JDSal45
Third String But Playing on Special Teams
- Joined
- Dec 21, 2004
- Messages
- 693
- Reaction score
- 16
Here is Bill Belichick talking about Julius Peppers before the Pats played them in 2005:
Belichick Press Conference
And here are some quotes before the Super Bowl vs. Carolina:
Bill Belichick Press Conf. Transcript - 1/19/2004
J D Sal
Q: They didn’t seem to move Peppers around much.
BB: I don’t think they need to move him. He causes plenty of problems where he is. He’s a hard guy to deal with. He’s hard to run at. He’s hard to throw at. That’s where most of the right-handed quarterbacks have to throw, into that left side. He’s a factor there one way or the other. Because the offense usually extends a little bit to try to take care of him, they like to bring to the linebackers and blitz them up inside, whether it’s [Will] Witherspoon or Morgan or [Brandon] Short, whoever it is. So, as the line widens, to take Peppers and give attention to Peppers, that opens up a lot of the inside pressures for them. So, they do a good job of that. He’s a good player. We talked about last week [Randy] Moss being kind of in a special category offensively for the Raiders. I think you have to put Peppers in that same, whatever category that is, defensively. You have to know where he is every play. If they move him, they move him. If they don’t, sometimes they drop him. Sometimes they stunt him. A lot of times when they move him, they move him after the snap. In other words, the ball is snapped and he’s stunts down inside or he’s on a gain or something like that. It’s not like he doesn’t move off of that spot. But, for the most part, he does align there. At times he reduces down. But for the most part, he is on that tackle.
Q: What about when he was at receiver? Didn’t they throw him a couple of jump balls in the corner of the end zone last year?
BB: Yes. Well, he has played tight end.
Q: What do you do there?
BB: It’s hard. He’s a hard guy to match up against. The guy could probably play… he certainly could play outside linebacker. We know he can play defensive end. I imagine he could probably move inside and play defensive tackle. There's no question he could play tight end. He probably could play offensive tackle. He's 290-something pounds. You're talking about a guy that could probably play six or seven positions on the field. That's pretty unusual.
Q: I was wondering because in that game, that Super Bowl game, there were a number of plays that you guys went right at Peppers, whether it was with Daniel Graham or Richard [Seymour] on the goal line play and took care of him on those particular plays. Since then, how has Julius changed?
BB: Well, I think any player that has had a couple of extra years in the league gets better and I think Peppers is better now than he was then, but he was pretty good then too. He's a guy that we had to account for heavily in that game and did take into consideration in terms of our protections and our calls and even the plays that we ran. I don't think you want to run every single play throwing away from a corner or run away from a certain player on every single play. I think you have to do enough to keep them honest. But, there's no question that Peppers is a guy that you have to game plan for offensively. You have to know where he is. He can ruin the game and we've seen that plenty of times.
Belichick Press Conference
And here are some quotes before the Super Bowl vs. Carolina:
Q: [Julius] Peppers was really hot. Did you look at him that year?
BB: Yeah, but we were picking 32nd that year, so the chances of him being there when we were picking were [small]. And there were a number of players that year—[Ryan] Sims was there that year if I am not mistaken, he came out that year and he went to Kansas City. I think they had somebody else too. Yeah, we saw him. He is a tremendous athlete. He can do pretty much anything you want him to do coming off the edge. He can run fast, jump over guys, but he is a big guy and has a lot of power. He plays the run well. He is strong at the point. He can get up field and beat the guys around the corner. He can come inside and power them. He is a terrific player.
Bill Belichick Press Conf. Transcript - 1/19/2004
J D Sal
Last edited: