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© St. Petersburg Times, published September 23, 2002
ON THE ST. LOUIS RAMS OFFENSE: "It's amazing. I am a fan of the St. Louis Rams and what they have done. They are very creative and very explosive. They have great players at every skilled position. Arguably, (Tory) Holt, Isaac Bruce, Marshall Faulk, quarterback Kurt Warner, solid at tight end and an outstanding left tackle in Orlando Pace. They have continuity. They've had an opportunity to play with one another and that's when you really start to take off. The accumulation of four or five years in the same system is a real dangerous thing and that's what makes them exceptional in my opinion.
"You can't deny the fact that they set a standard in the NFL in scoring and production over the last three or four years."
ON THE IDEA THAT TEAMS HAVE THE RAMS FIGURED OUT BY USING THE COVER-2 DEFENSE: "I don't buy into that. If you look at the last couple of games, they have mishandled a couple of passes, big plays and opportunities for whatever reason. There's a lot of idle chatter, I think, about the Rams being soft. But this is a very complex mystery if you ask me.
"We need to do everything we can to deny these guys the big plays, and we need to turn them away when they are presented with scoring opportunities.
ON THE BENEFITS OF SEEING THE SAME DEFENSE AS THE RAMS IN PRACTICE: "I think it's a little bit exaggerated. They have a couple of coaches who coached under (Bucs defensive coordinator) Monte Kiffin who have some of the same fronts.
"But no two men are created equally. They all have their own interpretation of the system. (Rams defensive coordinator) Lovie Smith and his defensive staff put their own spin on their system and it's not the same."