ESPN Sunday NFL Countdown News and Notes

2009 “Sunday NFL Countdown” Notes and Quotes — Week 2

ESPN’s Sunday NFL Countdown host Chris Berman and analysts Cris Carter, Mike Ditka, Tom Jackson and Keyshawn Johnson previewed today’s NFL action.

Some excerpts:

On whether Tom Brady is struggling as a result of the knee injury which forced him to miss last season …

Johnson: “Any player with a major knee injury is going to struggle out the gate. That’s just it. … As the season continues to go, Tom Brady will continue to get better. Now, I don’t know if the team will continue to get better but Tom Brady will continue to get better.”

Jackson: “There are players who have had knee surgeries who are never the same again. That has happened in the past. So we don’t know whether that’s going to happen. … He certainly doesn’t look the same right now. The other thing is, he’s a victim of game plan. When you drop a guy back 50 times a game to throw a football, you not only make it hard on that guy – empty backfield – you make it hard on the five guys in front of him. But what were they going to do? They won 18 games in row doing this.”

Carter: “I don’t know what Brady I’m going to see because I don’t know what kind of protection he’s going to get. … There’s only one guy that I could see that could take pressure, and that was Joe Montana. That’s why when people ask me who’s the best quarterback, it’s always Joe. What I saw last week was a guy who didn’t want to get hit.”

Ditka: “When you have success, you get confidence. When you have failure, you get doubt. Now this is not his failure as much as the football team’s failure. They don’t have the people, the receivers. I don’t care how good Randy Moss is, you can take one guy out of a football game, and they don’t have the other weapons around. … This kid’s a great football player, but he’s got to have some help.”

ESPN analyst Trent Dilfer (pre-recorded): “Let’s not get too caught up in his mechanics. Sometimes that’s the easy thing to say. The NFL position of quarterback is played under chaos. You must throw from multiple platforms and multiple arm angles. The problem is Tom Brady is being asked to do it too much this year, and that’s the problem. It’s with the Patriots, not Tom Brady.”

To View Video Clip, Click Here

On the Patriots’ struggles this season …

Jackson: “You have to make some commitment to the run game. When you look at the Patriots’ offense, it’s all about throwing the football. … As the game goes on, they tend to get away from the run game to where you get to the fourth quarter – the last three full games that Tom Brady has played, they’ve only run the ball four times, four times in three football games. When you do that, you make yourself one-dimensional and teams are taking advantage of that and putting pressure on top.”

Johnson: “There’s a lack of personnel on the defensive side of the football … and the depth offensively is just not there.”

From Sal Paolantonio interview with Michael Vick …

Vick (on the wildcat offense): “I like to drop back and throw the football. I like to drop back, read the defense, throw the football. That’s when I make the plays that I’m able to make, whether it’s with my arm or with my legs. That’s when things happen naturally. Now, more so, it’s almost like when I come into the game it’s like I’m coming in as a decoy or I’m coming in to run the wildcat. I like it, it’s cool, but it’s more effective when you are out there full time, you know, but we’re going to make it work here.”

To view Paolantonio’s interview with Vick, click here.

On Vick and the Eagles quarterback situation …

Jackson: “He’s got to play. … His strength is, ‘I’m a better athlete than anybody else on this field.’ If he’s a better quarterback (than Kevin Kolb), then you’ve gotta let him play. You’ve got to figure out how to get him on the field.

“You heard that he wants to be a full-time quarterback again, dropping back to pass the football. One of the more amazing athletes we’ve ever seen in this league, touching the football on every play. I think that really is eventually the ultimate threat, but today look for him to do what he does, do what Andy Reid wants him to do out of that wildcat formation, and make a few plays for the Philadelphia Eagles.”

Ditka: “I believe Michael Vick is one of the best football players in the National Football League. I don’t care if you put him under center, put him in the shotgun, put him in the wildcat – use him.”

On Colts quarterback Peyton Manning and his performance on Monday night …

Jackson: “What he’s doing right now, it’s magic.”

From Rachel Nichols feature on the attitude and toughness head coach Rex Ryan has brought to the New York Jets, reminiscent of his father, Buddy Ryan, architect of the Bears’ famed 46 Defense …

Rex Ryan: “I learned a ton of what to do from my dad and maybe a couple things that maybe what not to do.”

Jets assistant coach Doug Plank, who wore #46 for the Bears (for which the Bears’ 46 Defense is named): “What Rex has done over the last 20-30 years, I think he’s taken the body of what was the 46 Defense and added so many different components to it, and variations, it’s almost like that toy the Transformer. It starts out as one thing, as an automobile, and you can turn it into 50 different things.”

Rob Ryan, Rex’s brother and Cleveland Browns defensive coordinator: “If you make a Ryan guarded, it’s dumb. If you want to harness him back, and pull him back, it’s ridiculous. It’s like having a Ferrari and not going over 15 miles per hour. Hell, let that thing burn. Let it go.”

To view the Nichols E:60 feature, click here.

From Trent Dilfer feature on 49ers head coach Mike Singletary and the hill he had built at the team’s training facility this offseason, creating a new conditioning program …

Singletary: “I always said that whenever I became a head coach, that’s one of the first things I wanted to do. … It’s just trying to give the guys just one more thing that I know builds endurance that’s different from what other teams are doing. … Everybody that I have known that worked on the hill had great careers – had long careers. A lot of guys that really worked on the hill, it did things that you can’t get in the weight room. … The biggest thing this team will learn from the hill is that it really is about the climb. ‘I’m going to get to the top of something and I’m going to conquer it.’”

On the New York Jets’ toughness and versatility …

Carter: “I give the Jets credit for style points — because they have an all-weather team.”