Archives for December 2003

‘Williams said the Dolphins did a good job of “managing the game,” and “understanding the circumstances,” which basically means giving the ball to him, which is always Miami’s best option. “We used Ricky, got ahead and then let our defense tee off on them,” Fiedler said.’

‘But that’s exactly what the Dolphins did, holding Buffalo to only 11 yards of offense in the first half and only 177 for the game while forcing four turnovers, including a 74-yard interception return for a touchdown by cornerback Terrell Buckley that sealed the game.’

‘When that pass rush is coming like that, it’s like stealing out there, Buckley said. Those guys always have been my best friends and anytime they do anything, I make sure I tell them thank you. And today, thank you, they was bringing it.’

‘One fan leaving Sunday’s game late in the fourth quarter blurted out, Bledsoe shirts . . . at a discount.’

‘“We owe them one,” safety Rodney Harrison [news] said. “Everyone knows that. They came out and flat out kicked our butts. We’re going to enjoy this for a day, but by Monday morning it’s Buffalo 100 percent. We have to be ready.”’

‘Bledsoe, who has struggled badly this season with the Bills, now lives on a sprawling farm in a Buffalo suburb. Depending on what happens with his contract (he has a $7 million option bonus coming due), Bledsoe may once again be a seller in the near future.’

‘Five fumbles, one interception, six sacks and a few very costly penalties told me the team was there physically, just not mentally. When I mentioned that to Moulds he said, “I agree, everybody was enthusiastic, but when we got out there, it seemed like guys were just going through the motions a little bit and I think being a professional, you can’t do that.”‘

‘”We’ve been very good about that all year long, protecting the football,” head coach Gregg Williams explained. “That was something coming into the year we wanted to improve upon, and today the ball was out.”‘

‘”This was a disappointing loss against a rival, another AFC opponent. We just didn’t play very well with the turnovers. We were lucky to be in the game by halftime with what we had to do and the field position problems that we had. They made a good play on a double move after the first turnover with the ball in the corner of the end zone to (Chris) Chambers. We were lucky to only be down 13-0 at the half with the turnovers we had to play through.”

‘”Early in the game there were a couple of plays I probably should have hit and then the interception was an avoidable play. I thought that they were both carrying my inside receiver down the field, then Buckley came off and it was just a horrible play. I thought that Bobby Shaw was going to come underneath of him, but when he came off I just didn’t see him and it was just a horrible play. Overall, I think that the way that the game went, what I was trying to do, was I was trying to go through my reads as quickly as I could to get the ball out against what was a good pass rush and because of that, I made some poor decisions.”‘

‘”We were so enthusiastic in the locker room before the game so I thought we’d go out and play well. We came out flat and we didn’t do enough to make plays to win the game. Today they beat us and they had a great game plan. We didn’t execute our game plan well enough to win.”‘

‘”I hate to lose. I’m a sore loser. I don’t care how you win the game, you just have to get it done, and we haven’t been able to do that all year.”‘

‘What has happened to Drew?

“I don’t know. That’s a question that you would have to ask Drew specifically. I don’t know how comfortable he is. Just looking at him he just doesn’t look like the same guy. We go as a team, we win as a team, we lose as a team. Drew is a warrior, he’s a trooper, he stands in there and does everything he needs to do for us to win. It’s just not going well.”‘

‘”As I told the players in there, with all the distractions from the media and everything else this week it’s a remarkable job that this football team was able to keep its focus and come up here in December and win in the cold. Everything else that was written about gave the guys an opportunity to doubt themselves and that didn’t happen, we’ve got a great group of guys. The situation that we’re in we can’t do anything more about it at this time and we’ll see what happens from here. I thought today our defense played as well as we’ve played all year. We rushed the passer and played the run pretty well. Offensively when we had to run the ball we did against a very, very good defense, one of the best in the NFL. Overall it was a great win for our team, great win for the guys and everybody can share in it. Terrell Buckley comes up big. That interception, he came close last week and it was great to see him get one this week and make a difference in the game.”‘

‘”I don’t know if I’ve ever won a game with those numbers. I don’t look at the stats like that, but we did what we had to do.”‘