Dave Barry Quotes

Hockey is a tough game. With all the talk and everything that's going on right now, it frightens me a little bit that we are giving our players an excuse not to hit. I just hope that we don't take that out of our game at the pro level.

Only in football is long-term injury the result not of accidents but of the game played properly.

Soccer is a continuous game, rugby is a continuous game, but for the physical elements that are involved in playing a football game and the number of plays that you play, I don't know that it was ever intended to be a continuous game.

The hockey I was raised on, the hockey I understand, the hockey that my dad taught me about when I was a boy was intrinsically connected with fighting. I grew up in a house where we revered tough guys.

Look at rugby, the national sport, you have guys weighing 130kg, 140kg, who can run like sprinters full clip into each other causing brain damage constantly on that field.

Coming from Australia and playing rugby, you just think that soccer is a bit soft, but I'll tell you what - it's not. It's rough as guts. It's great.

My experience over my five years at Wisconsin and my one year in the NFL was that there were times where I couldn't play the game safely. There are positive measures we can take... but on a lead play, on a power play, there's violence.

I never want to hurt a player but being physical is different. Body to body.

In football, there is always friction, collisions, contact. But I am used to that.

I don't understand referees. It appears like some players can't even be touched, but in my case, everyone can hit me as hard as they can.

The game is choreographed; it is mental, it is physical, it is a battle. People can feel those hits when they are in the stadium, you feel them and you see the velocity of the players.

I am one of those players who has many scars up and down my legs from being kicked, but I know I have a job to do, and beating my opponent is my goal.

I would bet you that even though people think I absorbed an inordinate number of head injuries, I'd say relative to the number of guys who have played this game, I would say that my head injuries were relatively small.

I've always been a physical player.

I love offensive physicality.

You know that when you come to England, there are a lot of players who like to play a more physical game.

I mean, football is a violent sport.

The wrestling is real, all the injuries are real, so much so that in no other sports, whether soccer or cricket or hockey, players get so many injuries as in WWE.

The reality is that it's just the nature of the game. It's the nature of playing offensive line, defensive line, and linebackers, where your responsibilities as a player involve those little hits that are going to accumulate. You can't take that out of the game.

There's shouting, there's blood, there's boogers, there's a whole thing. I mean, there's spitting, there's fighting, there's ripped jerseys. There's someone grabbing someone's throat. I mean, it's why you have football.

MLS is a league that is growing. What can I say? The league is more physical: the players here can play 90 minutes or more. There is a little bit more quality in Spain, because it's more technical, but it's difficult to say.

I'm always a player who has taken fairly rough treatment, to be honest. I think my time in Scotland typified that because I think there was one game where I set a record for being fouled ten or 11 times in a game.

Football has always been a contact sport, and it's always going to be a violent sport, and there are going to be repercussions from that. But every player that ever played this game and will play this game, they're signing up for it.

I don't have any problem with tackles or duels, but I react when I notice that someone is only trying to kick me out of the game. But I never have the intention to hurt anyone. Everything is forgotten again a minute later.

Drew McFedries was the hardest hitter I've ever been around. A big, strong, athletic guy with power. He didn't have to hit you with a hard shot or load up - even the little short shots could hurt you.