minutes and then got ready for the day-after press conference
with Brady and NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue.
By noon he was on
Northwest flight 9965. The team was leaving New Orleans for Boston, where there
would be a downtown parade the next day. Belichick sat near Pioli on the plane,
and they compared their lists for the expansion draft. Their Lombardi Trophy
wasn’t even twenty-four hours old. But shortly after takeoff, they had already
begun thinking about how they could win another one.
CHAPTER 6
REVERSAL OF FORTUNE
The man at the front of the room hates giving
this speech, although he has never lacked the confidence to give it. Anyone who
knows him can tell you that. Bill Belichick hates to stand there, his entire
team and coaching staff before him, and talk about the phenomenon of
intelligent men— some of the same men who only nine months before had been
champions of their sport—playing dumb football. Or, as he said after the 28–10
loss to the Green Bay Packers, “We have a lot of smart guys in this room, but
on the football field we play like a bunch of fucking
morons.”
If you are one of the players flinching at
the harshness of these words, you might as well begin packing. There is no way
you are going to last as a New England Patriot. This is one of the reasons
the Patriots’ college scouts are asked by their bosses, “Can
this player handle tough coaching?” What they really want to know, without the
euphemism, is whether a prospect can deal with being “motherfucked” when things
are not going well.
Most of the players in this auditorium could.
They had to. This is a profession where political correctness never caught on.
There is no liaison in Human Resources who monitors the way your supervisor
talks to you. The players know their head coach can be profane, even when he is
not angry. He has an extensive vocabulary—expletives not included—but he stores
it like a precious sports car when he is here. He knows ambiguity doesn’t work
in the NFL. Some people may not like his brand of bluntness, but at least they
understand it. That’s what’s important in this business where misunderstandings
lead to losses and layoffs.
He has visions of how football teams
should be built and how the games should be played. He is secure enough to
allow these visions to be inspected, four or five times per year, for soft
spots and holes. There is frequent self- scouting and self-analysis, his
version of 3,000-mile checkups to see if everything is running well. He prefers
to have advisers and scouts with strong opinions, and at times he demands that
those opinions be stated. As with his preparation for the Super Bowl, he will
ask the football people closest to him—Scott Pioli and Ernie Adams—what they
think, unafraid to hear ideas that are inconsistent with his own. He does the
same thing with his assistants and other coaches he speaks with by phone. There
are times when he talks strategy with his friend Nick Saban, the head coach of
Louisiana State University. Saban will explain how he approached a play or
situation at LSU, and Belichick will shake his head and
say, “That makes a lot of sense. Why didn’t I think of that?”
It’s
hard to find something that irritates him more than a lack of preparation and
thought. When potential free agents arrive in Foxboro, one of the first things
they’re shown is the computer system. They are told that the video guys—Jimmy
Dee, Fernando Neto, and Steve Scarnecchia—are on the second floor. They are
reminded that they can better understand their responsibilities simply by
walking up a flight of stairs or clicking a mouse. Jimmy Dee is used to
cornerbacks asking for tapes on wide receivers and safeties asking for
breakdowns on tight ends.
There are actually written tests—no
multiple-choice here—in which players show their position coaches that they
have grasped the key points of the week. Prior to the Green Bay game, the
quarterbacks were given a
with Brady and NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue.
By noon he was on
Northwest flight 9965. The team was leaving New Orleans for Boston, where there
would be a downtown parade the next day. Belichick sat near Pioli on the plane,
and they compared their lists for the expansion draft. Their Lombardi Trophy
wasn’t even twenty-four hours old. But shortly after takeoff, they had already
begun thinking about how they could win another one.
CHAPTER 6
REVERSAL OF FORTUNE
The man at the front of the room hates giving
this speech, although he has never lacked the confidence to give it. Anyone who
knows him can tell you that. Bill Belichick hates to stand there, his entire
team and coaching staff before him, and talk about the phenomenon of
intelligent men— some of the same men who only nine months before had been
champions of their sport—playing dumb football. Or, as he said after the 28–10
loss to the Green Bay Packers, “We have a lot of smart guys in this room, but
on the football field we play like a bunch of fucking
morons.”
If you are one of the players flinching at
the harshness of these words, you might as well begin packing. There is no way
you are going to last as a New England Patriot. This is one of the reasons
the Patriots’ college scouts are asked by their bosses, “Can
this player handle tough coaching?” What they really want to know, without the
euphemism, is whether a prospect can deal with being “motherfucked” when things
are not going well.
Most of the players in this auditorium could.
They had to. This is a profession where political correctness never caught on.
There is no liaison in Human Resources who monitors the way your supervisor
talks to you. The players know their head coach can be profane, even when he is
not angry. He has an extensive vocabulary—expletives not included—but he stores
it like a precious sports car when he is here. He knows ambiguity doesn’t work
in the NFL. Some people may not like his brand of bluntness, but at least they
understand it. That’s what’s important in this business where misunderstandings
lead to losses and layoffs.
He has visions of how football teams
should be built and how the games should be played. He is secure enough to
allow these visions to be inspected, four or five times per year, for soft
spots and holes. There is frequent self- scouting and self-analysis, his
version of 3,000-mile checkups to see if everything is running well. He prefers
to have advisers and scouts with strong opinions, and at times he demands that
those opinions be stated. As with his preparation for the Super Bowl, he will
ask the football people closest to him—Scott Pioli and Ernie Adams—what they
think, unafraid to hear ideas that are inconsistent with his own. He does the
same thing with his assistants and other coaches he speaks with by phone. There
are times when he talks strategy with his friend Nick Saban, the head coach of
Louisiana State University. Saban will explain how he approached a play or
situation at LSU, and Belichick will shake his head and
say, “That makes a lot of sense. Why didn’t I think of that?”
It’s
hard to find something that irritates him more than a lack of preparation and
thought. When potential free agents arrive in Foxboro, one of the first things
they’re shown is the computer system. They are told that the video guys—Jimmy
Dee, Fernando Neto, and Steve Scarnecchia—are on the second floor. They are
reminded that they can better understand their responsibilities simply by
walking up a flight of stairs or clicking a mouse. Jimmy Dee is used to
cornerbacks asking for tapes on wide receivers and safeties asking for
breakdowns on tight ends.
There are actually written tests—no
multiple-choice here—in which players show their position coaches that they
have grasped the key points of the week. Prior to the Green Bay game, the
quarterbacks were given a
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