could happen at that point. We’ve had guys that have had success in those situations before. Do whatever you have to do to get into the playoffs and then see what happens.”
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