Within minutes, Goose was exchanging sushi recipes with a Japanese television crew.
He was discussing his sex life.
He was saying things like, “Let’s hear it for the Giants!”
Insert brief pause.
“Kissing my ass!”
Goose may be a bit crazy, but he is one tough son of a bitch.
His legend grew immensely at the first Tennessee game of the season, when he was carried off the field on a stretcher with a neck injury and taken across the street to Shock Trauma for X-rays, only to return to PSI Net Stadium ready to play an hour later in the fourth quarter.
“It kinda pissed me off,” said defensive tackle Sam Adams the day after the incident. “Getting me all scared for him and stuff. Then he comes back and plays in the same game. I was like, ‘C’mon, Goose!’ When one of your brothers goes down like that, lying there all numb, it’s not a good feeling. I had that sick feeling in my stomach. When he came back and played, at first I was happy. Then, I got pissed at him again for scaring me like that.”
The media loved following the every move of America’s newest bad boys during Super Bowl week.
The Ravens were easy targets and great fodder – loose cannons for the microphones, a superstar linebacker who beat a murder charge, a loudmouthed and arrogant coach, the owner who broke Cleveland’s heart, and an unapologetic and hateful defense.
Of all of the agenda items that the media contingent could question during the week, they somehow picked Billick’s lackadaisical stance toward the Ravens’ free time in Tampa as their favorite.
Billick made it very clear that the Ravens wouldn’t have a bed check in a Florida town known for its racy adult nightlife.
Would they be out late, binging? Would they be receiving illicit lap dances at the world-famous Mons Venus gentleman’s club? Would the lure of endless Super Bowl parties cause a breakdown on Sunday? Could these “wild men” make it to Sunday afternoon without cracking?
“The team had always shown the ability to be loose and then to kick it in when necessary,” Billick said. “They were the most professional group I’ve ever worked with. You didn’t have to be militaristic because there was great leadership.”
Billick pointed back to his initial theme from the minute he entered the Ravens’ organization.
“I wanted passion and accountability,” Billick said. “They gave me that all year. If we needed a bed check at the Super Bowl, then we were really going to have problems on Sunday. I told them all along, ‘If you act like men, then I’m going to treat you like men.’”
That adult attitude was embraced and endorsed by his veterans.
“Brian allows us to be us,” defensive tackle Rob Burnett said at the time. “He doesn’t silence us. He lets us be men. His confidence rubs off on all of us.”
Much like the case of Ralph Staten during the first few weeks of Billick’s tenure, the rules were very clear. And they were to be obeyed.
At one point in 1999, the Ravens were having problems at their Owings Mills facility with players parking their cars on a back dock, making it impossible for trucks to load and unload at the facility. Sounds like a silly item, but parking at the cramped facility sucks, to be honest. And early on, some guys thought they deserved special parking privileges, so they just ignored the company policy.
Until one day, a defensive player walked out after practice, only to see his silver Mercedes being towed away from the complex.
“He’s only going to say things one time,” Marvin Lewis said. “(Billick’s) thinking was, how can you do third-and-1 right if you can’t do something as simple as follow instructions about where to park your car?”
Billick had many clues as to how his team would fare on Super Bowl Sunday against the Giants, but none better than when leaving practice on Thursday at the University of South Florida.
There were very specific rules about not bringing family members to practice. As much as Billick wanted to have his players share time with their families during the week – he had given them the previous Sunday off, their first Sunday with their families in nearly 23 weeks – it would be hard to run a credible practice for the biggest game of their lives with obvious distractions.
“I was very clear,” he said. “You take the bus to practice, you take the bus back to the hotel. We travel as a team. I just didn’t want things to get complicated or out of control.”
As much as Siragusa had brought an enormous traveling contingent of family members from New Jersey on a huge bus, and several players like Jeff Mitchell and Ray Lewis were from the Tampa area, and had friends and family everywhere, this plan seemed to be uniform and not necessarily punitive to anyone. No one seemed pissed, because it seemed fair and in the best interest of the team and winning a championship on Sunday.
While walking back to the bus, and almost out of the corner of his eye, Billick overheard a young special teams player tell Shannon Sharpe to inform Coach Billick that he’d be “catching a ride with his cousin.”
Neither player saw that Billick was observing the affair from a distance.
Sharpe, militant and obviously perturbed, said, “Did you hear what Coach said? We all travel together! Get your ass on the bus like everybody else!”
Billick could only muster a smile.
“Sometimes it was like having an extra team of coaches,” Billick said. “It’s better than me having to enforce discipline. When it comes from the other players, it’s very genuine. At that moment, if I didn’t know already, I realized we were in good shape for Sunday.”
