Matt Birk
FameRank: 4

"Matthew Robert Birk" is a former American football Center (American football)/center. He was drafted by the Minnesota Vikings in the sixth round of the 1998 NFL Draft, and later played for the Baltimore Ravens. He played college football at Harvard University/Harvard. Birk is a two-time All-Pro, six-time Pro Bowl selection, and one-time Super Bowl champion.

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It's not all on him. ... untouchable.

227

(Wilf) decided he wanted to sit down with me at some point later on and talk about some stuff. All he said is he was concerned about my physical health and he wanted to sit down and talk with me about it. He looked me in the eye and told me that and I believed him, which made me think also that I'm in the long-term plans here, the long-term thoughts, which is great, because I want to be.

209

Right now I'm just focused on getting healthy and feeling good. It's a bummer. Going through what I went through last year, I burned the candle at both ends. It caught up to me.

144

I would have been ecstatic to play this year. And I'm disappointed that I'm not. But also, at those moments when I separate the emotion from it all, I think this is probably the right thing to do, not only for myself and my career, but also for the Vikings.

143

I think that a percentage of contracts should be guaranteed. But [trailblazing] wasn't my thinking. I was just trying to think of a scenario under which I would be comfortable playing given my condition, something that would work for both sides.

139

In 1999, it seemed like Randall was struggling, and he kind of seemed frustrated to the point where he didn't know what else to do.

118

Playing with pain is part of the game.

116

We put the fun in dysfunctional, don't we?

114