New England Patriots beat reporter lands one on head coach Bill Belichick
Here’s a pretty fun exchange from Bill Belichick’s press conference last Tuesday’s :
Q: Is Chad Jackson ready to practice today?
BB: He’s day-to-day
Q: So that means that he’s probably not ready to practice today.
BB [Sounding pretty irate]: It’s no different than any other of the day-to-day situations that we’ve talked about for the last five years. We go out to practice, we warm the players up, we see how they’re doing, and if they’re ready to go, then we put them out there, and if they are not, then we don’t. We haven’t practiced in three or four days, whatever it has been since the game, so we don’t do anything any differently than we’ve ever done it in the past in that phase. I can’t tell you how a guy feels four days from the last time he was out there. Once he gets out there, once anybody else gets out there, and we see how they’re doing, we start to put them through some of the preliminary stuff and if that’s going good, then you move them into the next phase. If it doesn’t, then you back off until you think they’re ready to go. It’s not any different than it’s been for the last six years.
Q: I was only asking it because you suggested that you thought that Nick Kaczur was going to be out there today so I thought maybe you’d know if Chad was going to be out there practicing.
BB [suddenly sounding like the reporter may have a point]: Because Nick has progressed to the point where, when we took him out there yesterday to do the things that we needed to do in order to take him off the PUP list, to get him out there, that those things went well. So based on that information, which is a little bit different than everybody else, and he’s in a different category than just about everybody else on this team, then that put him into a little bit of a different situation, which I guess I could’ve just sat here and said, ‘You know, we’ll wait and see how he is,’ because I’ll tell you the truth; if he goes out there today and doesn’t feel as good as what he would like to feel, then he wouldn’t practice either.
You really need to listen to the exchange to get the full flavor
More substantative is coach Belichick’s elaboration on nose tackle Vince Wilfork’s development and his role in the defense:
Q: What is Vince Wilfork doing better this year at the nose position than he was last year?
BB: I’d say the big thing is his reacting to the blocking schemes quicker. Nose is a tough position to play in our defense. You have two guards that are uncovered, and you’re on the center, so any one of those three guys can get to him and they can get to him pretty quick. There is nothing to stop the guards from coming down on him, it’s not like they have a guy lined up over them. Being able to react to all those different blocking schemes and believe me, the offense tries to make a lot of them look alike, so that one looks like the other, but it’s really not. The play is designed to go somewhere else. Or how they’re trying to influence the nose is different. It’s a tough position to play. There probably isn’t another position on the field - there certainly isn’t in our defense - where a guy can be attacked that quickly from as many different angles as the nose can.
So his ability to read those things, react to them quickly, be in the right spot and still play with strength and leverage and quickness - and not be caught off balance or caught either guessing or misreading the play - that’s really what a lot of that position is about. It’s having physical skills, but also being able to react almost instantaneously to what three guys - that far away from you - are doing. That includes in the passing game, too, because when they set up one guard or the other is usually going to involved in a slide protection, or some type of double team, and that’s pass rushing against double teams and working on which guy to attack and how to use leverage and all, there is a lot of skill there, there is a lot of mental reactions that have to be processed in a very, very short amount of time. That’s what experience at that position can provide a player, is his ability to react as quickly as those thing happen. There’s a lot going on.
I’d say that’s been Vince’s biggest step, but I would probably say that about any player who plays that position - up until they get to a certain point in their development - four, five, six, seven years - whatever it is - all the whole process up through there, they know what it is, but reacting to it quickly and being able to recognize the offenses attempt to disguise those things and to make them look the same - and then have to differentiate between them - it’s really hard. A team like Washington does a good job of that. That’s one of the things they’re really good at, several of their blocking schemes look on the first step, or even the first two steps, look exactly the same. But they’re totally different. It’s hard to differentiate them.
Coach Belichick also addressed the versatility factor in the context of Junior Seau joining the team:
Q: Is that an example of having versatility work to a player’s advantage?
BB: I think, ultimately, versatility is important, but being good at one thing is important too. We have some players on our team that can only do one thing, but in those cases they can usually do it pretty well and that’s what their niche is. Then there are other players that have more versatility and maybe aren’t strong in one specific area, but have the ability to do multiple assignments.
It’s probably safe to say that Wilfork will never play offensive line or nickle back, but he’ll still be valuable if he can jam the line of scrimmage on running plays.
