Is there a program out there that can rip or view the character models from the final fantasy 9 disks.
Or is there a website that has the models to download?

i'm curious to find out how many polygons were used,

also i'd just like to take a look

To be honest, I don't think there is such a program (not a legal one anyway). All I can think of are the drawings/sketches of the original characters, or maybe the sprites, but I have no idea how or where to obtain them.

I thought there might be a generic psx model viewer that might work. I do recall using a model viewer too see some ff7 models but the program barely worked and it wouldn't load any other games that i tried (including ff9)

I know of a ffx and 10-2 model viewer