Thursday, September 20, 2001

Q- Will you expect that kind of noise(artificial crowd noise) at Arrowhead?

KC- We certainly don’t think it can be any louder than that. We know it’s going to be loud. Once again, we know it’s going to present a challenge for us. We’re prepared for it. As long as we keep our composure, we’ll be able to handle it pretty well.

 
Q- Do you think it will be different because of the circumstances?

KC- I don’t know. I doubt it honestly. The crowd will be spirited. They are looking forward to getting back into the stadium and getting back to watching football. They love their Chiefs out there, so I think it’s going to be tough.

 
Q- Will it be tough with all that has gone on the last week?

KC- There have been a lot of tough spots here the last week or so. That will be another one. At the same time, we want to play the way that we want to play our game. It’s going to be an emotional one. It’s impossible to get out of your mind. To say that no one is going to be thinking of it would be a lie. At the same time, you need to maintain your focus and get ready to play a game that we all love and that we are ready to play again.

 
Q- Have guys said anything to get the team more focused?

KC- I think, for the most part, our focus has been pretty good. I think we’ve enjoyed coming in here and having something to do and doing something to get our minds off of everything. We want to play well. We want to go out there and we want to get back to playing well and try to get a win. You can never forget about it. Even today here in practice, I told Jason Garrett, 'did you hear about this, did you hear about that?' That’s going to go on for a long time, and that’s not going to go away, and it shouldn’t go away. We’ve had good focus and I think our preparation has been good. We’re going to go out there and give it our best shot.

 
Q- What is so good about the Chiefs defense?

KC- They’ve got a good scheme. They do a lot of good things defensively. They have some exotic type of blitzes in the third down area. We’ve got some things that we’ll try to counter with, but at the same time they blitz a lot. They do some different things. Our guys have to be able to handle their blitz and their pressure.

 
Q- What’s the biggest thing you have to do from last game?

KC- I think we need to be more efficient on third down. We left a couple of opportunities on the field the other night on third downs. On the road, against good teams, you don’t get them back. Everyone of them is important. We really try to emphasize third down, and converting on third down will be our focus. If we can do that, it will be an improvement and it will give us a better chance to win.

 
Q- Have you had to watch what you say following last week?

KC- No, I haven’t really thought about it. Maybe from a quarterback's standpoint and on offense, it might be a little different. I haven’t really tried to watch my vocabulary or watch what I’m saying. Maybe we need to. That’s an interesting question, but nothing has come up about it where you hesitate to say something or hesitate to talk about something. It might be something to think about.

 
Q- Some of your teammates have brought up the sensitivity issue, how have you reacted?

KC- It hasn’t come up in the quarterbacks meetings, but I could see where it would. I could see where guys could be hesitant about saying something, or think twice about the things they say.

 
Q- Did you hear about Bush saying the Crusade, meaning a holy war with the Muslims?

KC- Yeah, I did. You just don’t think about those things because it’s not a part of your culture and you just don’t understand it.