Milloy arrives here exhausted, happy
By Catherine E. Toth
Advertiser Staff Writer
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| Lawyer Milloy of the New England Patriots has been in New Orleans, Boston and Honolulu this week.
Bruce Asato The Honolulu Advertiser |
Try his hotel room.
"I'm exhausted," he said, signing autographs after a short practice at Aloha Stadium yesterday. "I'm sleeping in a Hawaiian bed, that's what I'm doing."
Who can blame him?
The Patriots defensive back has traveled from New Orleans to Boston to Honolulu in the past week, arriving in Hawai'i 1 a.m. Tuesday after a 10-hour flight on team owner Robert Kraft's private jet.
And talk about climatic extremes.
After winning the Super Bowl on Sunday, the Patriots paraded around City Hall Plaza, shivering along with the more than 1 million fans who came to celebrate the team's first championship. Nineteen hours later Milloy was running drills in 80-degree temperatures.
But he's not complaining.
"It's always good to be recognized by your peers, the guys you respect a lot in the league," he said. "I think everybody plays this game in search of respect. This is definitely the way to know you're getting that respect."
Milloy has undoubtedly earned that.
In his six seasons in the league, the 6-foot, 207-pound defender has amassed 670 tackles (475 solo), 19 interceptions and seven sacks.
His interception against Pittsburgh in the AFC Championship with 2:02 left sealed the win for the Patriots and sent his team packing for New Orleans.
"Winning the Super Bowl, I'm complete now," said the three-time Pro Bowler. "I've been to Pro Bowls, I signed a big contract, I've been to a Super Bowl and lost before. But now I've won it. I just feel more complete this time."
He never gave up. He believed in the team and his teammates, scoffing at history that has been harsh on the Patriots, who hadn't won a championship in their 42 years of existence.
And they won it against the odds. Fourteen-point underdogs, the Patriots defeated the St. Louis Rams in a Super Bowl that some critics are calling the third greatest upset in the championship's history.
The most telling sign of the team's belief in teamwork came before kickoff, when they requested to be introduced as a team instead of singling out either unit.
"We got here as a team," said Milloy, one of the team's captains who made the decision to come out together. "We've been doing this all year — as a team — and that's how we wanted to present ourselves to the world. This is not a team of individuals."
The Patriots found strength in this philosophy, especially this year when the team lost its starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe early in the season. Second-year backup Tom Brady stepped in — and stepped up. But when Brady sustained an ankle sprain in the AFC championship game, Bledsoe took over and led the Patriots into the Super Bowl, raising questions about who would start against the Rams.
"We really believed in both of them," Milloy said. "The whole team, throughout the whole year, was riding behind both of them. That's really something. We don't worry about what individuals are going through. We try to support every individual through their saga, their drama, but we really believe that when one man goes down, the next one's gonna come in and do his job. ... We have a lot of depth and we believe in each other. First and foremost we believed our coach was going to make the right decision and we didn't make it a distraction. We would be able to still progress instead of digress."
Brady started the Super Bowl — and ended at the Pro Bowl. Teammate Ty Law also made the Pro Bowl roster.
And Milloy is convinced that as long as they played as a team, anything was possible. And winning almost a guarantee.
"We were still getting better, even after we won the Super Bowl," he said. "It was always the next game for us. We always respected our opponents, who we were playing. We just gained an unexplainable amount of confidence within our group that as long as we approached the next game as the next game, and we handled what we could do and didn't worry about all the elements or the environment we were in, we would keep winning. And that was exactly our approach, week in and week out."
But the approach for tomorrow's Pro Bowl is a bit different.
"This is fun," he said, smiling. "The good thing about being in the Pro Bowl is that not only do I get to see the guys I respect in the league, but I get to see them without a helmet. I get to see them personally, meeting people's families, drinking mai tais. That's what it's all about."
• • •
• Today
- 9 a.m.—AFC photo day and practice at JW Marriott Ihilani Resort and Spa (closed to public).
- 10 a.m.—NFC practice, Aloha Stadium.
- 1-10 p.m.—Topps NFL Experience, Fort DeRussy.
- 3-5:30 p.m.—Military Day & NFL Military Challenge. Topps NFL Experience, Fort DeRussy (Includes special price for military and competition between the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard).
Tomorrow
- 10 a.m.-7 p.m.—Topps NFL Experience, Fort DeRussy.
- 11:30 a.m.—Kickoff 2002 NFL Pro Bowl Game. AFC All-Stars vs. NFC All-Stars, Aloha Stadium.
- 7 p.m.—Pro Bowl post-game Block Party, Aloha Tower Marketplace.
Sunday
- 10 a.m-6 p.m.—Topps NFL Experience, Fort DeRussy
