Matt Cassel Quotes

It's my job, first and foremost, to take care of the football. Guys work their tails off. That's Football 101. From the time you play youth ball to high school, college, pro, every level, that's the starting point for every quarterback. You have to take care of the ball.

I think the number one job as a quarterback is protecting the football.

I think for any QB, if you play with confidence you play well because you're confident in what you're doing; you're confident in where you're going with the ball.

A guy like Drew Brees is a guy that knows how to undress a defense. Most of the time he knows where he's gonna go before he even gets the ball. So he's ready to deliver that ball almost as soon as it comes to his hands.

My favorite quarterback is Donovan McNabb. I think he's a complete quarterback. I love the way he can scramble and throw on the run. He can do it all. He can control a game.

I definitely feel like I'm a really good playmaker, a really smart point guard that can lead his team and win.

Great quarterbacks, good quarterbacks, make plays.

The better quarterbacks are real consistent. Rookie quarterbacks are not.

Everybody thinks when I say a guy is a good game manager, that's a negative, but I think it's a real positive. You have the ball in your hand every time when you're a quarterback. Whether you're handing it off or throwing to somebody, I think that's extremely important.

I actually watched Tom Brady a good amount in college. My coach in college was Kliff Kingsbury, and he actually was a backup for Brady at one point, and so he showed me things that he liked with Tom and his pocket movements and stuff he did within the pocket that I've tried to put in my game a little bit.

You take your shots when you have them, and I threw a lot of touchdowns, but I'm always going to take care of the football in the red zone.

If you can grab a ball and throw it, you can grab a ball and throw it. I don't care how tall you are, either. I'm not gonna see over a 6-foot-7 left tackle. You've gotta find lanes; you've gotta know where your guys are. It's not about the height: if you can win ball games, you can win 'em.

I think my game isn't very flashy, but the test of time for the position of quarterback is how fast can you get the ball out of your hands to the right guy? And I think I do that better than everyone else.

While it's great for a quarterback to have athletic ability, his goal is to get the ball out of his hand, orchestrate the offense and not allow his ability to stand in the way of the offense running efficiently.

The team aspect of football and just playing quarterback, having the ball in your hands, having to make the plays, that was definitely something I loved.

I handled myself as a quarterback in the manner I thought necessary.

Quarterback - it's a boring, monotonous position that revolves around consistency.

Names that come to mind that I've learned from are Tom Brady - the way he gets the ball out and is so decisive. You can tell he is in total control out there. Another name is Aaron Rodgers, and how he's in total command. And also, Cam Newton, the way he has fun. I love that part of it.

I think I could describe the perfect quarterback. Take a little piece of everybody. Take John Elway's arm, Dan Marino's release, maybe Troy Aikman's drop-back, Brett Favre's scrambling ability, Joe Montana's two-minute poise and, naturally, my speed.

We're not running the ball again until we get ahead. Shula was calling the plays, but I told them, 'I don't care what he calls. We're throwing every pass from now until we get the lead.' To Shula's credit, he always gave me that option.

He is a very positive captain; he is proactive as well as reactive. He is keen to read the game, to get in there, and he never stops thinking about the game, the situation, and trying to turn it to his advantage. He has been very good for the game.

I like to think I'm pretty close in comparison to Aaron Rodgers. He's very athletic and gets the ball out quickly. He's very knowledgeable of the game, controls the offense totally, and that's something I try to do. Just know the offense inside and out.

You have got to boss scrums. The players need to know what you want them to adhere to. Then it is up to them to decide whether they are adhering to that or not.

The question of many college quarterbacks is can they operate in the pro game, in the pro system. Can they not only function under the early, especially with our game, but can they do it efficiently?

A captain shouldn't be chosen on the amount of goals he's going to score.