I've been very lucky in the freedom that I've been given. Every artist needs two types of freedom: You need the freedom to - the freedom to come up with an idea or treatment - and then you need the other half of the freedom, and that's freedom from - somebody saying, 'This is great. This is how I want you to do it'.

I blew the college boards, and to ease the snub from Harvard made a tour of Europe.

Life is great, football is better.

I've always been fascinated by Picasso and how he would look at a single image through multiple perspectives and from separate moments in time. He would look at a woman's face and he would see almost a three-dimensional look even though it was a flat canvas. I thought, well why couldn't we do the same thing with a football play?

The autumn wind is a pirate. Blustering in from sea with a rollicking song he sweeps along swaggering boisterously. His face is weather beaten, he wears a hooded sash with a silver hat about his head... The autumn wind is a Raider, pillaging just for fun.

Live your life as a revolution and not just a process of evolution. I realized today that if I stay on a path of gradual evolution into the man I ultimately want to become, I am going to run out of time before I reach the goal.

I never thought of what I was doing as a way to sell the NFL. I was making movies about a sport that I loved, about players and coaches that I respected. I wanted to convey my love of the game through film. And most artists convey their love through art. And my art and my love was expressed through film.