BALTIMORE RAVENS CONFERENCE CALLS
OCTOBER 26, 2005

HEAD COACH BRIAN BILLICK

 

It looks like you’re beat up with some injuries.

 

A little bit, but every team is. The magnitude of your injuries always feels worse than anybody else. Obviously, to not have a Tony Weaver, a Ray Lewis or an Ed Reed is a lot. But it’s the challenge that we have in front of us.

 

How much of their absence will affect what you can and cannot do on defense?

 

I don’t know. It will limit what we do package-wise. We have much confidence in the guys that have to step up. You’re talking about some pretty dynamic players. The cliché thing is to say you cannot really replace a Ray Lewis or you can’t really replace Ed Reed. But the fact of the matter is you have to. We don’t have to limit the package necessarily. But we understand that is asking a lot from the players that have to step in.

 

Are these games against the Steelers different from other rivalry games in the NFL?

 

Anything in the division, any time you have a history. And we have a history with the Steelers and it’s an interesting history compared to some of the other rivalries because of the way we’ve passed each other since I’ve been here. I only have a limited reference on it; so I can only speak about the last six years. Where the Steelers have been—going up or going down—and we’re we have been, we’ve kind of crossed each other in the night so to speak. It’s kind of interesting to look at. This is just one of those phases. I don’t think it diminishes the rivalry, the intensity and the passion that these two teams have for one another when they play.

 

Do you see any dirty play by both teams in these games?

 

I don’t know if it’s dirty play. It’s intense play. It’s very passionate play. There has been a fair amount of jawing going on. Less so, more recently. When the two teams are passing one another—and when I say that I mean in terms of where we’re at and where they’re at, the way they’re rolling along and we’re struggling a little bit—as compared to two years ago when they were 6-10 and the game didn’t mean anything with regards to our winning the division and going to the playoffs. It was still very passionate. It was still very intense.

 

Was the Todd Heap/Joey Porter situation dirty?

 

That was unfortunate. Things like the happen. But we addressed that the next time we played them. Certainly it impacted our season to a degree because we lost Todd Heap for 10 games. I don’t know if that has lingered any more than any other passionate circumstances that we’ve found ourselves in with these two teams over the last six years.

 

What do you think about the Steelers secondary?

 

When (Troy) Polamalu was taken, his transition that rookie year was just explosive onto the scene. He is a Pro-Bowler and deserving, as so. He is as active, as physical a player as I have seen at that position in a long time. They’ve been building that secondary. It looks as though that is something they wanted to address for a while and they knew there was going to be a transition based on the Chad Scott, Dewayne Washingtons they had. Every team recognizes that there is a shelf life here and they built very well for that transition.

 

Have you thought at all about giving Kordell (Stewart) a shot?

 

No, we are anxious to get Kyle Boller back. It is likely that Kyle could serve at least as the third quarterback this week, maybe the back-up. We’ll see how he progresses during the week in practice. There is a possibility that he could be available to us to start next week, so if we can accelerate that this week, that’s fine. Anthony (Wright) has actually been playing very well for us. We need more. We need more out of the running game, we need more big plays. That hurt us in the Chicago game. In the three previous games we were running at a pretty good clip- about 150 yards a clip. We completed about 65% of our passes and had not turned the ball over a great deal which was a great bugaboo for us to open the season. So we have done some things. Clearly, last week against Chicago, we just didn’t make enough big plays. We have got to try and make that happen.

 

Do you think Ben (Roethlisberger) is playing similar to last year?

 

It’s hard to say with the nature of the games. They are running the ball so well. The percentages, the style, look similar to last year. 15-1, why would you change it? You got to believe his experience and perspective is expanding. I am sure it allows them to do more things, but what they are doing has been pretty successful.

 

Does it look like they are using their quarterback for what you did in your Super bowl year?

 

To a degree. But I’d defy anyone who looks at what they are doing and says, “This has been done before.” It’s a unique looking set of numbers. There is a limited number of throws in terms of their ability to run the football. They do it with 15-20 throws and have big plays. It defies some conventional thinking, but they seem to be continuing to do it so I don’t know that you can just dismiss it on a game-by-game basis.

 

Is there a trap that teams seem to run into when running against the Steelers?

 

We’ve played them enough. We know you have to be balanced; you cannot just do one thing and beat the Steelers. Our experience with them tells you that you have to have a certain amount of balance. If you get forced out of the run early, like maybe the score has gotten a certain way or you arbitrarily do that, that’s usually not a winning formula. So you’ve got to press that aspect of it, but by the same token you have got to throw the ball well to make plays down the field. If you think you are just going to line up and shove it down their throat with 45 plays, I don’t know that that’s a winning formula. But if you only get into a 15 or 20 run game because of the score, and we know because we’ve been in it, I don’t know that there’s much of an upside to that, either.

 

(Chester) Taylor ran well against them last year, right?

 

Both Taylor and Jamal (Lewis). Everything went well for us in the first game. In the second game we did ok. There again we let some big plays get away from us down the field. But Chester is an excellent back and we have a great deal of faith in him. We are fortunate to have two good backs. Jamal has got to get on track and run a little bit more physical and get back to the style of running that he is used to. I think he is ready to do that.

 

Is it fair to say that one of the disappointments in your tenure there is your failure to develop a quarterback?

 

Yeah. I think we have in Kyle Boller. Unfortunately the injuries; we went through injuries his rookie year and Anthony came in and played very well. I saw a nice growth with Kyle last year, particularly in the second half of the season, under a very demanding schedule. People talk about how we lost our last five games on the road; well those last five games were against the four divisional round AFC teams and the NFC Super bowl representative. I don’t know that anybody has had to do that before. He (Kyle Boller) played well and we were excited about him coming back this season and we lost him after a half. So we still very much believe that Kyle Boller can be that quarterback for us. I envy those who have been in the situation where they know every year- for three, four, five, six, years in a row- who they will start in that position. For whatever reason I didn’t have it in Minnesota, either. We certainly had a level of productivity there, but the John Elways and the Brett Favres and the people who have had runs with those kinds of guys, that sounds like that could be fun.

 

 

QUARTERBACK ANTHONY WRIGHT

 

What do you think about coming back here and playing on Halloween against the Steelers?

 

Anthony Wright: It’s going to be an exciting experience for me being that Pittsburgh gave me my first chance in the NFL. It’s definitely something that I look forward to.

 

How much better are you now as a quarterback than when you were in Pittsburgh?

 

I am much better, obviously. I’ve played in games and have some experience. I think I’ve learned a lot about playing this position in this league.

 

Have you improve the most in the mental aspect?

 

I think so. I think just having a chance to get game experience, you learn how to be in the game, you learn certain tendencies of certain teams and it makes you a better quarterback.

 

You’ve only had a couple completions over thirty yards. Would you like to “air it out” more often? Is there something preventing you from doing that?

 

I think right now we just have to get our running game on track. Teams are playing a lot more cover 2 against us which is preventing us from taking chances down the field. It’s been tough getting those kind of plays. As long as we can get things going and get our running game on track, I think we’ll be alright.

 

Do you like throwing the deep ball?

 

I like doing the deep ball. I just like taking chunks. I like having the chance to take advantage of the defense and one-to-one coverage. When that is taken away, it makes the game difficult.

 

Is the offense struggling even more with your full back out [Alan Ricard]?

 

We need our starting full back to be healthy and be playing. Having to sub different guys in that aren’t able to do it as well as he does makes it difficult. But at the same time, everybody has a job to do. We have to get the job done regardless of the situation and circumstances working against you. And right now, we are struggling with it.

 

There are younger guys in the Steelers locker room who haven’t played against you that are talking about your arm strength. Is it nice to have that sort of reputation?

 

Yeah, it’s interesting. There are only a few guys that I have played with, as you said before, that are still there with the Steelers. At the same time, I would rather them be more impressed with the decisions that I am making and just being on top of my game.

 

How about having a tight end like having Heap as your weapon?

 

Yeah, it adds another dimension to the offense that teams have to defend. Once you have a guy like that, that can make big plays like a wide receiver, it causes a lot of trouble for the defenses.

 

 

What are you seeing from the Steelers defense?

 

They are fast; they like to bring a lot of blitzes and get a lot of sacks. I think they lead the league in sacks. They are a disruptive defense, and if you can handle disruption you can throw well against them. If you can’t handle the disruption, then it’s going to be tough the entire night.