"I told the guys that that's a victory to be proud of,"

"He did a fine job last night, probably his best game that I remember where he didn't have eight to 10 catches because he hustled his tail off, he blocked. So as I watched that tape this morning, I was proud of Chad Johnson for how he played."

"I'm excited. I'm different than I was against Denver (2003). Last year we played on Sunday night (against Miami). That was something new and neat for our guys."

"Why would I want our game in Pittsburgh to be there on a Thursday night to open the season? (It favors the home team), particularly coming off a world-championship season."

"The defined role is to get him in the game and get him the football in his hands as much as we can."

"He finds a way to make football plays,"

"We have a plan. Some of it can be the game plan, some of it can be the opponent, where other guys are at the position health-wise. Sunday morning we should be pretty close. I want to make sure the guys who should be OK and ready to go are OK and ready to go."

"In a lot of their games this year they've got right down the field early and scored,"

"You can't purposely go out and hurt somebody. I've never seen that happen in the NFL. So I don't think there needs to be any resentment."

"Gee whiz. The guy got hurt. Let it go. There's nothing you can do. You can't get it back. To sit there and baby and cry like their quarterback did - ridiculous."

"We hung in there toe to toe, but we have to make plays to win. We're a good football team. In order to prove that, we have to go beat the other good football teams."

"We beat a good football team,"

"I think we're doing a lot of giving. I don't know how much taking we're getting to do."

"I'm proud of our guys for how hard they've worked, giving everybody something to smile about. We're ready to keep going."

"We have an opportunity to have a home playoff game in Cincinnati. We still have a lot of football to play, but it's time to stop hiding from it. It's time to go sit in the front row."

"Nah. It's not going to have any effect on who wins or loses the football game -- until somebody hits you in the mouth."

"We made a lot of mistakes. When you make a lot of mistakes, you can lose the football game. That's the way it is. We've said this before. It's medicine. It doesn't taste good, but it's good for you."

"He's got a lot of football ahead of him here."

"We're in a situation on our football team where no matter what position the guy plays, he doesn't necessarily have to come in right now and be the bell cow. We don't have to put the pressure on that guy to do that, right or wrong. But when we pick that first pick, we want a guy that we feel can be a fine pro for a long time."

"It's a pretty typical play whether they show it or not. It's a fundamental football play. Just cover your man. Don't let your eyes go to where they don't belong."

"We played another physical football game and we knew it was going to be that type of game. We've got to make corrections, both players and coaches."

"If you tackle well and you tackle with your arms, and if you keep going after the football aggressively, good things will happen."

"Our team needed to win games, ... As I said a zillion times, we could not afford to lose football games and having somebody to blame. All that would've done is give people an excuse to say, 'They're losing because of the quarterback position.'"

"We won't know where things are until we go out and begin playing football when it counts. That's the hard part of it. Even if he had been here every day, no matter who it is, what position, there's always something new that comes up, and how people handle those situations is always tested. That's why it's not an exact science."

"He's just a phenomenal athlete and has very quick feet, good speed and he has the desire to catch the ball."

"To have Willie back now adds a sense of calmness and also determination. I think Willie and Rudi (Johnson) play off each other as far as their approach to the game."

"It's unfortunate. We're not going to sit here and baby and cry like their quarterback did."

"This is a key development for our team. It further secures our future with one of our top players, in the prime of his career, and I want to commend Chad for his efforts in making it happen. He is showing his commitment to what we have going here."

"We're excited to have this deal concluded. We're excited to get started with David, for his and our future."

"We are underdogs. We're underdogs every time we step on the field. Don't let anyone fool you. We're underdogs."

"We have to win football games. I don't think Carson has to do anything different. The rest of us have to keep playing and coaching better. We just let him do his job. I think it's up to the rest of us."

"It's an exciting week for the city. For our football team, I'll keep them calm and let's just get ready to play the football game. But I think for everybody else it's going to be an exciting week."

"It just tells you that we have a good football team, but we need to play good at all times or that's what's going to happen. We have enough good players and a team that has some resolve."

"We don't need to spout off. Let's play football."

"I was pleased with our execution. Guys went out there and carried out their assignments the way they're supposed to."

"For me, I can't believe,"

"They'll keep playing. We didn't play well at the beginning of the game and were playing uphill. But we kept playing and hanging in there together."

"Our focus has been geared toward beginning our season better than we did the last two seasons. We get an opportunity here to write that script as we go week in and week out."

"We didn't play very well in the beginning of the game and were playing up hill."

"We dug ourselves a hole with field position in the first half. We didn't play very well at the beginning of the game and we were playing up hill."

"When you recruit in college, you do those things. Those are the things you think about. How you drive a guy around the city? What routes do you take? Where do you take him to show him? Do you involve the wife? Who's important to him? Who's going to help him make the decision? Those are all the things we talked about and were important for us to do, as we brought these guys to town. And I think that's helped us acquire the guys we have."

"He's our guy, we drafted him, we like him. When we get him here, we'll coach him up."

"I think it's the role of the offensive coordinator, the special teams coordinator and the defensive coordinator to coach the coaches as hard as he coaches the players. As hard as I push on them, they've got to push everybody else just as hard. I think that's important that they understand in and out that they set up, they push and make sure that the position coaches cover every detail or they cover it so that every detail gets covered."

"Obviously you draft a player, (and) you really, really, really like the player. You really, really want to coach him."

"He brings a lot of ability and character to our football team."

"There was (the) ability for us to take advantage of some NFL cap numbers and rules if we got this completed in time. This is a foundation, and now we're able to move on and know where certain things are spent and allocated."

"First of all, you must have the ability to run the football and take care of the ball offensively."

"I have no doubt in my mind that it's time for our team to achieve success. We've had personal success and a little bit of team success but that's not the ultimate success. The only way to get the ultimate success is to become a football team totally. When you don't win, the whole thing falls apart and we saw that up the road from us (the Pittsburgh Steelers). They figured out a way to turn it around and get it righted. We saw a couple of years ago with Baltimore."

"You're a combination of all those things, but you learn that you have to set the direction, and I learned a lot of that from Bill. You always have to adjust, but you always have to have a starting point, as far as a direction, a game plan. It all ties together."

"I think what he's been able to do is have a good plan for the team and set a direction -- set it on Wednesday and reinforce it throughout the week. Then, as the game unfolds, things that come up don't put them in a panic. They are able to stay the course."