Belichick in WEEI’s Big Show 12/10/2007
My boy Tom Rock beat me to the punch breaking down Belichick’s Monday sitdown with Boston’s local sports radio station, WEEI. I was able to listen to about the last few minutes of the conversation on the ride home last night and then go through it later. I have outlined Belichick’s answers to WEEI’s Big Show (click on Patriots’ Monday or The Big Show), then my thoughts below Belichick’s on the topics. You can listen to the interview here.
It’s a great interview and I pretty much listen to it every week, a great chance to hear Belichick outside of his normal persona you are used to hearing.
The questions, answers and my thoughts after the jump.
… on the relationship …
Belichick: We’ve already talked about my relationship with Eric, the handshakes, what happened the first week of the season all that, so … We’re not going through that this week, were going to concentrate on the Jets and the game and all the other stuff … that’s the way it’s gonna be though, there’s going to be some short press conferences.
Bassett: We’ve been through this and re-hashed this many times. 20 years from now I would love to sit down with these two off the record and get the real story behind this relationship. I still maintain that Mangini took an opportunity presented to him, understanding full well what it would mean between him and Bill, and the incident in Week 1 was just the latest installment of how Mangini felt about his old boss all along.
… on the Jets …
Belichick: They’ve been in a lot of close games. We saw a lot of the Pittsburgh, Jet game. We saw a lot of that in getting ready for Pittsburgh, cause it was a recent game and some of the things they do offensively and defensively had application to what we do, so the Jets played very well against the Steelers, of course beating them in overtime. They’re great in the kicking game, they have a great returner in Washington, they’re a good field position team and they’re running the ball well with Jones, but a very complex blitz package we’ve got to get ready for and they came up here and got us last year, so I think we have a lot of respect for what the Jets are capable of doing.
Bassett: This is classic Belichick, praise the team and overstate what they do well. There’s no reason to give the other team any unecessary fodder by slighting anyone. Even if they don’t do it well *cough run the ball cough* say they do.
… what Clemens brings to the Jets …
Belichick: Athletic guy, good arm, I think he’s got all the skill … you know … we really didn’t see much of Clemens cause he played just bit after our game. We saw him prior to the Buffalo game because Pennington got hurt. Even though he finished our game he missed the next week or whatever it was .. part of the next week … Clemens had a real good preseason. Again athletic guy with a strong arm, smart kid, has good poise back there and uh … certainly he’s been capable of running it they must have a lot of confidence in him, we know how good Pennington is … Pennington took them to the playoffs last year and I think Pennington is an outstanding Quarterback, I really do. So for them to feel that confident in Clemens they must really like a lot of what Clemens did.
Bassett: I’m tempted to think the same as Rock does on his blog… is this some sort of overture to Pennington? But no, I don’t think Penny would go to New England at least this coming year, as he still wants to be a starter, so going to NE would be resigning himself to the same fate he’d face by staying in New York. For Belichick to use the word “outstanding” is odd. To me, it seems an abnormal word from his lexicon when talking about opponents, so I do think his respect for Pennington is heartfelt. All the same, it was a great opportunity to drive a wedge further in the relationship between Pennington and the Jets, so why not take the opportunity to weaken your opponent, even if it is for next year’s gain? Isn’t that what Mangini did with the cameras? So all in all, a heartfelt complement from Belichick with alterior motives.
… on masking blitzes and the frequency of the blitz …
Belichick: Right up there with [Pittsburgh around 90%] … right up there with them. Certainly if they can get you on the run with it, they can keep coming, they have a lot of different blitzes … they blitz the secondary guys, they blitz the linebackers. And as you said, they move and stem around a lot. It’s a hard system to get ready for and we’ll need to focus in on that, and it takes just one bad play and you get a stripsack of a ball tipped and run back for a touchdown or something like that so it’s those kind of plays that beat you. We are going to have to do a really good job of offensively taking care of the ball and be sure we get them all accounted for.
Bassett: I must say that I am surprised that they blitz close to that much, but I’m going to trust Belichick’s staff on those figures to my own staff of one. I think mixing up the pressure has been better for the Jets in the second half of the season, and I like seeing Ellis standing up and rushing in the “big” package, but to me it’s an indication that they think Hobson isn’t a long term solution outside, just like Robertson isn’t a long-term solution inside. So we’d better see some moves to adequately address it in the offseason.
11 Responses to Belichick in WEEI’s Big Show 12/10/2007
-
Michael says:
The blitzing comment doesn’t surprise me. First, in a 3-4, you have to blitz at least one LB to get the usual four men rushing. The difference is where he’s coming from. I bet if you adjusted the numbers to 5 or more blitzing, the percentage would drop considerably, though still be near the top of the league (Sounds like something FO would do). Second, our defensive line just isn’t that good at generating a pass rush. We have to blitz.
-
jeff i says:
bassett – there’s no magic formula to the relationship — i think the choronology of events speaks for itself/provides the answer.
the locking him out of his office stuff when he heard he was considering the jets’ job wasn’t spiteful, it was business, realizing that mangini might want to bring “patriot” property with him — it makes sense and anyone in belichik’s position who cares about winning and maintaining an edge would have done the same. while he obviously didn’t want mangini to leave, nor to the jets, he manned up in the end. go back and read belichik’s quotes when mangini was hired. they were glowing and sincere.
the “bad blood” started when mangini tried to get some coaches to come with him and hit full boil when tangini “tampered” with branch.
everyone faults mangini for not saying anything when he speaks. i disagree. you need to read in between the lines with him. whenever people try to bring up situations with belichik and how he may have been disloyal, etc…, mangini’s response is something to the effect of the fact he is focused on the jets now…this translates to the fact that he’s not allowing any personal respect or gratitude for belichik enter into his professional decision making process. belichik however, appears like he wants this type of respect from his coaching tree…it’s likely an insecurity thing on his part bc he sees the deference people pay to parcells and wants the same.
that’s what makes spygate so interesting. it was mangini upping the ante. you can look at it two ways — here’s a guy who sold out his old boss. or….here’s a guy who is trying to create every advantage possible/eliminate every disadvantage for his team. mangini isn’t stupid. he waited for the right opportunity/a flagrant violation that could have been discerned by any coach (even one without inside knowledge). this whole “mangini knew it was going on thing, therefore he’s a rat” is BS. i mean, when the pats film guy is pointing a camera at our defensive coaches, it doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. in fact, i’m willing to bet it was his security guy who pointed it out and mangini acted on it under that umbrella.
i personally don’t like a lot of things manginig has done this year but the spygate thing is totally misunderstood in my opinion.
-
TR says:
Thanks for this and all the cyber shout-outs!
-
Bob says:
J.E.T.S. rats, rats, rats…!
-
SackDance99 says:
The irony of Belichick feeling betrayed by Mangini is that Parcells felt betrayed by Belichick when he left as “HC of NYJ.” Remember Belichick was the NYJ coach before Parcells, who was supposed to be just a consultant until his Pats contract expired. Tagliabue stepped in and the rest is history. Belichick was paid very well as the defensive coordinator, groomed as Parcells’ replacement and stabbed Parcells in the back when he went to his nemesis’ team. And, Mangini’s betrayal is nothing like Belichick’s. Belichick may hate the Jets, but it’s not the same organization that was around when he was here. Belichick specifically went to coach for a guy Parcells hated, Bob Kraft. So, what goes around, comes around.
-
keith says:
All Bill Belicheat was doing when he was praising Chad,was trying to make everyone(including the jets) think that the JETS made a bad decision in making the switch to Kellen.Which is absolutely NOT the case.What it does do is raise Chads trade value which only helps us in the long run!
-
TOON2388 says:
The bottom line is that NE broke the rules and the JETS did their duty and reported them. The NFL should seriously inquire why GB & Det did not last season when they had evidence that NE broke rules. Belichick is a great coach who tarnished his himself forever by cheating as his teams squeaked 3 SBs by a FG and may or may not have illegal help to do so. And even if they go 19-0, with the tapes turned over, 2007 is tarnished as well, simply because if the guy if such a genius, are we supposed to believe he FORGOT everything on the tapes?
Amazes me how this has been turned around to make Mangini & the JETS look bad.
-
Jeff says:
I believe that Belichicks comment about Pennington is heartfelt. He knows that Chad has suffered much through injury and anguish since entering the league and he has never been knocked of his feet. Belichick knows that Chad like few QB’s in the league can run a complex offense well. There are very few smart QB’s in the league top 3 being Manning, Brady and Pennington. Except Pennington lacks the physical tools needed to excel as well as a top tier team.
Besides having a big arm Clemens hasn’t changed my opinion about how good he is. Until we see some consistency then I’ll change my opinion.
Belichick is a douche and to all those Pats fans that say they are the greatest thing ever. Remember Bill-B was the NYJ head coach and if he never left it would have been the 3-time SB champion Jets.
-
Jeff – I prefer our 1 clean title to the 3* NE titles – they can keep him – typical arrogant, pompous Massachusetts liberal who thinks he is superior to everyone – hopefully he rides shotgun wih Brady on his laptop in Ted Kennedy’s car very soon
-
Toon- nice Ted Kennedy line, nice!
Classic Par-Beli-gini, speak often but say nothing.