RAVENS LEFT TACKLE BRYANT MCKINNIE
Q: Frustrated? What is the mood of this team?
A: "Yeah, because I feel like everybody fought hard, and there were a lot of turnovers on both sides of the ball, but on the road, you can't you can't afford to have so many turnovers as well. We just have to move forward and watch the film and learn from it."* *
Q: What do you think the reason was why you couldn't run the football?
A: "I guess we couldn't get into quite of a rhythm that we wanted to get into, and when you get behind in a ballgame you kind of don't run it as much as you planned to because you're trying to play catch-up."
Q: When Joe Flacco throws it 50 times, does that put too much pressure on that passing game?
A: "No, as long as the receivers and everybody just go out there and makes the plays that they were going to make, it doesn't put too much pressure on it. But you want to be able to kind of balance it out a little bit more."
Q: Up front, did you guys feel like you were able to make some holes?
A: "I feel like it was okay early in the game, it just, by us being behind, when you're on the road you don't get that many attempts to do it. I don't think we had that many attempts really."
RAVENS HEAD COACH JOHN HARBAUGH
Opening Comments:
"Obviously hats off to Buffalo. They played an excellent game. I thought they made plays especially in the first half in the passing game. They ran the ball exceptionally well, especially in the first half. We didn't play well. We didn't play well at all. I'll take responsibility for that. It was a poor performance. We didn't make plays, especially on offense. We allowed them to run the ball, especially between the tackles in the first half. We had missed assignments in pass protection that cost us a couple sacks. And then we had turnovers. When you have five turnovers that's going to challenge you.
"I'm proud of the fact that our guys keep playing. I believe we have a quarterback that can keep you in any game at any time. We all felt that way at the end, and that's the most important thing going forward. I believe our guys played their hearts out from the beginning until the end through the difficulties.
"We're two months into this thing. The team we're going to be two months from now is not the team we are right now."
Q: Did you think about going for TD when you opted for FG late in fourth quarter?
"Of course there was a thought. Sure, we were talking about that the whole way down there. A lot of it had to do with how much time we were going to have left. If you have that much time left, and the distance is that far, the chances of making it are not as high, I think you definitely kick the field goal there. I feel like we did the right thing there."
Q: What happened with the running game?
"We're not running the ball well. We've got to run the ball better. You saw the difference in the first half with [Buffalo]. They're running the ball for four, five yards at time and putting themselves in manageable third downs, and we're not doing that. That's tough on everybody. That's tough on our passing game, on our quarterback. We've got to get to the point where we can execute in the running game."
Q: Talk about the personal foul by Terrell Suggs to end the game.
"I think the quarterback is responsible for taking a knee there. He has got to get his knee down and he should do it more quickly. Not try to run more time off the clock. That is something that we hear from the league all the time and his knee was not on the ground. I'm just disappointed Terrell [Suggs] didn't cause a fumble there. He definitely did the right thing there."
RAVENS CORNERBACK COREY GRAHAM
Q: What were you thinking as you played an NFL game in your hometown?
A: "It was fun. Obviously you want to come here and get a victory, I mean we just didn't do enough today to get the victory. Buffalo went out there, they played well, but it was exciting to come here and play in front of a lot of friends and family obviously."* *
Q: Given that you were back, did you take a second to really think about all that you've done now that you're back in your hometown?
A: "I didn't really look at it like that. Obviously I've been very fortunate to be in the NFL what; this is my seventh year, so it's a blessing. But you know, just coming here, I just looked at it more as like an opportunity for my friends and my family to see me play live and in person, so that's the way I looked at it. I was excited about coming here and playing, but it didn't work out the way we wanted to work out though."
Q: Can you tell us a little bit about that interception?
A: "To be honest with you, that's the same play they scored a touchdown on earlier. I mean, double move by the receiver, it was one of those situations where I kind of knew what was happening a little bit and I was fortunate enough to be able to come underneath and make a play."
Q: Was it hard for you, knowing that you were going to have friends and family here, to keep focused?
A: "No, not really. I mean I went about the whole week, everything, pretty much the same way I always do. I mean nothing changed, my wife handled a lot of the tickets and a lot of the stuff going on, so I didn't have to put too much of it on myself, but it was pretty much the same game plan as always. I went about things the same way, I mean it was exciting, obviously, to play in front of friends and family, but everything was the same as far as preparing and things."
Q: How is it every week that the team seems to be up for the Ravens, the Super Bowl champions?
A: "Well you know how that is. Obviously we were fortunate to win the Super Bowl last year, so teams are going to come up and play us hard. We have to do the same thing. We have to get up for every game, we have to find a way to start faster. We didn't start fast today, we started real slow, and when it came down to it we didn't have enough. So we have to start faster and find a way to finish games."
BALTIMORE RAVENS LINE BACKER TERRELL SUGGS
Q: The read option is a difficult play to stop. You knew it was coming, is it that difficult?
A: Well, you know, it's all about the technique. We did some things early to hurt ourselves, but I think once we got back to it and once we caught on to what they were doing, we pretty much got it addressed. They were still able to make some plays, but that happens. They played a phenomenal game. * *
*Q: You had a sack early coming off the left side, and you were coming off the left and right side both, are you as comfortable coming off the left side? *
A: I have a great position coach and he teaches us to come off both left and right, so I've got to be able to do both.* Q: Do you agree with what Coach Harbaugh said as using this as a motivator?*
A: This is the NFL. Never in my 11 year career have I gone 16-0 or 15-1, it's all about how you play. You win your home games and split on the road. That's been a pretty good formula for us in the past so we'll see how we do. They play phenomenal football at home and we knew that, so we did some things that hurt us. All we ask is to give ourselves a chance to win in the end, and we did that, they just made one more play.
Q: You told your defense you would have to be ready to run early on in the game to keep up with that offense, is that something you saw in film?
A: They did a good job of having us off balance at first. When you have a team off balance you can open up the playbook, and that's what they did. Once we addressed the run, we were able to make some plays and gave ourselves a chance in the end.
RAVENS LINEBACKER COURTNEY UPSHAW
Q: Were you expecting more read option looks from them?
A: "I mean, week in week out they change, but we did, we kind of focused on that a little bit. Not as much, you know, it is E.J. Manuel back there, you know, throwing the ball with those guys, C.J. Spiller, Jackson running the ball, so we studied it a little bit."
Q: From what happened during the course of the game, is there anything that sticks out that led to them having the success that they did on the ground?
A: "They just ran the ball well on first down. Like I said, the coaches put us in and teach us the right technique to play stuff that they showed us, and we just have to go out and make plays and tackle."
Q: How frustrating would you rate it that they were able to run the ball on you?
A: "Just a loss period is kind of frustrating. We can't just look at it as evidence, you know they ran the ball on us and that's the reason why. We just have to come out , tackle better and everybody swarm the ball, rip the ball out when we get a chance. Like I said, just give our offense a chance to have good field position."
BALTIMORE RAVENS RUNNING BACK RAY RICE
Q: Why didn't you see many touches in the second half?
A: When you get behind it's hard to pound the rock. When you have a lead like they did it's different. When you look at the run game, you usually run where you try to do different things. We were trying to slow up the clock. We were trying to score quickly so, the pass game, we needed to ramp that up.
Q: When you look execution wise, you know you guys thought you were going to be able to run the ball against the Bills, but it didn't happen. Why?
A: Yeah, they played a good football game. You can't take away anything from them. They played a good football game. I've said it all along, we're going to get everybody's best every week. So we've got to go out there and come ready to play, every week. We can't start slow and we've got to execute. Everybody's got the Ravens marked on their calendar. Nobody wants to come in and get beat by the, you know obviously I'm going to leave that where it is with everything in last year, but no one wants to get ran over. So everybody comes in ready to play and we have to match everybody's intensity.
Q: Did you feel 100 percent?
A: Nobody plays the game 100 percent. This is the NFL, everybody plays a little banged and beat up. I came out of the game healthy and I'm looking forward to next week.
Q: You guys stopped running in the second half?
A: We got behind. When you get behind you can't pound the rock, you just can't do it. We needed to try to find a way to score quickly. There are times in there where you could try to line up, dink and dunk, trying to run the ball. When you get behind, it's just hard to run the ball. The run game is effective when you have something going and when you have a lead ahead, like they were able to do. They were able to run the ball some to eat up some clock. We would've liked to be in that position, going forward, and obviously we saw that last week versus Houston, that's what we were able to do- run the ball, manage it a little bit. Still would like to get there with the average-per-carry and all that stuff that we have to work on. It's hard to run the ball when you get behind, so I just played my role today, and tried to protect Joe and keep him upright. In terms of their blitz schemes they were very much like us, they mix and move, move around a lot. That team, everybody looks at them, that's a good football team over there. Hats off to them.
Q: Despite the miscues and some of the mistakes you still were in the game in the fourth quarter?
A: That's where it shows, where if we would've executed a lot better, and I just don't like taking away another team's credit, they played a heck of a football game with a rookie quarterback, but if we execute at a high level the Ravens are always going to be in it. I'm not saying we would've blown them out. That was a good football team, they came ready to play today. If we executed who knows what could happen. That's a good football team over there, and you look at the way they played New England, they play everybody tough and obviously having the home field is great, but that football team deserves everything they got today.
Q: People say that with as many interceptions as Joe Flacco threw the loss is his fault, what do you think A: He is our guy. We don't get down the field. Guys have to make plays, and that's what it boils down to. We've got guys that are going to make them plays, but Joe is our leader. We've been down that road before and it's definitely not Joe Flacco. We don't point fingers around here, but the last person I'm worried about is Joe Flacco. He's a Super Bowl MVP, a Super Bowl quarterback. As long as Joe goes, we go. You've seen it for yourself, as bad as we played, Joe Flacco still let us march down the field.
