QB Joe Flacco (12.17.23)
You’ve seen a lot. Have you ever seen a game like that before?
“You know what, I think in the moment, you wouldn’t think so, but there’s had to be games like that that I’ve played. We’ve played so many games, ugly games throughout the first ten, 11 years of my career. This was definitely one of them. Wow. Got to give so much credit to our defense. I mean, they let up three points – was it even that? I forget even how they got the three points there. So how they even got in field goal range, but such a good job by those guys.”
How do you keep going after three interceptions? What drives you to keep going?
“Believe me, part of you wants to crawl into a hole somewhere and hide from everybody, but you can’t do that —especially, somebody like me. I mean, I’ve been in this league a long time and you’ve seen so much happen. You just have to keep your eyes on what’s next. You have to continue to look forward and continue to have faith that your teammates are going to get themselves in the right positions for you to get the ball to them. It might not happen, and today it just happened to work out for us. And like I said, I don’t think enough can be said about how well our defense played with all the turnovers that we had and the little amount of points they let up.”
It looked like it was clicking more for you in the fourth quarter?
“Listen, I think when you look at it, we just got a few chunks and then guys made really good runs with the ball. I feel like they did a pretty good job of keeping us underneath of them all day and we were trying to take little bits at a time, but they were aggressive. As soon as they saw the ball thrown, they were breaking on things and making us go the long, hard way. And then late in the game, we started to get some chunk plays that we definitely kind of thrive on. When we can get those going, then we’re a good offense.”
Can you take us through the one to Amari (Cooper)?
“You know, I saw him coming around the MIKE linebacker. I knew somebody was out to the right, but there was a huge hole in there, so I let the ball go kind of as he was wrapping around the MIKE, you know, it was all him from there.”
What can you say about David Njoku? Not only the touchdown catch that he had, but then on that final drive he set up the field goal.
“Yeah, he’s been awesome. When you get the ball in his hands, he’s such a strong runner. I don’t think – you probably don’t get a great chance to see what he does in the run game and how physical he is, but you do get a chance to see that when he gets the ball in his hands and it’s just the kind of player he is. Started the drive with him and it was a huge play by him to get us down in the field goal range there.”
Joe, what is it about this team? Set a franchise record with five wins on game-winning scores in the last two minutes of regulation. It looked like you guys were dead in the water going into the fourth quarter. You haven’t been here that long. But what do you make of this team’s resiliency and ability to win these kind of games?
“Listen, I think it just tells you a lot about the kind of guys that this organization has purposely picked to put on the roster and in that locker room. And I think it’s one of those things that you probably can’t quite quantify. But having hard workers, having tough guys and all those things, if you’re put in situations where you need to have that resilience, like I said, not every one of them are going to work out. So there is a little bit of probably luck involved in things like today, but I think it just speaks to the character of the guys in that room. And I think you have to give credit to the organization for probably doing that on purpose.”
The line was decimated. We know that. What were your words of encouragement in the huddle, on the sidelines?
“I didn’t have much. You just look at the guys and say, ‘Hey, let’s go. Let’s get in a groove here. Let’s get back in our rhythm. Let’s go get one.’ Stupid, simple little things to just kind of keep everybody’s heads up. But I got to say, all those guys, there was never a time where we got to the sideline, getting ready to go out for a drive and you saw a head down. Everybody had their eyes up and were ready to go. So, like I said, if they had a little bit of a different feeling inside, then they weren’t letting it be shown. And that’s what you have to do in these situations. You have to trick your mind into thinking that it’s not that big of a deal, even though it might be.”
What kind of view did you have of that final drive?
“I saw it on the big screen and I saw it almost go in the guy’s lap. Yeah, listen, when you watch and or are a part of all the games that go on every week, you know, not to get excited until that clock hits zero. There are so many things that can happen, whether we’ve been a part of it or whether, like I said, you’ve seen it on Sundays just watching TV. So believe me, I was over there and guys want to come up and congratulate you and things like that, and I’m just sitting there just waiting for that clock to hit zero.”
Joe, can you just address the fact that you guys lost Joel Bitonio, you were down four of your starting five offensive linemen in this game. Can you address that?
“I think the guys that came in there did a great job in stepping up and listen, our center had to go out for a play. It’s next man up and the fact that – it’s not an easy thing. Listen, I’ve done that for a couple of years. You’re on the sideline and you have to be constantly ready to go out there and take the field if something’s going to happen. And it’s not easy. It is not an easy job. So, the fact that those guys have come in mid-game and just filled in and done the job that they’ve done, it’s really impressive and I don’t really think you can understand how impressive it is until you probably had to experience that to some extent. It’s not a very easy job and it says a lot about who they are.”
Joe, when you first came in, you said that you could tell this team was tight. It seemed like these guys are really close. How much is that related to guys truly buying into that next man up? Because everybody says it, but they have this kind of success is the difference.
“I think it goes hand in hand. It’s like you have to have that mindset, but also when you’ve had success doing it when you’ve gone out there and proven to yourself and to your teammates that we’ve done it. So it helps the next time that it happens. The next man up has already seen two other, three other guys go in there and do it and step up. So, he’s like, ‘Okay, why not me?’ I think lead by example, all those things, they all play off of each other. And the fact that we’ve done it in the past definitely helps for when we had to do it today and when we’re going to have to do it in the future and all that stuff.”
Did you know you were going to have to hear from the ‘Flacco Flock’ about the three interceptions and did you know you just had to come back and erase those and win this game?
“Believe me, those kids were the least of my worries with throwing three interceptions. You’re just looking at yourself and then like we talked about, just this is a great locker room and you don’t want to play like that to feel like you let those guys down.”
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