Super Bowl XLVI – Monday, January 30, 2012(on what a second Super Bowl Championship would mean to him) “You don’t think about that as a player. You concentrate on the opponent, that’s New England – trying to get ready for them. You try to keep your mind focused on the job and what style of football it’s going to take to win this game. If you get concerned with other things, it takes your focus off what your job has to be for this coming Sunday. That’s the mindset of the players and the coaches – just trying to get ready and focused to go out there and play your best football.”
(on whether the uncertainty with Peyton Manning’s football future causes him to have a deeper appreciation for the game) “If you play this game long enough you realize how precious each season is and how precious these opportunities are. You don’t know if you’re going to get a chance to play in another Super Bowl. You don’t know when a season might be cut short on you. It’s not just reminding me because of what Peyton’s going through. Having had numerous teammates get injured and miss the season or all of a sudden their careers get cut short or they have to retire; those things happen. You’re reminded of that yearly. You understand that in a season when you feel like you have a good team and you have good players and you have an opportunity where you can go win a championship, you don’t want to let those things slip away because you just don’t know if you’re going to get another opportunity.”
(on why he felt it was important to give the team a speech about his last experience at the Super Bowl) “I know everyone is excited. When we had the meeting last week, it was a Tuesday. We had just come off a big win. We were excited about going to the Super Bowl. Our families were excited, there were a lot of things going on. I just wanted to make sure guys knew the importance of the practices last week. That week, when we were back in New Jersey, those practices are the time when we need to have our best practices. The focus has to be there and our preparation has to be at its best because when you get to Indianapolis, your schedule is thrown off. All the things that you might normally do during the week, it might be a little tougher to get the extra work in. So, I just told them to treat this week like you’re playing on Sunday. (I told them to) handle all the business with tickets and family, make sure all that was handled last week, so when we get to Indianapolis your focus is on getting the game plan and having the mindset that this is a business trip and we have to go play our best football.”
(on whether there was a turning point this season for the Giants) “I don’t know if it was one specific time. Obviously, the win at Dallas was a big one. There was a stretch there when we lost four in a row – going to play a division team, a team that was first place in the NFC East at that point. It was going to be tough to make the playoffs if we didn’t win the division at that time. We knew we had to go in and play well against a good team. They were playing good football. We got back on a winning streak – got us back to that winning feeling. It was a big win at the time. The Jets’ game was another big one. Our defense played outstanding. Offensively we didn’t do much, but we didn’t make many mistakes. We were able to rely on the defense and not put them in harm’s way. From then on, our defense has been playing outstanding. Offensively we’ve been playing smart football. We’ve been making plays. If we don’t put our defense in harm’s way, if we don’t make mistakes and make turnovers, we can win games playing great defense and playing smart offensively.”
(on the similarities between the Giants’ Super Bowl run this year compared to four years ago) “As a player, it’s not our job to compare these two seasons. The fact that we’re playing the Patriots in the Super Bowl, that’s the similarity. That’s the only thing that I want to think about. We know that they’re a very talented team. We’re going to have to play great football. They have tremendous players on both sides of the ball. They have a way of making comebacks at the end. They have a quarterback who has been able to do that for a long time. On both sides of the ball, we are going to have to play our best football. We are going to have to play for 60 minutes. You can’t let up or relax or give them any easy field position or easy points because they’ll take advantage of it.”
(on how familiar the Patriots feel as an opponent to the Giants) “It does feel like we’ve played them a decent amount in the last couple of years. We played them in the Super Bowl. We played them in the regular season. We have played them close in all those games. We do understand that they are very talented. They have the ability to score a lot of points. Their defense has the ability to keep you to a minimum of points. It’s going to be a great challenge for both sides of the ball to do our jobs at a high level. It’s also a situation where you’ve seen them play so many times – from a fan or from watching Colts’ games or watching past Super Bowls growing up. You’ve seen them on TV a lot, so you know the players. You know the names. You know the style of football that they play, so it makes it seem like you’ve played them more than you have.”
(on whether he remembers the comments Peyton Manning made about him after Peyton won the Super Bowl) “I think he was just trying to be nice at the time. Seeing Peyton after the game, in the locker room, seeing that smile on his face and then being with him those next couple of months after he won the Super Bowl; it definitely made me jealous. You always want to win a championship, but when you see someone win it, just the relief, the smile that was painted on his face for months – it makes you want to win one even more. It truly gives you a burning desire to get one. That made a bigger impact on me than his comments. There’s not a better feeling from a professional standpoint knowing that you’ve done your job, that season, better than anyone else. That is what we’re fighting for.”
(on an example of when he was little and Peyton Manning “big brothered” him) “I probably have quite a few of them, but to limit it to one – his most popular move, he would pin me down and take his knuckles and knock on my chest and make me name the 12 schools in the SEC (Southeastern Conference). I didn’t know them all at the time, but I quickly learned them. It was a great learning technique. I don’t suggest anyone else try it out, but it definitely made me learn the schools of the SEC. Once I figured those out, he moved on. There were 28 teams in the NFL at that point, so all teams in the NFL. I had to get my studying on for that. Then once I figured that out – the one I never got was the 10 brands of cigarettes. When he really wanted to torture me and knew I had no shot of every\ getting it, that’s when I just started screaming for my mom or dad to come save me, or maybe Cooper. That was his go-to move.”
(on the challenges of developing a rapport with a new receiver) “The timing issue is something you can work on. You can work on it during the offseason. You have training camps and practices. That’s not the biggest issue. The biggest thing that it takes to develop chemistry with (new receivers) is what happens in a game and the things that you prepare for and all of a sudden you get a different technique. Something that maybe hasn’t happened before occurs. Can you tell by their body language or the stem of their route, exactly what they’re going to do? Sometimes you have a scramble drill or you have to move in the pocket and the timing is a little off. How are they going to react in those situations? That’s only something that can really only happen in games. You can try to practice it. You can’t always create those situations. It’s a great learning experience. That’s why I try to talk to them on the sidelines – talk to receivers during the game and after games. They may do everything correctly, but it might be two or three plays where the timing was a little off or you had a different coverage. You have to talk about those things so you can learn from those experiences so the next time it does happen you’re ready for it.”
(on whether this trip to the Super Bowl feels different than his last trip and whether he plans to visit Peyton Manning this week) “It feels very similar. You’re just excited to be here, like the last time. It’s not a situation where you feel more comfortable or you have a better idea of what to expect. You may have a better idea of media day, tomorrow, and what to expect. You don’t want to be so relaxed you have a great feeling that everything is going to work out perfectly. You still want to prepare hard and get all your studying in, and make sure you’re doing everything to get your team ready to play. That’s still the mentality, knowing that we have a lot of work to do. It’s all going to come down to making sure we play our best football on Sunday. That’s the ultimate goal.
“I don’t have any plans, right now, to see Peyton. I know I won’t be going over to his house anytime this week. The last Super Bowl I played in, he was in Arizona starting on Wednesday or Thursday and I never saw him then. I’ll talk to him throughout the week, like I always do. Besides that, I am going to keep my normal routine and probably will not see a whole lot of family throughout the week.”
(on the Giants staying in downtown Indianapolis) “It’s something that we will have to see as the week goes how that affects us and how we have to deal with that. In Arizona we were away from the action. There wasn’t a whole lot going on around us which was nice. Obviously, there will probably be more distractions. Getting around the hotel might be a little more crowded. If you want to go somewhere or go outside for a little bit, there will probably be more fans around. That is something as a team, each individual needs to realize that and understand that you can’t get distracted. You can’t let these things get in the way of our preparation and what we have to do to get ready to play on Sunday.”
(on playing in Peyton Manning’s shadow ) “Peyton has been a great big brother to me and very helpful in my progression as a quarterback whether through college or the NFL. He has supported me and given me any tips he could think of, especially my first couple of years. For a Christmas present, he bought me a computer that stores all our software to watch film at home. He would want to do anything for me to be a better quarterback, to help me play at a high level. He has been very helpful at that. In his case, he’s been the guy who I’ve looked up to. Not just because of what he’s done in the NFL, but since I started watching him play football when he was in the seventh grade and the starting quarterback. I didn’t miss one of his games from the time he was in seventh grade through high school. I saw every one of his games. I tried to see every college game, whether on TV or attending. He is someone who I’ve watched closely, talked to and worked with on drops and different (techniques). When he went off to college he would come back and things his coaches were teaching him in college, he would come back and teach to me when I was in eighth grade or in high school, just so I would have an advantage. We’ve had a very close relationship. I thank him for all that he’s provided me and helping me become a better quarterback.”
(on the possibility of winning a Super Bowl in Peyton Manning’s city) “I really have not thought much about playing in Indianapolis. It’s not really a time to reflect right now on that. It’s just a matter of trying to get ready for the Patriots and get ready to play this game, and get ready for their defense. We’ll look back on the fact of playing in the Super Bowl in the town where he plays for the Colts. We’ll look on that later.”
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario