Portal:American football/Selected quote/archive

May 29, 2007 to June 10, 2007; June 20, 2007 to June 24, 2007

• I think he was the greatest football player that I ever stepped on the field against. Nobody dictated what you could do offensively like L.T.. — Retired Atlanta Falcons and Los Angeles Rams quarterback Steve Bartkowski, on New York Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor
• Vince Young is the greatest quarterback to ever play college football. — College and Pro Football Hall of Fame defensive back Ronnie Lott, in consideration of Young's play in the 2006 Rose Bowl Game
• Every time a football player goes to ply his trade he's got to play from the ground up—from the soles of his feet right up to his head. Every inch of him has to play...If you're lucky enough to find a guy with a lot of head and a lot of heart, he's never going to come off the field second. — Green Bay Packers head coach Vince Lombardi, on the import of a player's having intellect and passion
• Playing football is obviously very strenuous. It's exhausting. You have to try very hard in football. But there's no heroic risk involved. — American writer Gregg Easterbrook, on the consideration of professional football players as heroes
• I don't understand American football at all. It looks like all-in wrestling with crash helmets. — English musician Sting, on the brutal and physical quality of American football, especially as against that of association football

April 21, 2007 to May 6, 2007

• Football is a game played with arms, legs, and shoulders but mostly from the neck up. — University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach Knute Rockne, on the import of intellect and passion to a player's or team's succeeding
• College football: I do not see the relationship of those highly industrialized affairs on Saturday afternoons to higher learning in America. — University of Chicago president Robert Maynard Hutchins, on the putative extra-academic character and corporate, professional nature of the collegiate game in the United States
• If my mother put on a helmet and shoulder pads and a uniform that wasn't the same as the one I [were] wearing, I'd run over her if she [were] in my way. And I love my mother. — Detroit Lions running back Barry Sanders, subsequently an inductee into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, on his devotion and the intensity of his play
• My thoughts just before the first real college game of my life: The honor of my race, family, and self is at stake. Everyone is expecting me to do big things. I will. My whole body and soul are to be thrown recklessly about the field tomorrow. Every time the ball is snapped, I will be trying to do more than my part. — Iowa State College Cyclones offensive tackle Jack Trice, in a letter to his family one day prior to his sustaining fatal injuries in a game betwixt his team and the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers in Minneapolis, Minnesota
• Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect. — Green Bay Packers head coach Vince Lombardi, on the meticulous and taxing nature of his training camps and team practices

October 14, 2006 to April 21, 2007

• This was an insult to college football...it was just a farce. [The officials] didn't have control of the game. They ruined my last game as a college football player. I don't believe they can take something like that away from this program...It's something I'll have to live with the rest of my life. — Stanford University Cardinal quarterback John Elway, on the ultimate disposition of a 1982 collegiate football game betwixt the Cardinal and the California Golden Bears, the 85th contested between the two sides in a rivalry styled as the Big Game, in which game, in view of a controversial game-ending kickoff return touchdown known thereafter as The Play, the Golden Bears claimed The Stanford Axe, 25-20
  

Image:Vince Young scores a touchdown in the 2005 Big 12 Championship Game.JPG

• You don't have to win it, just don't lose it. — American middle linebacker Ray Lewis, to Elvis Grbac, upon the latter's assuming, in 2001, the starting quarterback position for the Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League, in view of the Ravens' emphasis on defense and after the team had conceded just 165 points across its sixteen 2001 regular season games, fewer than had any other team in single season, en route to the Super Bowl XXXV title
• I left Texas A&M because my school called me. Mama called, and when Mama calls, then you just have to come running. — American Bear Bryant, on his deciding, after the 1957 National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I-A football season, to resign as head coach of the Texas A&M University Aggies to assume the same position for the University of Alabama Crimson Tide, for whom he had been a wide receiver between 1931 and 1935 and whence he graduated in 1936
• The quarterback just ran all over the place. He's a fantastic player. He was the difference. And how classic was it that he ran it in on the last play? — University of Southern California Trojans head coach Pete Carroll, on the play of University of Texas-Austin Longhorns quarterback Vince Young, pictured rushing in the 2005 Big 12 Championship Game, in the 2006 Rose Bowl Game, in which Young rushed for 200 yards and three touchdowns and passed for 267 yards to help the Longhorns to the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I-A national championship
• We've been working hard all season and playing from behind...A lot of people doubted us, but we came back and beat them on the third time. The third time's a charm. — Frankfurt Galaxy tight end Keith Willis, on his team's winning World Bowl XIV over World Bowl XIII champion Amsterdam Admirals despite the Galaxy's having trailed the Admirals at halftime, 7-2, and having lost twice to the Admirals in the 2006 NFL Europe regular season
• I did coach three years in the United States Football League with the Tampa Bay Bandits, and we had winning teams every year. — American Steve Spurrier, in response to the suggestion that, in view of his having had collegiate success as the head coach of the University of Florida Gators but having won just twelve games across the 2002 and 2003 seasons as head coach of the Washington Redskins of the National Football League, he was unsuited for professional coaching
• I think it is important for all those young out there, who someday hope to play real football, where you throw it and kick it and run with it and put it in your hands, a distinction should be made that football is democratic, capitalism, whereas soccer is a European socialist sport. — Six-time American Football League all-star quarterback Jack Kemp, in his capacity as a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives for the 31st district of New York, jocularly expressing his disfavoring of soccer, styled globally as football or Association football, as against American football
• When I started playing, I realized that most important aspects of the sport were strategy and a fighting spirit. These two elements really impressed me. — Kyoto University and Asahi Beer Silver Star (X-League) quarterback Tatsuya Tokai, on the reasons for which Japanese partake increasingly of American football despite the sport's being more brutish and less well-mannered than those traditionally seen as consistent with the values that underlie Japanese culture

August 14 to October 14, 2006

• Some people try to find in this game things that don't exist but football is only two things: blocking and tackling. — Green Bay Packers head coach Vince Lombardi
• Football is an honest game. It's true to life. It's a game about sharing. Football is a team game. So is life. — New York Jets quarterback Joe Namath, pictured
• American football makes rugby look like a Tupperware party. — British television broadcaster Sue Lawley, on the physical nature of football vis-à-vis that of rugby
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• I didn't quit football because I failed a drug test. I failed a test because I was ready to quit football. — Miami Dolphins running back Ricky Williams, prior to the 2004 NFL season, on his testing positive, in contravention of the National Football League's doping policy, for tetrahydrocannabinol for the third time in his career and subsequently retiring from his sport
• Baseball is where we were. Football is what we have become. — Washington Star columnist Mary McGrory, on the evolution of the national pastime of the United States
• NFL owners should quit worrying about silly things like players celebrating in the end zone. They should give them something to really celebrate. Get rid of the artificial surfaces. — Buffalo Bills running back O.J. Simpson, on the decrying by many National Football League executives of post-touchdown celebrations, and on the disfavoring by many players of artificial turf playing fields, as against those of grass
• He has the speed and vision, and he reminds me a lot of Dante Hall when he came to Europe. — Amsterdam Admirals special teams coach Richard Kent, on the similarities betwixt Kansas City Chiefs kick returner Dante Hall and Admirals returner Noriaki Kinoshita, who seeks to become the first Japanese-born player to compete in the National Football League
• Imagine yourself sitting on top of a great thoroughbred horse. You sit up there and you just feel that power. That's what it was like, playing quarterback on that team. It was a great ride. — Quarterback Terry Bradshaw, pictured, on his having played for the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League from 1970 to 1983, during which period the franchise won eight times the American Football Conference Central Division title and four times each the AFC championship and the Super Bowl

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• I have played professional football back home for a long time now. I know the sacrifices you have to make, the team environment and how much pressure there is playing in front of big crowds. — New York Jets punter Ben Graham, on the facility of his adapting to American football in the National Football League in view of his having previously competed in the Australian rules Australian Football League
• Well, I won't bash the XFL too much...just remember that ESPN has proven that men would rather watch mediocre sports than great anything else. — American sports agent Leigh Steinberg, on the collpase after just one season of the XFL, an indoor football league promoted by the World Wrestling Federation as an extremely physical and flashy alternative to the National Football League
• Jay was most deserving of the Heisman Trophy. He could do it all. He was an outstanding runner as well as a passer; he could kick, punt, and make field goals...and in those days the ball was round and so it was much harder to throw. — University of Michigan Wolverines center Gerald Ford, on University of Chicago Maroons running back Jay Berwanger, the winner, in 1935, of the first Heisman Memorial Trophy Award ever given, and the first overall selection in the 1936 National Football League Draft

July 20 to August 14, 2006

• When you win, nothing hurts. — New York Jets quarterback Joe Namath, pictured
• I like linebackers. I collect them. You can't have too many good ones. — New York Giants head coach Bill Parcells
• If my mother put on a helmet and shoulder pads and a uniform that wasn't the same as the one I was wearing, I'd run over her if she were in my way. And I love my mother. — Los Angeles Raiders running back Bo Jackson
• Speed is not your fastest, but your slowest, man. No back can run faster than his interference. — University of Pittsburgh Panthers head coach Jock Sutherland
• There are two kinds of people in the world: Notre Dame lovers and Notre Dame haters. And, quite frankly, they're both a pain in the ass. — Notre Dame University head coach Dan Devine, on the difficulty of coaching the prominent Fighting Irish football team
• You have to play this game like somebody just hit your mother with a two-by-four. — Oakland Raiders defensive lineman Dan Birdwell
• He's like a beautiful woman who can't cook, doesn't want to clean and doesn't want to take care of the kids. You really don't want her, but she's so beautiful that you can't let her go. — Dallas Cowboys cornerback Deion Sanders, mercurial five-time Pro Bowl wide receiver Randy Moss, then of the Minnesota Vikings

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• I'm the best defensive end around. I'd hate to have to play against me. — Los Angeles Rams defensive end Deacon Jones, later honored by the National Football League on its 75th Anniversary All-Time Team as one of the three best defensive ends in league history
• Football is not a game but a religion, a metaphysical island of fundamental truth in a highly verbalized, disguised society, a throwback of 30,000 generations of anthropological time. University of California-San Diego psychology professor Arnold Mandell

July 5 to July 20, 2006

• I am alarmed at the subtle invasion of professional football, which is gaining prominence over baseball. It's unthinkable. — Brooklyn Dodgers president Branch Rickey, on the increasing popularity of the National Football League, at the expense of Major League Baseball and the sport of baseball generally, known otherwise as the national pastime of the United States
• I like to believe that my best hits border on felonious assault. — Oakland Raiders Pro Football Hall of Fame defensive back Jack Tatum, on the fierce quality of his play
• If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If anything goes really good, then you did it. That's all it takes to get people to win football games for you. — University of Alabama Crimson Tide head coach Paul "Bear" Bryant, on his motivational techniques
• Let's win one for the Gipper. — University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach Knute Rockne, imploring his team prior to a 1928 game against then-undefeated Army to win in honor of former Notre Dame halfback George "The Gipper" Gipp
• Once it's gone, it's gone. Golfers get to play their sport just about their whole lives; baseball players play a pretty long time. But football, it's over fast, and once it's over you're not going to get that same feeling, the competition, Sunday afternoon. Everything about it is going to be over. — Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino, pictured, on the transience of a professional football career
• To me, Brett Favre laid down. — Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback and FOX Sports television commentator Troy Aikman, on Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre's ostensibly permitting New York Giants defensive end Michael Strahan to sack Favre in 2002, which sack gave Strahan the regular season sacks record

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• If you're mad at your kid, you can either raise him to be a nose tackle or send him out to play on the freeway. It's about the same. — Cleveland Browns defensive tackle Bob Golic, on the physicality endured by linemen

June 19 to July 5, 2006

• A lot of fans were drawn to me because they knew that whatever the score was, I was going to run as hard as I could on every play. You don't have that now; you have guys waiting for next week or even next year. - Chicago Bears running back Walter Payton
• What's the worst thing that can happen to a quarterback? He can lose his confidence. - Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw
• I believe in rough, manly sports...[like] football. - United States president Theodore Roosevelt
• It is better to have died as a small boy than to fumble a football. Clemson University head coach John Heisman
• When it's third down and ten yards [to go], you can take the milk drinkers and I'll take the whiskey drinkers every time. - Green Bay Packers wide receiver Max McGee
• I've always admired Coach Shula. I thought I'd be drafted a little sooner, but now I'm happy I wasn't and Miami was around to pick me. - Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino, on his being the sixth quarterback selected in the 1983 NFL Draft

May 28 to June 19, 2006

• "Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing." — Vince Lombardi
• "We (the Cincinnati Bengals) can't run. We can't pass. We can't stop the run. We can't stop the pass. We can't kick. Other than that, we're just not a very good football team right now." — Bruce Coslet
• "Pro football is like nuclear warfare: there are no winners, only survivors." — Frank Gifford
• "At the base of it was the urge, if you wanted to play football, to knock someone down, that was what the sport was all about, the will to win closely linked with contact." — George Plimpton
• "The Jets will win on Sunday (in Super Bowl III), I guarantee it." — Joe Namath

February 26 to May 28, 2006

Football is, after all, a wonderful way to get rid of your aggressions without going to jail for it.~Heywood Hale Brown