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September 20, 2007

"There's plenty of new challenges"

Hey all --

One of the fascinating things about Bill Belichick is his ability to make even the worst teams seem like a worthy opponent.

Now we will acknowledge up front that this is the NFL, and every player gets paid to play and ultimately win games. And games aren't played on paper. Yadda, yadda.

(I spend too much time here.)

But as of right now, Buffalo is not in the same class as New England. The boys in Vegas think so -- the Pats are 16 1/2 point favorites for Sunday -- and basically everyone outside of the Bills' locker room thinks so.

Still, Belichick stood at the dais in front of the electronic billboard and espoused the virtues of the Bills once again.

"There's plenty of new challenges," he said, again talking about Buffalo's strength on special teams; yesterday Belichick mentioned their defense and their bulked-up offensive line.

On his own team, Belichick praised the progress of safety James Sanders, who has been starting while Rodney Harrison serves his suspension, and said he's glad to have Kyle Brady on his side.

In the locker room, there was a lot of joking going on, as Ryan O'Callaghan was hearing it from the media thanks to his former teammate Marshawn Lynch, who said O'Callaghan's nickname at Cal was "Big Baby" because he didn't have facial hair.

Laurence Maroney, Chad Jackson, Kevin Faulk, Donte Stallworth and Sammy Morris were clustered in front of Faulk and Morris' locker, all smiles.

Tight end David Thomas revealed that his wife gave birth to their first child, a son named Jaxon David, on Tuesday. Jaxon weighed in at 8 pounds, 12 ounces, and mom and baby are doing well.

shalise

Posted by Shalise Manza Young  at 11:59 AM | Permalink