End of the Belichick era? Dysfunction and Mailbag | Greg Bedard Patriots Podcast - video Dailymotion

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In the most recent episode of the Greg Bedard Patriots Podcast featuring Nick Cattles, Greg and Nick delve into the pressing question: Is this the end of the Belichick era in New England? They base their discussion around a story from the Boston Herald that highlights the team's current dysfunction. The episode also includes a segment from the BSJ Member Mailbag, where they address intriguing questions from listeners. Topics include whether Bill Belichick's post-Brady record and past controversies have impacted his chances of being a first-ballot Hall of Famer, the idea of hiring a GM to manage Belichick's responsibilities, and addressing the rumor about Belichick's intentions to retain Matt Patricia as the offensive coordinator for the current year.  Check Greg's Coverage out over at www.bostonsportsjournal.com, for $50 on BSJ's annual plan. Not only do you get top-notch analysis of all the Boston pro sports, but if you're a Patriots junkie — and if you're listening to this podcast, you are — then a membership at BSJ gives you access to a ton of video analysis Bedard does on the coaches film, and direct access to him in weekly chats.  This episode of the Greg Bedard Patriots Podcast w/ Nick Cattles is brought to you by:  Fanduel Sportsbook, the exclusive wagering parter of the CLNS Media NetworkRight now, NEW customers get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS with any winning FIVE DOLLAR MONEYLINE BET! So, visit https://FanDuel.com/BOSTON and kick off the NFL season. FanDuel, Official Partner of the NFL. 21+ and present in MA. Hope is here. First online real money wager only. $5 pregame moneyline wager required. First online real money wager only. $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets that expire 7 days after receipt. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. GamblingHelpLineMa.org or call (800)-327-5050 for 24/7 support. Play it smart from the start! GameSenseMA.com or call 1-800-GAM-1234.  Visit https://factormeals.com/BEDARD50 to get 50% off your first box! Factor is America’s #1 Ready-To-Eat Meal Kit, can help you fuel up fast with ready-to-eat meals delivered straight to your door.

Transcript

00:00 But, you know, look, and this isn't just, this is from multiple sources over multiple

00:06 years over the last two years with this Patriots team.

00:10 I think I've been pretty clear that the coaching, specifically the assistant coaching, has not

00:18 been good enough.

00:20 It's been on film repeatedly.

00:22 Conversely, I point out that Demarcus Covington and Gerard Mayo at defensive line and linebackers

00:28 has done a really good job.

00:29 You could make the argument that Pellegrino at times has done a good job, you know, with

00:35 some of his guys.

00:37 But yeah, I just, I don't know if I caught wind of it that early, but would it surprise

00:42 me that that was happening?

00:44 No, because once you, once Bill O'Brien gets into the office and he starts working with

00:48 people and they're going over film and stuff like that, I don't think it takes long to

00:53 see that your co-workers maybe aren't up to snuff that you're used to.

00:58 Certainly, you know, if you look back to when Bill O'Brien was last here as Patriots offensive

01:02 coordinator, he had a pretty good staff around him.

01:06 And so, you know, for him, I bet you, you know, just think of it from that perspective,

01:12 Bill O'Brien from where he was to coming back in the door, he must have been like, what

01:17 the hell has happened around here?

01:18 This is not the offensive coaching staff that I left last time I was here, you know, some

01:23 12 years ago.

01:24 [Music]

01:32 We knew this was going to happen.

01:33 We knew we were going to have a lot to talk about this week, next week, the following

01:37 weeks with all of the stuff happening in New England with the Patriots.

01:41 We're going to get to all of it.

01:42 He's Greg Omnik, this episode brought to you by FanDuel, the exclusive wagering part of

01:46 the CNS Media Network.

01:48 Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 Moneyline bet.

01:54 All right, so before we get into the Andrew Callahan, Doug Kide story, Greg, let's just

02:00 start off with the big picture question, I think, of the day, of the week, and especially

02:05 the weekend.

02:08 Is this it for the Bill Belichick era?

02:10 What do you think?

02:11 Is it over Sunday, the last time we see Bill Belichick head coach of the New England Patriots?

02:18 I don't know how it's going to go down and the exact timing of it.

02:22 I know Mike Reese reported today that the Belichick and the owners are scheduled to

02:27 meet on Monday.

02:29 I know they've sort of had those quote unquote appointments in the past and Belichick hasn't

02:34 stuck to them.

02:36 But I think at the end of the day, I think Bill Belichick is no longer head coach of

02:42 the Patriots.

02:43 I think it's been this way for a while.

02:47 I think that the lack of pushback against the initial Tommy Kern report, I think that

02:59 the Crafts refusing to back Belichick, I mean, if they wanted to have Belichick back and

03:05 were dead set on that, they easily could have done that.

03:07 They haven't done that.

03:08 I think that any half measures that they were thinking about, new GM, new sort of setup,

03:18 personnel, power for Bill, limiting his power, all that.

03:22 I think if you had any illusions about that, that that would be successful for the Patriots.

03:27 I think that the Herald story, if you needed further evidence, I think the Herald story

03:32 would have demolished that just in terms of how they got here, which is largely and we've

03:40 talked about it time and time again, that Bill's failures in personnel and with the

03:48 coaching staff and the front office have led to this, that it's all sort of snowballed

03:54 into this, into this, you know, whatever, 5-12 season.

03:58 So I think that the chances of Bill Belichick being the head coach, you know, for next season,

04:07 for 2024 being the Patriots head coach, I would put at about somewhere between 10 and

04:13 20%.

04:14 I don't completely rule it out, but I've been pretty decidedly in the camp that I think

04:21 this is it.

04:22 Yeah, I think he's gone.

04:25 I think Sunday will be the last time we see Belichick as the head coach of this program

04:29 and the GM of this franchise.

04:32 And you know, I tweeted out earlier today, you can follow me on Twitter at NickCRadio.

04:39 The only reason that you could possibly come up with as far as keeping Belichick here,

04:45 aside from the Tom Brady years, because nobody's debating the Tom Brady years, but when you

04:49 look at his recent track record, the only reason to keep him is because of the defense.

04:53 And unfortunately for him, the other two phases have been terrible under his watch for several

05:00 years now.

05:01 We've gone through the draft record, Greg, we've gone through a lot of the free agency

05:04 stuff.

05:05 We've gone through the conservative fourth down decision-making, all of those things.

05:09 One last thing I would say, because I hear a lot from a lot of fans.

05:15 I do think the majority, if not vast majority, are ready for Bill to go.

05:19 But there are those fans that keep pushing back.

05:22 And here's what I would say to them, to the, what if he could be just head coach and not

05:26 GM?

05:27 What if he could be head coach, but let Bill O'Brien run the offense, let somebody else

05:32 run the personnel?

05:34 If you're trying too hard to make it work, it should tell you it's not going to work.

05:39 It's like a relationship.

05:40 Like at a certain point, if you're trying over and over and over and over again, coming

05:45 up with new ideas and date nights and this and that, and it still just doesn't feel right,

05:50 it's probably time to cut the cord.

05:52 And when you're working too hard on some kind of grandiose plan to make Bill Belichick work

05:58 here in New England, that should tell you that Bill Belichick no longer works here in

06:02 New England.

06:03 All right, let's jump to the Herald story.

06:05 Andrew Callahan, Doug Kite, some great work there.

06:07 Now, we've hit a lot of this on prior podcasts, Greg.

06:11 We've talked about the offensive staff and the fact that O'Brien hasn't really had a

06:16 lot of say in that, if any.

06:18 We've talked about Adrian Clem.

06:20 You were the first guy, first reporter that I saw really kind of talk about Clem and some

06:25 of the history of Clem and not everything worked out for him where he had been prior.

06:31 We've talked about the offensive personnel, but there are some questions from this story

06:35 I wanted to ask you.

06:38 So Callahan and Kite, they write that Belichick pretty much would only allow Bill O'Brien

06:46 to bring in one assistant, which is Will Lawning, the tight ends coach, which we've talked about

06:51 before.

06:52 Nick Caley left and Lawning came in.

06:55 And then later on in the story, they write that they couldn't necessarily confirm that

07:03 O'Brien wanted to absolutely have his own staff.

07:07 What is your understanding as far as the offensive staff for Bill O'Brien, his frustration levels,

07:15 and whether or not he wanted it to happen, and Belichick said, and not going to happen

07:20 on my watch?

07:21 Yeah, the composition of the offensive coaching staff, Nick, I mean, I think, you know, it's

07:26 something that I've openly questioned the entire time, even going back to the "searches"

07:36 for an offensive coordinator, offensive line coach.

07:40 It was all bullcrap, ringer, like, you know, Bill's special stuff.

07:47 So you know, what I understand is that, you know, just knowing Bill O'Brien and how he

07:54 does things, and he's very much like, you know, he's rank and file, chain of command

08:00 type thing.

08:03 I think that he was hoping to get the opportunity to compose his own offensive staff, but he

08:13 was never going to dictate that.

08:16 That was only going to come from Bill, and from, you know, from the looks of it, and

08:20 from what I understand, Bill was never going to do that.

08:26 It was enough that he, and again, I do think that Bill, at the end of last season, I think

08:33 that he had the intention of going forward, because he doesn't think he does anything

08:38 wrong, that he was going to go forward with Matt Patricia and Joe Judge, but the Crafts

08:44 basically mandated it.

08:46 That like, you know, "Look, Bill, you can't do this."

08:48 And I think he gave that to them.

08:50 He was like, he gave that to them.

08:52 That, okay, fine, fine.

08:53 We can bring Billy O'Brien on board or whatever, but that's as far as he was going to go.

08:58 And so, from what I understand, like, I think Bill O'Brien would have liked to hire his

09:07 own staff, but that was never dictated.

09:12 He was never going to speak up about it.

09:15 Bill Belichick just never gave him the option to do that.

09:21 The Matt Patricia stuff, you know, I actually talked about the Herald story, because everybody's

09:25 talking about it today.

09:26 On my solo podcast, Nick Cattleshaw YouTube channel, you can check it out.

09:31 But some people pushed back on this and saying, "Yeah, but Nick, I mean..."

09:35 And it wasn't a lot of people, but there were a few.

09:37 "Yeah, but Nick, the offense was better last year than it was this year.

09:40 So, you know, maybe Bill wasn't so stupid for wanting to bring Patricia back."

09:45 I would say to those people, you're too focused on the tree in front of you and not the entire

09:48 forest.

09:50 The idea is that the offense sucked last year and it sucked this year.

09:54 So coming off of a season where the offensive system and scheme was a mess and so many things

10:01 went wrong, the problem here is not that Belichick went to O'Brien, even though that is a problem,

10:07 which I'll talk about in a second.

10:09 But the first problem is that Belichick looked at the offense last year and was like, "Nah,

10:15 we can run this back.

10:17 We'll figure it out."

10:18 Didn't think about anything else.

10:22 It was good enough for him.

10:24 And I asked those people, "Was it good enough for you?"

10:26 The second part of it is that he went out and they went and hired O'Brien.

10:33 And this goes into what Greg has talked about ad nauseum.

10:35 And we've discussed this for the last several years.

10:39 Belichick's circle of trust.

10:41 He is unwilling to leave a certain circle of people.

10:46 He's not going to bring somebody from the outside in.

10:50 He doesn't trust that.

10:51 He's not going to bring in these new ideas.

10:54 And when he does bring in new ideas, like he did with the offense last year, he forces

10:59 a non-offensive coach to try to install a new scheme and program or at least tweak it,

11:04 which is just the inability, Greg, of change and accepting change and embracing change.

11:11 Right.

11:12 Yeah.

11:13 And, you know, their pushback on the offense, like, "Okay, so this year is worse."

11:17 So it's like, "All right, well, I was 350 pounds last year, but I'm 400 pounds this

11:25 year."

11:26 Like, you were still fat the year before.

11:28 You're just more fat now.

11:30 I mean, like, you know, it's like, no, like, you know, tell me you're a Bilbo without telling

11:39 me you're a Bilbo when you say something like that.

11:41 The offense, it wasn't about, it's not about the production.

11:46 It's not about like, you know, that they blew out a few teams and stuff like that.

11:50 Like it's just about like it wasn't functional.

11:53 It wasn't functional with, you know, Matt Patricia, with Joe Judge as the quarterback's

11:57 coach that Matt Patricia was acting as the offensive line coach.

12:02 It just it wasn't functional that Matt Patricia was installing a Kyle Shanahan offense and

12:06 had no clue how to run the offense.

12:09 Like, you know, could it have been better this year if they stuck with it?

12:12 Yeah.

12:13 But it wasn't going to be good enough at the end of the day.

12:15 It wasn't going to make a difference in their win loss record.

12:19 So that's the point.

12:21 You know, when you talk about, you know, not seeing the forest through the trees, you know,

12:24 I think that's exactly your point that it, you know, yeah, it might've been better.

12:28 That doesn't mean it's good or good enough to have a successful NFL team in today's today's

12:33 league.

12:34 So I totally agree with you.

12:36 It didn't mean that Matt Patricia deserved the job off of what he did last year.

12:40 Like that, that's moving the goalposts.

12:42 You're now bringing Bill O'Brien into the conversation.

12:44 The point is he should have wanted to move on from Matt Patricia, no matter where he

12:48 went to after that, it should have been obvious that didn't work out.

12:52 All right.

12:53 There's a story, an anecdote within the Herald today, again, from Andrew Callahan and Doug

12:57 Codd want to give those guys credit about an argument between Adrian Clem and Matt grow.

13:04 And apparently this argument got pretty loud.

13:07 I think the term that was used was that it sent reverberations throughout the organization.

13:13 Any Intel, any information, any thoughts on this reported argument between Clem and grow?

13:21 So I asked a couple of team sources about a couple of things like, you know, look, I

13:27 think, you know, these guys did a really nice job putting things together, sort of, um,

13:33 fleshing out details.

13:34 Um, you know, but there wasn't largely anything that to me was new.

13:40 So, and I don't read everybody and I've said a lot, I've read, I've written a lot.

13:46 Like sometimes I forget what I've said or what I've heard and what other people have

13:49 reported.

13:50 So I sort of am, am, uh, relying on, uh, Nick C radio, who is a media connoisseur and you

13:57 know, who, who shoots it straight and is, uh, you know, independent.

14:01 So, you know, if Nick says, you know, this stuck out to me as new or, you know, I hadn't

14:07 really heard this before, like, you know, I, I definitely like relying on Nick to do

14:12 that, but so I've asked it, there were two things that stuck out to me that I didn't

14:17 know.

14:18 Um, because I think, you know, the overarching things was the, the dysfunction in the offensive

14:23 coaching staff and the offensive personnel, right?

14:26 This is stuff we've talked about all year, even before the year started, you know, going

14:30 back all the way to the Adrian Clem firing.

14:33 But there was that anecdote about, uh, Clem and macro.

14:39 And then there was another one about Bill O'Brien and how the, the Patriots weren't

14:45 doing positional meetings as much, or certainly it was a, it was a weird detail where they

14:50 said not as much as Belichick and Patricia did last year.

14:54 So that's the bar like that's you're, so you're saying last year was normal.

15:00 This is abnormal.

15:01 So, but so on the Clem grow thing, I asked somebody who would know who sort of walks

15:09 in those circles.

15:11 And he said, and he said, if that happened, it's new, it's news to me that he didn't know

15:16 that.

15:17 I mean that he didn't know anything about it.

15:20 So if that happened, I don't know where it happened and that it reverberated.

15:24 This person would know another person on the O'Brien and actually two people on the O'Brien

15:28 positional meeting as a group anecdote.

15:34 One person sort of rolled their eyes at it, that it's, you know, it's, it's not really

15:39 that unusual.

15:41 Another person said, and I'm just calling it up right now.

15:46 So I can hold on one second while you call that up, let, let me point to what Callahan

15:50 and Kyde wrote in the Herald.

15:53 So here's what they said.

15:54 Here's that excerpt.

15:55 O'Brien also pulled the offense closer to him running more unit meetings, which involved

16:00 all offensive players than Belichick and Patricia had.

16:04 Consequently, positional meetings became scarce sources said, which limited individual time

16:10 shared between players and their position coaches.

16:13 Most everything flowed through O'Brien.

16:15 Okay.

16:16 So like I said, one source sort of rolled their eyes at that being like, that's not

16:22 that big a deal.

16:24 Another one said, I don't find it entirely out of normal for the offense to meet as a

16:28 unit in my opinion.

16:30 I also think this goes towards something that we've talked about the entire season about

16:39 the poor assistant coaching staff on offense.

16:42 And you can insinuate what I might've been saying along the lines, but look, the bottom

16:47 line is the, the assistant coaches on offense weren't good enough.

16:53 They haven't done a good enough job specifically on the offensive line and wide receivers.

16:58 And if this happened, that's just an indicator of that, that Bill O'Brien was just like,

17:05 what's the point in these guys meeting individually?

17:07 Because they're not being coached how I want them to be coached.

17:10 So I might as well do it directly.

17:11 But I do at the, at the end of the day, you know, positional meetings being scarce on

17:17 offense.

17:18 I don't know.

17:19 I kind of find that hard to believe.

17:20 Like, yeah, you know, but maybe they just did, maybe they just did film review as a

17:25 unit.

17:26 Normally the positional meetings are very heavy during the week on reviewing what happened

17:32 in the last game and sort of dialing down who they're going up against this game, what

17:36 techniques to look for and stuff like that.

17:39 Could that have been done in a team setting instead of a individual, a unit setting?

17:46 Absolutely.

17:47 You know, but I think that would speak more to how Bill O'Brien felt about the coaches

17:52 under him, which included, you know, Vinny Sonseri who played defensive backs, Ross Douglas

17:58 who played defensive backs in college, Troy Brown, who we've talked about a lot on this

18:03 podcast, Adrian Clem and Billy Yates, who we've talked a lot about on this podcast.

18:07 And you know, in my opinion, Will Lawing, the tight ends coach, the one coach Bill O'Brien

18:11 got to, got to bring, I think you could say that the tight ends in terms of Hunter Henry

18:16 and Farrell Brown, again, Mike Gusecki is more of a wide receiver.

18:19 I think those have been two of the better players on offense and more consistent players

18:23 on offense all year.

18:24 I want to ask you about the timing of all of this because in the story Callahan and

18:30 Kyde, they write again that the Herald could not confirm whether O'Brien wanted to remake

18:36 the offensive staff.

18:37 Greg believes that O'Brien would have liked the opportunity to, but he wasn't going to

18:42 press on it.

18:43 But O'Brien's frustration with the wide receivers and offensive line coaches began bubbling

18:48 as soon as the late spring.

18:52 That's really early in the process.

18:54 Yeah.

18:55 Were you, did you, were you catching any wind of, of frustration from O'Brien towards the

19:01 staff that early?

19:02 The fact that we're talking late, we're not even talking about mandatory mini camp in

19:07 like June, late spring is, is really early in the process.

19:12 I'm trying to think back.

19:17 I don't know if I caught wind of it that early.

19:21 But you know, look you know, and this isn't just, this is from multiple sources over multiple

19:27 years over the last two years with, with this Patriots team.

19:31 You know, I think I've been pretty clear that the, the coaching is specifically the assistant

19:38 coaching has not been good enough.

19:41 It's been on film repeatedly.

19:44 You know, conversely, I point out that DeMarcus Covington and Gerard Mayo at defensive line

19:49 and linebackers has done a really good job.

19:51 You could make the argument that Pellegrino at times has done a good job you know, with

19:57 some of his guys.

19:58 But yeah, I just, I don't know if I caught wind of it that early, but would it surprise

20:03 me that that was happening?

20:05 No, because once you, once Bill O'Brien gets into the office and he starts working with

20:09 people and they're going over film and stuff like that, I don't think it takes long to

20:14 see that your coworkers maybe aren't up to snuff that you're used to.

20:19 Certainly, you know, if you look back to when Bill O'Brien was last year as Patriots offensive

20:23 coordinator had a pretty good staff around him.

20:27 And so, you know, for him, I bet you, you know, just think of it from that perspective,

20:33 Bill O'Brien from where he was to coming back in the door, he must've been like, what the

20:38 hell has happened around here?

20:40 This is not the offensive coaching staff that I left last time I was here, you know, some

20:45 12 years ago.

20:46 All right.

20:47 I have more questions and get more thoughts from Greg, but first let's take a quick break.

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21:25 All right, back to this Herald Story, Greg, from Andrew Callahan, Doug Kide.

21:35 You were mentioning the coaching and we were talking about the offensive coaching staff.

21:39 Adrian Clem obviously left the organization due to health reasons.

21:44 In the story, there's this idea of Ferentz stepping up and being almost a player's coach

21:52 to help out the offensive line.

21:55 Somewhat interesting.

22:00 Any thoughts on the possibility of Ferentz being called upon because apparently James

22:07 Ferentz was somebody who Billy Yates could depend on.

22:11 It says that he also met individually with rookies and assisted them on the sideline

22:16 during games.

22:17 Your thoughts on James Ferentz being a player's coach here?

22:23 My initial reaction is this stuff happened the year before.

22:28 Probably early on when Matt Patricia, if you remember, I'm trying to think back to exactly.

22:35 So in the preseason, because we talked about a lot going into Matt Patricia is going to

22:38 be offensive coordinator and offensive line coach.

22:41 We're like, how the hell is that going to work?

22:43 And I think if I remember correctly, Matt Patricia was in the coaching box early on,

22:48 like in the preseason, the first game or two, and then he was suddenly like on the sidelines

22:53 and Billy Yates was left coaching the offensive line, the in-game adjustments and stuff like

22:58 that.

22:59 And I distinctly remember in the preseason, David Andrews being heavily involved with

23:04 when he wasn't playing as a veteran, heavily involved in coaching those guys.

23:08 Ferentz was also involved.

23:10 So this has sort of been par for the course for them for the last two years.

23:16 And once Clem, you know, went on the shelf or however he has departed the team, and I

23:22 don't have anything directly to refute that this isn't a health issue.

23:29 You know, once he left and left Billy Yates by himself again, that, you know, and David

23:35 Andrews is kind of busy that James Ferentz, who's been around, who's comes from his, you

23:41 know, his dad's a coach, his brother's a coach, he's probably going to be a coach that he

23:46 sort of got involved with this sort of reminds me of Mayo at the end of his career when he

23:51 was remember when he was hurt his final season when they won the Super Bowl, he was hurt

23:56 and he was sort of an assistant coach.

23:58 This doesn't this doesn't surprise me.

24:01 It's been going on for a couple of years and it's nothing that overly alarms me.

24:05 It just goes to further illustrate, you know, how poorly this offensive coaching staff was

24:11 set up.

24:12 All right, one more anecdote from the story and then I'll ask you a couple of like big

24:17 picture questions coming out of this story.

24:20 Jack Jones, it seems like we might have solved the mystery.

24:24 We've solved the puzzle as far as why he was finally cut from the team.

24:30 According to the story, Callahan and Kite again, Boston Herald, Jack Jones was cut a

24:34 day after getting into a kerfuffle, an argument, a disagreement with Mike Pellegrino, cornerbacks,

24:41 defensive backs coach, who you mentioned earlier, Greg.

24:44 Apparently Jack was not happy that he did not start in Germany.

24:48 And at halftime of the game, he quote unquote blew up on Mike Pellegrino.

24:54 Belichick decided to cut Jones a day later.

24:57 Any info on that?

24:58 Any thoughts on that?

25:00 OK, I that was a new I did not know anything about that.

25:04 I knew that, you know, Jack Jones was not happy and pouting and being a problem behind

25:09 the scenes.

25:10 I didn't know that there was a confrontation with Pellegrino.

25:14 I haven't asked for confirmation on any of that because I really don't care because Jack

25:17 Jones isn't here anymore.

25:18 So you know, what do I care?

25:21 And I and I thought that the way he conducted himself, even aside from that, along with

25:25 the off field issues, he should have been long gone.

25:29 But you know, to me, it's not surprising, considering that he got suspended by the team

25:34 at the end of his rookie season, partly because he he blew up on Bill Belichick so that he

25:40 blew up on Mike Pellegrino does not surprise me.

25:42 I was going to say, I don't necessarily think that we needed a blowing up at halftime to

25:48 get out of get him out.

25:50 But you know, we got it anyway.

25:52 Apparently that that was that was the icing on the cake of the Jack Jones era.

25:56 All right.

25:57 So big picture question for you, Greg, coming out of this story, does this story to you

26:03 set a cleaner path towards the end of Bill Belichick?

26:09 I think you could make that case.

26:11 You know, similar to what I talked about earlier, like, you know, if you were, you know, basically

26:16 this, if you needed this to sort of illustrate to you how dysfunctional this organization

26:23 has become in recent years, you know, specifically with personnel choices like I like the antidote

26:31 in the story about they had a quote from somebody saying, like, you know, we don't draft an

26:37 offensive lineman until the fourth round and a receiver to the sixth round.

26:40 I'm like, wait a minute, was that source one of our podcasts or something like that?

26:45 Like immediately after the draft.

26:48 Here it is.

26:49 Quote, we didn't we didn't invest in the offensive line until the fourth round.

26:53 Didn't take a receiver until the sixth.

26:54 How do we spend the first three picks on defense when tackle was the biggest problem on the

26:58 team last year?

26:59 Unquote.

27:00 I'm pretty sure you could pull that from any Patriots fan who, you know, isn't a Bilbo

27:05 on Twitter sometime after the draft through this season, because, yeah, you know, I found

27:12 that funny.

27:13 But, you know, look, this I think the big picture thing is if you were if you were any

27:20 say you wanted Bill Belichick to be the head coach and just the head coach that, you know,

27:29 maybe he would, you know, if he would be willing to agree to an independent general manager

27:36 that say the craft said, all right, Bill O'Brien is now head coach offense.

27:39 He gets to hire all of assistant coaches and stuff like that.

27:44 You know, I just if you if you were under the illusions that that could work, that that

27:49 was a path forward for the Patriots.

27:52 I think this story should be a big spotlight for you to say that it's just not going to

27:57 work, that Bill Bill is going to do things his way.

28:03 And you know, even if he agrees to things, he's going to undermine them.

28:07 He's going to do half measures.

28:09 He agrees to Bill O'Brien, but doesn't let him hire his own assistant coaches.

28:14 The offensive personnel gets neglected while the defense gets boosted up like, you know,

28:21 I see no scenario where Bill Belichick could be just the head coach of this football team

28:30 and for that to be a winning sort of direction for the franchise.

28:34 All right, as far as the timing of the Belichick decision, you and I both think he's gone.

28:40 I think the vast majority of people believe he's gone now, but we weren't really sure

28:45 the timing of it all.

28:47 Like, yeah, there's going to be a meeting on Monday.

28:50 Could there be a firing on Monday afternoon, Monday night?

28:54 Was it going to drag into the next couple of weeks?

28:56 Do you think this story expedites that process?

29:01 No, I don't.

29:04 I think that the crafts were here all along.

29:06 I think they knew full well what was going on in the building.

29:09 I'm sure they've had conversations with Bill O'Brien.

29:12 I'm sure they've certainly had conversations with Gerard Mayo.

29:17 They've had other conversations with people front office, what have you, about what's

29:21 going on.

29:22 And so probably, you know, none of this is new to them.

29:26 It's just new to the general public.

29:29 And so, you know, if anything, if Kraft was wavering a little bit and was a little bit

29:36 more open to hearing from Bill about, you know, how maybe he goes in, like we've talked

29:42 about, that Bill goes in on the offensive and has an alternative for Robert, could this

29:48 story make him be like, yeah, that's not going to work?

29:52 Possibly, but I don't think this is new for them at all.

29:57 One last one for you.

29:58 If we go off of the premise that Bill Belichick was valued out there in the open market, does

30:08 this impact his reputation at all?

30:10 Does this impact his value on the open market?

30:15 I don't think so.

30:16 Maybe a little bit, but I think, you know, most people view this as, you know, Bill Belichick's

30:21 been here over 20 years.

30:24 Things got a little bit sideways.

30:25 Those things tend to happen.

30:28 You know, you would think that, I think I could see an owner saying like, you know,

30:33 just need a fresh start.

30:36 And you know, he just needs to start fresh.

30:38 There was too much sort of collective stuff built up, you know, personnel, what have you.

30:44 Fresh start, fresh set of eyes.

30:46 You know, I think he'll be fine.

30:48 That's the way I see it.

30:49 I lied.

30:50 I got one more.

30:52 Does the chaos described in this story, does it change in any way what you think should

30:58 happen next with the alignment and the head coach situation here in New England?

31:03 Well, aside from that, that Bill, that Bill can't have, can't be allowed to sort of put

31:12 things in place or agree to certain things.

31:15 I mean, I just think that, you know, look, I think it's imperative.

31:18 And I think we're going to talk about more in this a second that, you know, and we've

31:22 discussed it in the past, but to me, the problems with this team start with the talent on the

31:30 team, the lack of talent, the lack of balance between offense and defense and things like

31:36 that.

31:37 To me, you know, I am all about, I don't really care who the head coach is.

31:41 I want to get personnel right.

31:44 The Patriots have to be on the cutting edge of personnel in terms of, you know, not only

31:48 drafting but free agency, salary cap management to fit people underneath the cap and be creative

31:57 in that regard to analytics and all that stuff.

32:00 That's where my focus is.

32:02 And I would start with the general manager first, decide on who that's going to be, who

32:07 the best person is to bring this franchise forward into the present day in terms of,

32:12 you know, personnel and all that stuff.

32:14 And then I go from there on the head coach.

32:17 All right.

32:18 Speaking of head coach, Bella checks out the door.

32:23 That's what we both think is going to happen.

32:26 Candidates, candidates that you'd be looking at, Greg, we've heard that Robert Kraft has

32:30 been on the phone.

32:31 He's been calling, talking to people.

32:33 I'm going to ask you about candidates and who might be on your list.

32:37 But I want to ask you this first.

32:41 You and I have discussed Mike Vrabel a lot on this podcast lately, including the most

32:46 recent episode.

32:48 Vrabel came out yesterday and spoke to the media and he came out and said that he wants

32:53 to be in Tennessee.

32:56 Now, I know I came up with the conspiracy theory and I had my tinfoil hat on yesterday.

33:04 And I don't know if it's because of that.

33:06 And I'm just being a hard ass with the idea of the conspiracy theory.

33:12 I don't know if you agree with this, but I thought you could somewhat read into Vrabel's

33:17 comment because here was his comment in totality.

33:22 He was asked about it via Teresa Walker of the Associated Press.

33:26 He was asked if he wanted to stay and all the rumors and stuff.

33:29 Here's what Vrabel said, "Of course I want to be here."

33:34 That's the headline.

33:36 But the next sentence out of his mouth was, "Be here as long as we can win, as long as

33:45 we can do this thing, and it's been great."

33:49 To me, that's leaving the door open a little bit.

33:55 Of course I want to be here as long as we can get this right in the offseason.

33:59 Whether that's Rand Carthon and I can figure out what this vision is, if we go out and

34:05 get a quarterback.

34:07 I read that like Vrabel wanted to hear the plan.

34:11 Of course I want to be here, but we got to win.

34:15 I got to know that we can actually do this thing together.

34:19 Did you read anything out of what he said?

34:21 Do you think that changes anything that you've reported in the last several weeks?

34:29 My opinion on what he said, it was a whole bunch of nothing.

34:33 It was a complete non-answer.

34:34 He's still coaching the Titans in the last game.

34:41 He could just explain it away as, "Of course I want to be here.

34:46 I'm here this week.

34:47 I can't tell you about a month from now, but as of today, yeah, of course I want to be

34:51 here."

34:52 It was a word salad nonsense.

34:54 He didn't give anything definitive at all.

34:58 I think that when it comes to Vrabel, and again, let me also preface that I don't believe

35:08 anything these guys say.

35:09 They could say anything.

35:10 You have to remember, I was in the room when Nick Saban said, "I guess I got to say it,

35:16 I'm not going to be the next Alabama coach."

35:18 Guess what?

35:19 He was the next Alabama coach.

35:21 The dude straight up said it at the podium.

35:24 I was in the room and heard him say it.

35:28 I don't believe crap that comes out of people's mouth at the podium.

35:35 He gave a very politically correct answer and it was nothing that he can't go back from.

35:43 "Of course I want to be here if we have a chance to win."

35:46 Well, a week later, "Yeah, I didn't think we had a chance to win.

35:49 I didn't like the vision, so I'm going elsewhere."

35:52 No, I don't think it changes anything.

35:55 I think that Vrabel is in play.

35:57 I think that I'm sure the Titans have full intentions of him being back.

36:04 Could this just be a power play by Vrabel to get more money/more power?

36:09 Possibly.

36:10 But look, pro football talk, Mike Florio reported more about how sources around the league think

36:17 that he's in play for the Patriots.

36:20 I think that this is far from being over.

36:24 Am I saying that Vrabel's leaving the Titans?

36:27 No, anything could happen.

36:29 The Titans could offer him a crap load of money and he could stay and they could say,

36:35 "Look, Rand's here, but you have final authority now."

36:39 Anything could happen.

36:41 But I do think that Mike Vrabel is in play still, no matter what he said at the podium

36:45 the other day, which was a bunch of nonsense.

36:48 Any other candidates you want to throw out there and talk about right now?

36:53 Just to give you my list off the top of my head on people, and again, I think that the

36:58 Patriots should be, as soon as this is over, and just remember, just in case they are intent

37:04 on saying, just say for shits and giggles, that they are intent on Gerard Mayo being

37:10 the Ness head coach and say Elliott Wolfe being the next general manager of the Patriots

37:15 and both of them reporting to Robert Kraft, that sort of thing.

37:19 The Patriots still need to interview at least two minority candidates for each of those

37:25 positions before, even if Gerard Mayo is a minority candidate, they still have to do

37:30 that.

37:31 So there will be interviews.

37:32 And again, sort of what I wrote a few months ago about what the Krafts should be doing,

37:39 this is a, whether it's for now or down the line, this is a chance for intel, fact gathering.

37:46 I would be talking to the best and brightest at general manager and at head coach.

37:50 It doesn't hurt anything comparing Gerard Mayo to them, Elliott Wolfe to them, all that

37:56 stuff.

37:57 Maybe it comes back and they hire them, but I would be talking to the best and brightest

38:00 at both positions.

38:01 As far as head coaches, Rable tops my list.

38:05 I think he's a phenomenal game coach.

38:08 I think that he has made do with the least amount of talent year after year.

38:15 I think he's done a great job.

38:16 Is he perfect?

38:17 No.

38:18 I do think that he, I would want to ask him questions about his approach to offense.

38:26 You know, is, you know, a Derrick Henry run heavy offense.

38:29 Is that what he wants to run or was just that just the personality was given and he just

38:32 worked around it and did what any coach does.

38:35 This is what I have.

38:36 These are our strengths that I'm going to play to our strengths.

38:39 You know, I, you know, how did the quarterback decisions go down in Tennessee, Ryan Tannehill

38:45 to Tannehill extension, Levis Malik Willis, you know, all that stuff.

38:51 How did it happen?

38:52 What are your views?

38:54 You know, all that stuff.

38:56 You know, also, you know, Vrabel as a defensive head coach, I don't love that, but the chance

39:02 of pairing him with Bill O'Brien, if he would work under a guy who used to work for O'Brien

39:07 and sort of has, has shown an interest in being here for his family for a while, that

39:14 sort of alleviate some of the fears that I have about, you know, when you get to be a

39:18 defensive, when you get a defensive head coach like Vrabel, he's running these problems,

39:23 you know, whether it's LeFleur, Arthur Smith, he's had guys, Matt LeFleur was his offensive

39:30 coordinator for one year in Tennessee, and then he goes and be, and he's the Packers

39:33 head coach.

39:34 Arthur Smith was a year or two, then he's the Falcons head coach.

39:37 That's what happens when you get a defensive head coach.

39:40 But if a Bill O'Brien or Josh McDaniels would agree to, "Hey, here's a 10-year contract.

39:45 Be my offensive coordinator," they would agree to it.

39:48 That's a much better setup for me.

39:49 I just think Mike Vrabel has so much experience.

39:53 I think he's such a damn good coach and knows how to run a program that he's my number one

39:56 candidate.

39:57 I would definitely talk to Ben Johnson with the Lions.

40:00 Jim Harbaugh, I would talk to.

40:02 I'm a little bit leery of him because he sort of burns hot after about five years.

40:07 Brian Flores would certainly be on my list.

40:11 I think he did a lot of good things in Miami.

40:13 He would have to answer a lot of questions about Tua, his attitude towards offense.

40:18 But I'm curious what he learned under Mike Conlon in Pittsburgh, what he's learned under

40:22 Kevin O'Connell in Minnesota in terms of now he's seen how different operations run.

40:28 He has seen how a quarterback-friendly offense runs.

40:32 Who would he be bringing to be his offensive coordinator, stuff like that.

40:35 I would interview Bill O'Brien as a head coach.

40:38 I know a lot of people just can't, like you referred to earlier, recency biased, they're

40:44 just like, "Oh God, his offense, blah, blah, blah."

40:46 But the fact is the guy won, I think, four division titles with the Texans with crappy

40:51 talent.

40:53 What he did at Penn State, what he's learned, I would certainly be interested in talking

40:58 to him.

40:59 Bobby Slowick is the offensive coordinator with the Texans.

41:04 He came from Kyle Shanahan and the 49ers.

41:07 Is he ready?

41:09 When push comes to shove, I would rather go with an offensive guy because you know he's

41:13 going to be there with the quarterback and have a plan.

41:16 He did a great job with CJ, what's his name?

41:20 - Stroud.

41:21 - CJ Stroud in Houston.

41:24 You're going to have probably a first round draft pick coming in.

41:28 That's a bonus for him.

41:31 You pair a first round draft pick at quarterback with an offensive head coach who's already

41:35 made Stroud work in Houston.

41:37 That's very impressive.

41:39 Josh McDaniels, I would talk to as well.

41:42 Again, recency bias is going to have a certain reflection on that.

41:47 I still think he's a hell of a coach.

41:51 I know there are people out there who believe that a lot of what went wrong with the Raiders

41:57 was more of a symptom of Mark Davis' dysfunction.

42:00 You have to flesh that out, ask him about it, ask other people about it.

42:03 Then of course, Gerard Mayo.

42:05 I think he's going to be a head coach and a successful one one day.

42:09 Do I think he's ready yet?

42:11 No, I would want more time, but certainly he would be somebody that I would be interested

42:15 in talking to and lining him up with a bunch of other people.

42:21 - How much does experience play a role?

42:23 Because you just mentioned about Mayo, Sloic's been a play caller for one year in Houston.

42:28 If you're Robert Kraft, Greg, are you looking at this as, "I've got to get a guy in here

42:34 that's been at least a coordinator for a couple of years.

42:37 I can't put this situation with all of these questions and replacing Belichick and all

42:43 this stuff.

42:45 I think Bobby Sloic is going to be great."

42:47 And this isn't me, this is Kraft.

42:50 I think Sloic could end up being really good, but I'm not comfortable handing the keys to

42:55 a guy that's been an offensive coordinator for a year.

43:00 - I totally agree.

43:03 Given their track record of hiring Pete Carroll and hiring Bill Belichick, and we've been

43:06 over that, how they were successful defensive coordinators at multiple stops, also had experience

43:13 as head coaches, you would think that they would tilt in that direction.

43:19 I would be willing to take a chance on an offensive-minded head coach when you look

43:26 at the track record.

43:27 Yes, he's just one year as a coordinator, but that would be very similar to McVay, LaFleur.

43:37 A lot of these guys who came out of the Shanahan tree, I think also, I want to say the guy

43:43 in Cincinnati, Zach Taylor.

43:47 I think he's very similar.

43:49 This has been the MO.

43:52 I would be a little bit better about that.

43:54 The big thing, Nick, for me, and this goes more towards Mayo's candidacy, is again, I

44:03 have a hard time making the case for Girard, other than I think he has a bright future.

44:07 I know he's incredibly bright.

44:08 I know he's his own man and he knows how to lead a room, which is all key stuff.

44:15 He's impressive in a lot of ways, but you're talking about at the end of the day, you're

44:21 talking about a person who's only been at one Patriot place for his entire football

44:25 career, both as a player and a coach.

44:29 You'd be promoting somebody from an organization, from a team that just posted three losing

44:35 seasons in four years while he was one of the de facto defensive coordinators.

44:40 Granted, the defense has done fine and done its part.

44:44 He's never called defensive plays.

44:46 Yes, he's run the room, but you have to have some experience under fire calling something

44:53 in the heat of the moment, play clocks running down.

44:56 He doesn't do that.

44:57 He's just signaling substitutions.

45:00 Steve Belichick's the one who you would say has more experience doing that.

45:06 Basically, to go back to it, the track record of Bill Belichick's assistants becoming first-time

45:14 head coaches, knowing nothing other than what goes on at Patriot Place and watching Bill

45:19 Belichick, the track record just hasn't been very good.

45:24 I just have a hard case making it for Mayo.

45:26 I would be a little bit more okay with the offensive thing because I've seen it work

45:31 in other places.

45:32 One year as an offensive coordinator, not great, but it's worked in other places coming

45:38 out of the Shanahan tree.

45:39 Not sure if you mentioned him.

45:40 I didn't hear, but Mike McDaniel would be another one that's on the list of always

45:44 for one year and then made the jump from San Francisco.

45:47 He never called plays.

45:48 He never called plays.

45:52 I've heard people bring this up and I've heard people say, "Well, John Harbaugh, before he

45:56 got the Ravens job, was never a coordinator."

45:58 That's not true.

45:59 John Harbaugh was a special teams coordinator.

46:03 You talk to a lot of people around the league and they think that's the toughest job, well,

46:08 probably next to OC, but that it's a much tougher job than being a defensive coordinator

46:11 because you're dealing with guys going in and out and injuries and who am I going to

46:15 have and stuff like that.

46:16 He was widely respected as a great special teams coordinator with the Eagles.

46:22 I just wanted to correct that because I've heard that in a lot of places about how John

46:25 Harbaugh wasn't a coordinator.

46:27 That's not true.

46:28 He was a special teams coordinator and that is not something to sniff at.

46:32 Yeah.

46:33 What the 49ers do at Shanahan is they have a run game specialist, run game coordinator,

46:39 passing game coordinator.

46:41 That's how he sets it up.

46:42 Then he's the offensive coordinator who calls the actual plays.

46:46 When you look at Mike McDaniel, before McDaniel went to Miami, he was the run game coordinator

46:53 for a year.

46:54 Then he was the offensive coordinator and title, but again, Shanahan was calling the

46:58 plays.

46:59 Slowick was the offensive pass game specialist at first.

47:03 Then he became the offensive passing game coordinator.

47:06 That's why he made the leap to Houston because intelligently, he gets the opportunity to

47:10 call plays in Houston to take that next step in his professional journey so he can sell

47:16 a Robert Kraft on the idea, "Hey, I know what I'm doing."

47:19 By the way, Bobby Slowick looks like he's 15, so there is that.

47:22 Oh, really?

47:23 I don't even know what he looks like.

47:25 I'll have to Google him.

47:26 I have so many questions.

47:27 I feel like I could go three hours with you.

47:29 I'm not feeling it.

47:30 So does Matt LaFleur look about 15 too?

47:33 Oh my God, Bobby Slowick does look about 15.

47:35 He's getting ready for his high school prom.

47:38 Seriously.

47:39 Quickly on Gerard Mayo.

47:41 If Mayo gets bypassed, could you see him stay here and be upped to go into this idea of

47:51 coordinator a year of that experience?

47:53 Could you see him get the bump to defensive coordinator/assistant head coach with somebody

47:59 from outside the system?

48:02 Yes.

48:06 I mean, look, I think Gerard would be disappointed.

48:08 I think as we talked about in the last podcast, I think Gerard has a lot of confidence in

48:12 himself and has been angling for a head coaching job for a long time and thinks that this is

48:17 his coming up here.

48:19 And if he gets bypassed, I think there will be some hurt feelings and he'll certainly

48:24 get interviews to be a head coach elsewhere.

48:28 But I do think at the end of the day, I think the best thing for the Patriots and for Gerard

48:33 Mayo, and this look, this is my opinion and a lot of people are going to be against it,

48:37 but Mike Vrabel as head coach, Gerard Mayo as defensive coordinator, assuming Bill Belichick

48:44 goes and coaches elsewhere and takes Steve Belichick with him.

48:47 Gerard Mayo is assistant head coach/defensive coordinator.

48:51 He gets to run the whole shop, call all the plays, and Bill O'Brien as offensive coordinator.

48:57 To me, that's the best setup for success for the Patriots going forward.

49:02 Plus, maybe an Adam Peters or somebody like that as general manager.

49:07 Sign me up for that alignment.

49:09 One last one.

49:12 Defensive side, because we kind of started this journey talking about Bill Belichick

49:15 and I mentioned that really the only thing that you could look at over the last four

49:19 years post Brady that would lead you to keep Belichick as the defense.

49:24 Belichick, let's say Belichick's out, the little Belichick's follow behind, and Mayo

49:33 doesn't get the head coaching job.

49:34 He's like, screw you, I'm leaving New England.

49:36 I was the heir apparent.

49:38 You peed on my foot.

49:39 I'm out of here.

49:42 How about Demarcus Covington?

49:45 Any shot at defensive coordinator with him staying in town?

49:48 I think that the Kraus would probably push it.

49:51 By the way, while that's my dream alignment, if I am Gerard, and this is sort of the same

49:56 advice that I had for Steve Belichick going back a couple years, if I'm Gerard, I am going

50:02 someplace else outside of the Patriots system and I'm going to become defensive coordinator.

50:07 I think he should have done that already.

50:10 I think if he would have done that a few years ago, and I understand he's been here for a

50:14 long time, his family's here, his home's here, I understand all that and respect that.

50:20 The best thing for his career would have been going someplace else like a Kyle Shanahan

50:24 and proving himself elsewhere.

50:27 He might be the Patriots head coach right now if he would have done that, say, two or

50:30 three years ago.

50:33 I do think that...

50:35 Wait, so what was the question again?

50:37 I lost my train of thought.

50:38 Concerned about losing too much from the defense?

50:41 Could you see Demarcus Covington staying here to bring that continuity from this iteration

50:46 of the Patriots to the next one?

50:48 Yeah, if Gerard's not here and if that's not palpable for him, then I think that our palatable...

50:56 Palpable.

50:58 If that's not palatable for him, then I would love to see Demarcus Covington get a shot.

51:03 I think he's just done a tremendous job since he's been defensive line coach.

51:09 His unit's been arguably the best unit on this team going on multiple years.

51:16 I think he's done a great job.

51:17 So yeah, I would love to see that.

51:19 All right, check us out over at BSJ, 50 bucks for the year.

51:22 Bedard, Giardi, you know the whole team.

51:24 Check them out.

51:25 We're going to get to the pick for this week.

51:29 I don't think either of us are super excited about making a pick on this game.

51:33 Who gives a shit?

51:34 But I will remind you that this episode is brought to you by FanDuel, exclusive wagering

51:38 partner of the CLNS Media Network.

51:40 New customers receive 150 bucks in bonus bets with any winning $5 Moneyline bet.

51:47 Before I drop the line, I will update you.

51:51 Evan Lazar posts, Trent Brown, the lone Patriot player who didn't practice quote unquote illness.

51:58 I did the quote unquote.

52:00 Evan just put it in parentheses.

52:01 Miles Bryant was upgraded to limited.

52:05 Here are the limited players.

52:07 Get ready.

52:08 Farmore, Brown, Bryant, Henry, Jennings, Jonathan Jones, Devante Parker, Peppers, Slater, Tavai,

52:18 Wade.

52:19 Lots of limited dudes.

52:22 So that's the backdrop.

52:24 The line is Patriots minus a point and a half.

52:27 Greg, that's according to our friends at FanDuel.

52:29 The over-under is an explosive 30 and a half.

52:31 I tried not to laugh, but I couldn't help it.

52:35 30 and a half.

52:36 That's so terrible.

52:37 P shooters.

52:38 It's so bad.

52:39 It's embarrassing.

52:40 So we got Bailey Zappi on one side, Trevor Simeon on the other side.

52:51 What do you think, Greg?

52:53 I'm on cloud nine.

53:00 And not to mention, we're headed for a snowstorm.

53:04 Which could be hitting during the game.

53:08 I might come over, by the way.

53:09 If you don't go to the game, Greg, I might shack over your house because I'll probably

53:14 lose election within like three hours.

53:16 There you go.

53:17 Always welcome.

53:18 You know, look, I don't give a crap about this game.

53:22 Nobody gives a crap about this game.

53:23 I think, you know, everybody, I haven't looked too deeply into it, but it seems like just

53:27 about every team is just like, yeah, we can't team.

53:30 Screw it.

53:31 Like, you know, even the commanders aren't playing anybody.

53:35 And like, you know, as they sit in the number two seat, it's Belichick's last game.

53:42 You know, they're going to close with a five and twelve record.

53:45 By the way, we should mention that another parallel to Belichick's first season, along

53:49 with being this season being the worst record since then.

53:55 No Patriots Pro Bowl-ish for the first time since the year 2000.

54:00 Congratulations.

54:02 Which should tell you a lot.

54:05 Look, I think the Patriots are going to win.

54:07 The Jets stink.

54:08 Like, I think they're going to be even more cashed out than the Patriots.

54:13 So you know, whatever.

54:15 I mean, you know, probably watch them put up like 30 points or something like that.

54:19 And I can't tell you how I can't wait to see how excited Bailey Zappi is after this game

54:25 when they win 30 to 10 or something like that.

54:28 But yeah, I don't know.

54:30 It's Patriots 23, Jets nine, something like that.

54:36 It's week 18.

54:37 They got nothing to play for.

54:40 You know, records wise, guys get paid to do their job.

54:43 Coaches coach.

54:44 They're going to try to win the football game.

54:46 That's what they should do.

54:48 The fact that Jabril Peppers came back to practice today and he told the media, I'm

54:52 going to play on Sunday.

54:53 That should tell you everything you need to know about how this is going to be approached.

54:56 Peppers has been banged up for the last few weeks.

54:59 The guy has played his ass off all year long.

55:02 If there was one player who was going to get the Selah V week 18, get ready for your vacation

55:08 treatment.

55:09 It would have been Jabril Peppers.

55:11 So the fact that he's playing on Sunday, Belichick is going to war, baby.

55:16 He wants to bury the Jets.

55:19 He wants to murder them on television.

55:21 I can't imagine seeing Belichick and the Patriots losing this game.

55:25 And I know Zappi could throw four picks.

55:28 Crazy things can happen.

55:29 It might be a foot of snow.

55:30 I just, I'm not going to bet against the Patriots.

55:33 Final game of Belichick's career, likely in New England, his hatred of the Jets.

55:37 Everybody's going to play that can play.

55:39 I would say lay the points point and a half, take the under because I can't bet either

55:45 of these teams scoring more than 20 points.

55:47 So I take the under one more question, Greg.

55:52 How does it all end with Bill Belichick on Sunday?

55:55 Is there a standing ovation?

55:57 Is there any acknowledgement from the crafts in regards to maybe putting him up on the

56:04 scoreboard for, for, you know, as he walks off?

56:08 Is there, is there any indication from Belichick, you know, like, uh, I love to see him to,

56:15 you know, do the little, the little shooter McGavin out to the crowd.

56:21 I want Belichick to do something totally out of character, like rip his hoodie off and

56:24 just start like flexing and point to the crowd.

56:27 Is there, is there anything to the ending of Sunday's game that might surprise us or

56:34 we should expect?

56:36 So my, my prediction for how this ends up aside from a Patriots win, I don't think there

56:44 is any like longing shot on the video board.

56:48 I don't think the crafts do anything like that.

56:51 I think, um, I think Bill pretty much goes off the same way things as usual.

56:57 Um, I think he would be dead set against anything else if the crafts tried to do that.

57:02 I think, um, bears would kneecap some people if they tried to do anything.

57:08 Um, you know, but I do think that there will be, I think there will be a chant towards

57:13 the end of the game.

57:14 Um, like a thank you, Bill chant.

57:17 I think that will happen.

57:18 I think there will be a rousing standing ovation provided people actually go to the game and

57:22 stay for the end of this game and a snowstorm.

57:25 I think there will be an ovation to him going off the field.

57:29 Um, I do think that we will get a wave from Bill.

57:34 I think that we will get a wave.

57:36 I like it.

57:37 We'll get a little wave.

57:38 Maybe it could be like a Nixon, like the peace sign.

57:40 Like I could see him doing something like that, but I think there will be something,

57:45 uh, something along those lines, like a, like a, a very, uh, understated, like, sort of

57:51 like, you know, that sort of thing walking off.

57:54 That's, that's my prediction.

57:56 I want them to cue the Hulk Hogan intro music.

58:00 I want him to take the hoodie off and he's wearing red and yellow and he just, just rips

58:06 the shirt off snow behind him.

58:11 And he salutes everybody in the crowd.

58:13 People say, holy shit, was that a moment?

58:16 Never going to happen, but it would be a lot of fun.

58:20 We almost did an hour today.

58:21 I'm not feeling well.

58:22 Holy moly.

58:23 Yeah, I'm not feeling well.

58:24 You're powering through.

58:25 You're doing better than Trent Brown.

58:26 Yeah, that's right, baby.

58:28 That's right.

58:29 You're tougher than Trent.

58:30 Uh, if I can only get, Trent Brown illness, sick of football.

58:38 Yeah.

58:39 If I could only get paid like Trent.

58:41 Um, yeah.

58:43 So we did almost an hour.

58:45 Me not feeling well, a game that nobody cares about proves that Greg and I can talk for

58:50 an hour just about anything.

58:51 So that was proven today.

58:54 Hope you enjoyed it.

58:55 Stay safe during the weekend with the snow coming in.

58:58 We'll see how all of this ends.

59:00 I mean, uh, next week's episodes are certainly going to be fascinating to do whether he,

59:04 whether Belichick stays or goes until then be well.

59:07 It's a Greg Medard Patriots podcast with Nick Cavan.

59:09 We'll see you next week.

59:10 Thanks for watching.

59:11 We'll see you next week.

59:11 [Music]

59:21 [BLANK_AUDIO]

End of the Belichick era? Dysfunction and Mailbag | Greg Bedard Patriots Podcast

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