Playoffs Quotes

The game against the Vikings back in my second year stands out. It was kind of a turnaround for us. It allowed us to make a run at the playoffs for the first time in quite a while. The memories are so many it's hard to pin one down. ~ Drew Bledsoe

There were a lot of big games. But I think one of the biggest was one that will go down as one of the biggest upsets in playoff history. We were 15-point underdogs going into Miami and upset them. That was a big one. ~ Chuck Knox

It's not a question of if we make the playoffs; we will. And when we get there, I have no fear of anyone. ~ Kobe Bryant

The excitement of the fans in Montreal, especially in the playoffs, I don't think you can get that anywhere else. For a hockey player, I kind of wish everyone could go through that and experience what it is to play there. It's very unique. ~ Saku Koivu

None of the teams that actually probably were offering me a job from the getgo, actually in spring training, are in the playoffs right now. ~ Pedro Martinez

The playoffs are the playoffs. You just play who is put in front of you. ~ Steve Nash

I haven't been back in Montreal, at all, since the playoffs ended two years ago. It's been a while. ~ Saku Koivu

As you've progress further in the Playoffs, the ice usually gets a little softer. It's tough to keep it that cold. We could make it hard, but it would be about 4 degrees in the building. I'm sure the fans wouldn't appreciate that very much, wearing parkas in June. ~ Chris Pronger

Ultimately, if you can say that I'm a bad owner and we're winning championships, I can live with that. But if we're not making the playoffs and we're spending and losing money, then I have to look in the mirror and say maybe I'm not taking the necessary steps to doing what it takes to run an organization. ~ Michael Jordan

It's more frustrating. My expectation probably wasn't that I'd play [during the playoffs], but I was just trying to make sure that if there was any chance that it was possible to come back that I was ready and that I'd done everything I could to be ready. It's frustrating, disappointing. But can't really control any of that. ~ Sidney Crosby

The QB is going to be judged, fair or unfair, on success in the playoffs. You remember QBs who have won 3 or 4 Super Bowls ~ Aaron Rodgers

I played in the playoffs with teams that were known for flopping and you do not get respect. ~ Chris Webber

In this millennium that we live in, the 'Hack-a-Shaq'has proven not to work. It might work a couple games every now and then, but when it comes to the playoffs or a championship series, it doesn't work - not at all. ~ Shaquille O'Neal

The football playoffs feature one-off affairs, without bad feelings building from weekend to weekend. In addition, football uses platoons for offense and defense and kicking, so only the interior linemen have a chance to really get up close and personal with one another. ~ George Vecsey

After referees negated a line change that led to Tampa Bay"s winning goal in the Stanley Cup Playoffs: After all these years in the league, am I that stupid that I would put four forwards and one defenseman in a 3-3 tie, in the third period? I think everybody that knows me here knows I"m not that stupid. I might be halfway stupid, but not that stupid. ~ Pat Burns

I'm not trying to put any more pressure on me because it's the playoffs. ~ Monta Ellis

Every team in the NFL is hard, but when we play our own division it's a fight. Our goal is to make it to the playoffs and to do that we have to win games within the division. We match up well against this division, it's just a matter of getting on the field and doing what we know we can do. ~ Giovani Bernard

I want to help my team get to the playoffs, win, and run wild. ~ Adrian Peterson

Everybody wants to play in the playoffs. You don't know how good the good times were until you hit the bad times. But sometimes success is just around the corner. ~ Trevor Linden

Making the playoffs three consecutive seasons is a great accomplishment. ~ Pau Gasol

I think your goal is to win every single game you play ... I'm not a guy that just puts a number on it and says we're going to do this, or makes a bravado statement like, "We're going to the playoffs and I guarantee it." I'm not a guy that talks about what we're going to do. I'm just, "Let's do it." And what it is is, we need to work extremely hard. ~ Chip Kelly

I felt like calling attention to AIDS. I had the AIDS ribbon colored into my hair during the playoffs in '95. ~ Dennis Rodman

There are many reasons why I hate college football. The 4-hour games drone on longer than Steve Lyons during the American League playoffs. The ever-expanding season threatens to creep into early July. Boise, Idaho, hosts a bowl game. And it's played on blue artificial turf. ~ Stephen Rodrick

Playing in the playoffs is the best basketball in the world, and if you can learn under that pressure, succeed under that pressure, it gives you more confidence the next year. ~ Tony Parker

I don't care much about my personal record. I just want to be able to pitch in the playoffs. ~ CC Sabathia

In the playoffs, it is do or die. You win or you go home. As a competitor, you love it. ~ Ben Roethlisberger

It's a reality here. We're a team that at this time of the season, with teams trying to get to the playoffs, it's going to be difficult to win. ~ Nate McMillan

I've been in just about every situation as a player and coach and manager. I've been in the playoffs, World Series, and I know how to get there. ~ Don Baylor

Well, of course you question it, especially when you get to this point. I always look at it would I rather not make the playoffs or lose in The Finals? I don't know. I don't know. I've missed the playoffs twice. I lost in The Finals four times. I'm almost starting to be like I'd rather not even make the playoffs than to lose in The Finals. It would hurt a lot easier if I just didn't make the playoffs and I didn't have a shot at it. ~ LeBron James

It's funny, but when there are dominant teams, there are a number of people who rail about the fact that they're always seeing the Dallas Cowboys or the San Francisco 49ers or the Green Bay either in the playoffs or in the Super Bowl. ~ Al Michaels

I don't just think regular season. I think playoffs. World Series. That's how I think. ~ Mariano Rivera

You live to play in the playoffs. It's like your heart is ripped out. ~ Darcy Tucker

If I continue to just get to the playoffs every year, I guess you could say I arrived, but right now I'm just trying to find my way. ~ Kevin Durant

When I go back to NFL functions today, I feel a bit on the outside looking in. I played 13 years in the NFL, and I loved it - made a Pro Bowl and went to the playoffs - but I always felt like I was having to knock the door down to get in. ~ Doug Flutie

The model for an NHL without fighting is right there in front of us. The [playoffs are] the time of year that fans love best; when the best hockey is played ... [The] enforcers don't play. Even mini-enforcers ... remain on the bench. Teams and coaches can't afford anything stupid and unpredictable ... With no one to fight back for them, players go harder into the corners, more determinedly to the front of the net. If they want to fire up the crowd and their teammates, they have to do it themselves. And in the playoffs, they do. ~ Ken Dryden

The playoffs, everybody gets a little frustrated. You lose, your season's over. ~ Richard Sherman

In the playoffs will beats skill. ~ Kevin Constantine

I have people that I'm close to that give me things to read throughout the season, and in particular in the playoffs and the postseason. ~ Derek Fisher

Whatever happened in the regular season seems to not matter in the playoffs. ~ Carl Crawford

When I look back at the tapes, your first everything, your first All-Star Game, your first playoff experience, it just seems like it went by really fast. ~ Roger Clemens

I watch a lot of NBA basketball, especially with the playoffs. ~ Coby Bell

We have a lot of rookies in the lineup. More than anybody, I would say. Its going to be something new for them. They have to understand that it's totally different hockey in the playoffs. Starting with the fans, the intensity of the game, every mistake counts. ~ Jaromir Jagr

You could have a season where you hit .330 and did all these great things, but nothing ever materialized from it and you went home October One. Or you could hit .260 and have key hits and key plays on defense that help your team get to the playoffs and win the World Series. ~ Andre Ethier

I am right where I want to be-in the playoffs, and happy about it. ~ Bobby Abreu

This is a good group of young guys that's eager to play. When I was coming up with the (Minnesota) Twins, they called us a Triple-A team. But then we made the playoffs. That's the direction we're headed. ~ Corey Koskie

I don't doubt myself ever, but people that don't know me do. I've been playing for 15 years, and have the most playoffs wins in Wings history for a reason, and not because I'm a bad goalie. ~ Chris Osgood

We're beating a lot of poor teams. So what? We won a lot of games last year, too. Will Horace and Bill still be playing at this level in the playoffs ... Can Pip keep it up? ~ Michael Jordan

I'm a football guy. Baseball, I enjoy it at playoff time. ~ Jon Bon Jovi

I've been fortunate enough to do pretty well in playoffs. I feel pretty comfortable in them. ~ Sergio Garcia

Winning the Rookie of the Year would be nice but making the playoffs would be even nicer for me. ~ Andrew Bogut

The playoffs are the wedge between the season and the World Series. If you lose, it means you won't be going to the greatest sports event in this country ... You're forgotten by Thanksgiving. ~ Tim McCarver

When it comes to playoff time, I pull the energy and the motivation. ~ Pau Gasol

People judge you by the way you play in the playoffs. ~ Jaromir Jagr

Life would be better if the Leafs would make the playoffs. Life would be perfect if they'd win the Stanley Cup. ~ Tom Earle

I'm a firm believer that the wild-card teams, because they're grinding it out until the final days, have a tremendous amount of excitement. That excitement carries over into the playoffs and really helps. ~ Tim Salmon

Obviously, not playing a game before playoffs is something that happened, but especially going into the playoffs, you try to feel yourself out, where you're at, and then get right into game tempo and jump right in and play where you were before the injury. ~ Patrick Kane

My first year in baseball, there were only one or two reporters. My second year, I got to the Triple-A playoffs, there were four or five. When I came up in 1984, I never saw so many people. ~ Dwight Gooden

War of attrition, war of wills. That's what the Stanley Cup playoffs are - more intense, more physical and more prolonged than the playoffs of any other sport. ~ George Vecsey

My favorite event each year is the Yankees-Red Sox series. Love seeing passions run hot among the fans, especially when both teams are in the running for the playoffs. ~ Elizabeth Banks

At the same time, preparation is important to playoff success. ~ Barry Trotz

I know winning 20 is a special kind of thing, but I'd rather get into the playoffs, and be strong for the playoffs. ~ Tim Hudson

Everyone who loves pro basketball assumes it's a little fixed. We all think the annual draft lottery is probably rigged, we all accept that the league aggressively wants big market teams to advance deep into the playoffs, and we all concede that certain marquee players are going to get preferential treatment for no valid reason. The outcomes of games aren't predeteremined or scripted but there are definitely dark forces who play with our reality. There are faceless puppet masters who pull strings and manipulate the purity of justice. It's not necessarily a full-on conspiracy, but it's certainly not fair. And that's why the NBA remains the only game that matters: Pro basketball is exactly like life. ~ Chuck Klosterman

In 1999, I got fired as coach of New England. In three years in New England, we actually did better than most people think. We were 27-21, won the AFC division title, went to the playoffs twice. ~ Pete Carroll

I want my team to be more detached from the wins and losses and be more focused on doing the little things well. When you focus on getting the win, it can suffocate you, especially during the playoffs when the pressure gets thick. ~ Sue Enquist

But then I lock back in and I start thinking about how fun it is to compete during the playoffs and the first round, the second round, and Eastern Conference Finals. If I'm lucky enough to get here again, it will be fun to do it. ~ LeBron James

Everywhere I went during those days, the streets were filled with talk of the Mets. It was one of those rare moments of unanimity when everyone was thinking about the same thing. People walked around with transistor radios tuned to the game, large crowds gathered in front of appliance store windows to watch the action on silent televisions, sudden cheers would erupt from corner bars, from apartment windows, from invisible rooftops. First it was Atlanta in the playoffs, and then it was Baltimore in the Series. Out of eight October games, the Mets lost only once, and when the adventure was over, New York held another ticker-tape parade, this one even surpassing the extravaganza that had been thrown for the astronauts two months earlier. More than five hundred tons of paper fell into the streets that day, a record that has not been match sense. ~ Paul Auster

We are a terrible defensive team right now. We're not putting forth the maximum effort that we need to put forth, especially in our position. You'd think that we'd put forth that maximum effort to not only win the game, but to get a good rhythm to get into the playoffs. ~ Jermaine O'Neal

The playoffs is all about showing heart and playing together. ~ Dirk Nowitzki

The best part of basketball, for those people on the inside, is the bus going to the airport after you've won a game on an opponent's floor. It's been a very tough battle. And preferably, in the playoffs. And that feeling that you have, together as a group, having gone to an opponent's floor and won a very good victory, is as about as high as you can get. ~ Phil Jackson

I love the NBA playoffs. It's just a great mental test for each team.
When it's really close, usually one team pulls together, and the other team comes apart. ~ Doc Rivers

My situation is different from Mark's. I'm not looking for home runs, I'm looking for the playoffs. ~ Sammy Sosa

Any time you're playing a playoff-caliber team, it is always good to show well, because you don't know when you'll be seeing them again. ~ John Lackey

Famed basketball coach Phil Jackson, a meditator himself, arranged to have his players - first the Chicago Bulls, and then the L.A. Lakers - learn meditation as a way to improve their focus and teamwork. Jackson finds that mindfulness assists players in paying attention to what's happening on the court moment by moment. Such precise training in attention has paid off during tense playoffs; Jackson has led more teams to championships than any coach in NBA history. Meditation ~ Sharon Salzberg

That's our race. That's our playoffs. ~ Tim Salmon

When players are used to winning, they put out a little more. Basketball 3rd winningest coach (regular season and playoffs) in NBA history; won 1,037 times in 20 years; ~ Red Auerbach

I'm going to make the playoffs. You can believe that. To never play in the playoffs, that will not be my legacy. ~ LaDainian Tomlinson

Commenting on playoffs to determine a national champion: I'm not in favor of 15 games either. I think that's way too much football. The thing that I feel good about is that these guys hung together through 15 games and played hard every week. That's a marvelous tribute to the kids. We just hung in there today and kept playing. It's just been a special feeling all year long. ~ LaVell Edwards

You always want to feel better but I'm good. My thing is once you get to the playoffs, you do whatever it takes. You've got to lay it on the line. ~ Brian Jordan

Westbrook: 10 triple-doubles and carrying that team, injury-prone, into the playoffs. LeBron being the best player in the world. But I think right now I would go with James Harden because of what he's done. He's stepped up his game defensively. He's not a great defender but he's competing on the defensive end. ~ Mark Jackson

The goal every year is to win the Super Bowl, not just to get to the playoffs, not just to win a few games. ~ Calvin Johnson

I will not dream anymore, you said. I will not set myself up for the pain. But then your team made the playoffs, or you saw a movie, or a billboard glowing dusky orange and advertising Aruba, or a girl who bore more than a passing resemblance to a woman you'd dated in high school - a woman you'd loved and lost - danced above you with shimmering eyes, and you said, fuck it, let's dream just one more time. ~ Dennis Lehane

I went to a couple of Rangers games at the Garden, and someone at the NHL had seen me and figured I was a fan and decided to approach me about having a blog during the playoffs. ~ Eddie Cahill

I lost control of myself a couple times in the playoffs. I have to keep cooler in the future. ~ Dirk Nowitzki

There's nothing less than that. I don't care about just going to the playoffs; I've been to the playoffs before. ~ Allen Iverson

I don't think I was a year too late or a year too early in retiring. If the Seahawks had been in the playoffs a year later, I might have had some regrets. ~ Steve Largent

My dream was to be in the NBA. I wasn't really focused on being a star player on a team. I just wanted to make it to the NBA. I've been blessed for the opportunities to be in the Finals, been in the playoffs ever since I've been in the NBA. ~ James Harden

The 2006 playoffs were such a rollercoaster for me. I was able to lean on God and know that no matter what things were going to work out the way they were meant to work out. I had that trust that allowed me to go into the games without fear. When I prayed before games, I was able to just let it go. When I played in game seven of the Stanley Cup Finals, I prayed more that day than I have my whole life. That was a day that I leaned on the Lord a lot. It helped me to face some of my fears. ~ Matt Cullen

I'm not going to make it the all - everything. Our (the Saints) goal is to get better, make the playoffs and win the Super Bowl, but I'm not gonna anguish over it like I have in the past. ~ Mike Ditka

What I've learned so far from researching is that to win the Stanley Cup, you have to make the playoffs. ~ Ted Leonsis

You've got to be in the moment, especially in the playoffs. If you're worried about the past, worried about what happened last game, that's a lost cause. ~ Drew Storen

This is definitely a playoff team. There's no question about that. It's just a matter of how much we want it. ~ Peter Bondra

I dont believe it wins championships. (It) gets you to the playoffs. ~ Byron Scott

As an organization, would we like to be in a better spot Everybody would like to know they're in the playoffs. But that's not a reality, year after year being in a playoff spot with 10, 12, 15 games left. We don't have that this year, so our playoffs have started. ~ John Tortorella

Everything can happen in the playoffs. ~ Red Auerbach

You don't realize the atmosphere in the arena until you're down on the ice for real, especially during the playoffs. You come out of the gate, you hear the fans going crazy, you know you're at home and in for a good time. It's something special, that's for sure. ~ Joe Thornton

Which brings us to a little book that may provide a clue to the cure. My wife got it as a gift from a friend. It is titled Porn for Women. It's a picture book of hunks, photographed in all their chiseled, muscle-bound, testosterone-marinated, PG-rated glory. Lots of naked chests and low-cut jeans, complete with tousled hair and beckoning eyes. And they are ALL doing housework. There's a picture of a well-cut Adonis, and he's loading the washing machine. The caption reads: "As soon as I finish the laundry, I'll do the grocery shopping. And I'll take the kids with me so you can relax." There's another hunk, the cover guy, vacuuming the floor. A particularly athletic-looking man peers up from the sports section and declares, "Ooh, look, the NFL playoffs are today. I bet we'll have no trouble parking at the crafts fair". Porn for Women. Available at a marriage near you. ~ Anonymous

What pitching is in a short series in baseball, goaltending is in the Stanley Cup playoffs. ~ Jack Adams

I don't want to just go to the playoffs, I don't want to go to the playoffs and win the first round, second round, and not win the whole thing because it's bittersweet. ~ Allen Iverson

Good teams make the playoffs, hot teams win the playoffs. ~ Derek Jeter

Whether it's in the playoffs or not, you have to keep proving yourself. ~ Marc Bulger