First and foremost, he's an outstanding athlete. He has to be or else he wouldn't be in this position. He takes great care of himself. He's a competitor by nature. He has a great sense of humor, which I think keeps everything in perspective for him, good or bad. But, to play as long as he has played and to be on the verge of breaking these records is a tremendous accomplishment. For someone to be in a position that he's in and having done this for so many years and continue to be excited about coming to work every day and the opportunities he has is really a remarkable thing.

He's an incredible athlete and a guy whose conditioning really has been a measuring stick for everybody in this league. It is so easy for us to point to Jerry Rice when we are trying to make a strong message with a player who we may not feel is as serious about his game as he should be.

Kevin's a great coach and the hands-on guy that's taken Eli through all the mental processes, ... Being his position coach, it's Kevin's responsibility to teach him how to conduct his business and how to accept his role as a team leader.

Kevin's a great coach and the hands-on guy that's taken Eli through all the mental processes. Being his position coach, it's Kevin's responsibility to teach him how to conduct his business and how to accept his role as a team leader.

[But Bird had a couple of factors working in his favor. First and foremost, he was a businessman with a businessman's head governing his restaurateur's heart. He knew exactly what he was getting into when he picked up this Hampden Avenue space -- formerly a buck-a-scoop Chinese buffet of no renown, but with good street visibility and a big parking lot -- and chose it over properties he'd been scouting in Boulder, L.A. and the Bay Area.] I figured I could mitigate my chance of failure to 50 percent here, ... Seriously, I didn't go into this thinking I had an 80, 90 percent chance of success. I'm not deluded.

He?s an awfully good quarterback that happens to also be an outstanding athlete.