All Things Bill Belichick
     
 

Coffee With The Coach


 
 

WEEI
November 6, 2006

 
     
 

Bill Belichick joined The Big Show with hosts Glenn Ordway, Fred Smerlas, Steve DeOssie and Pete Sheppard during Patriots Monday on Boston's Sports Radio WEEI 850 AM.

GO: Back here on The Big Show, it is Patriots Monday live down here in Foxboro. It's time for Coffee With the Coach, and it's all brought to you by Dunkin' Donuts. Stop by Dunkin' Donuts today for a delicious coffee. America runs on Dunkin'. Time for the coach, Bill Belichick, to join us. Good afternoon, Coach. [Crosstalk] Dumped the red outfit, I see, and went back to the gray.

BB: Yeah, that's right.

GO: Good choice. Well, you've had an opportunity to look at the film today. Did you find anymore turnovers or INTs in that one?

BB: No, I think we saw them all last night. We just didn't play well enough to win. We had our opportunities, we just didn't get it done as a total team. Starting with me, all the way down through the staff, the players, it just wasn't good enough.

GO: Let's talk about the game plan, because people...we've talked a lot about it during the course of the day, and some people were saying you should have run more...and we've brought up the point about Bob Sanders the safety, very active, coming up on the run. Do you believe you took enough advantage of some of the stuff that they did out there defensively?

BB: I think we moved the ball...I think we had several real good drives. We had some turnovers, we didn't finish a couple of them. We just need to be a little more consistent.

FS: Did they do anything different? Normally [Tom] Brady reads the DBs and the safeties real well. One of the safeties, the first interception he had, it seemed the safety was just waiting in the end zone. Was it just a poor read on his part?

BB: I don't think they...no, they didn't do anything different, Fred. They changed up a little bit. They had their blitz zones, and a little bit of cover one, and two deep and three deep, roll weak and roll strong and all that, but that's what they do. So no, I don't think they did anything different. At times we had some real solid plays in all three phases of the game, and I thought we played well and played competitively right down to the last possession, but at other times it wasn't as good as it needs to be. We just have to do a better job. We have to prepare the team better and execute better and play better and coach better and do everything better.

FS: Well that's the big shocker. You had five turnovers and actually if you count the penalties that gave them first downs, those are basically turnovers – and you had the bad special team positioning, and after all that you get the ball at the end of the game with a chance to tie it. That was the most shocking part.

BB: Well, we certainly had more mistakes than we'd like to have, and I think you've covered most of them.

[Laughter]

GO: It did seem like those penalties came at just the worst moment. I mean, big third down situations, they were just killers, oh man.

BB: They sure did. Yes, they sure did. They kept them on the field, gave them more opportunities, and we lost some field position, so yes, it hurt us.

SD: At times when you've played against the Colts in the past, it seemed like you backed off of bringing people against Peyton Manning. Did you bring more people this game?

BB: Yes, I'd say we did, Steve. We brought quite a bit of four man rush and a decent amount of five man rush, mixing three man rush in there, tried to change up and keep them off balance a little bit. But I thought our defensive front at times got some real good pressure on them. They rushed well, they ran a couple gains well, and were able to flush the quarterback out or at least disrupt the timing of the passing game a little bit. Then there were times when we didn't do such a good job. But there were some times where we probably got a little bit more on them than we have in the past. It just felt like that was something we wanted to do get him out of his comfort zone.

FS: He made some extraordinary throws. One of the passes to [Marvin] Harrison in the corner, did you initially think to challenge that? Because it looked like no human being could make that catch – the one-handed catch. He brought it in and was bobbling it.

BB: I really couldn't see it very well, Fred, it was all the way on the other side of the field from me and down in the corner of the end zone. But the coaches upstairs got a pretty good look at it and they thought it was a catch. Which, after looking at it on tape, I think it was too. It was a good play. Harrison had a couple of them. He had a backshoulder throw there on the press coverage where Manning put the ball right in there. You know, look, they have a great quarterback, great skill receivers, a good passing game – they have the best passing game in the league so they're going to make some plays. I think the ones we'd like to have back are some of the ones that weren't highlight plays, they weren't the Play of the Week. We just need to play a little better and take those away.

SD: What adjustments did they make at the half, to address. Because it seemed like you were running the ball well in the first half. What defensive adjustments did the Colts make to stop your running game?

BB: I don't think they did a lot, Steve. I think it was probably more a case of they'd seen some of the plays, and a couple instances where we tried to change up the look, and then some cases where we came back to a play that was successful earlier, I think they might have been able to recognize it the second time and then play it a little bit better.

FS: The safety seemed to make plays. When they have a safety on first down make the initial hit in the backfield, they were committing to it. Did you notice the safety coming up in the second half more?

BB: No. Well I noticed him coming up, but that's what they did...they do that all the time. They play a lot of eight man fronts and they commit the safety down there really at linebacker level, so in effect it's a 4-3, but it's really like a 4-4 – there's an eighth guy down there. So you have one of two options on that: you can throw it on every down every time they come down there, or you can run it and deal with the eighth guy, which sometimes he was a factor but a lot of times he wasn't. We were able to still make good yardage even though they did have another guy down there. So that was kind of our feeling on the game, was not to be forced to throw the ball on every single down just because they brought a guy down in the front. We felt like we could still run it, and at times we did.

FS: Well that's kind of like feast or famine because I don't think their front could play a base defense that well. They need to commit more guys. Which, obviously, you could make a big play or you can blow it, because once they get past that front it could be a long run.

BB: Right. No, I think that's a good analysis of the game. I think that's a good analysis of the situation.

GO: Bill, the Rosevelt Colvin penalty for the late hit confused me. I know we've had conversations this year about the whistle and playing to the whistle. What am I missing here? Do you instruct the players to play till they hear that whistle, and what was he doing that was different than what [Raheem] Brock did earlier in the game when he stripped the ball loose from Corey [Dillon]?

BB: I don't know, Glenn. It's a judgment call by the officials and I can't really speak to what they saw or didn't see.

GO: Did anybody hear the whistle out there?

BB: Well again, I think that the way the rules are now, there is no more playing to the whistle; you play to the possession of the ball. Once the ball is clearly in a player's possession, and he's clearly down, then that's when the play is over. If the ball comes loose, the play's not dead. Even if the whistle's blown, it's still not dead. You've got to play to that final possession based on the new rule. I think there's still that judgment that if the official thinks that a player has come in late and unnecessarily, then that can be penalized. Now, what that is, that's at their discretion.

GO: Does it make it difficult for a player, though, to make that judgment of when the player...he may think the play's over but the referee may think the play's not over. How do you make that judgment? It seems to me to be too open-ended.

BB: Glenn, I couldn't agree with you more. I thought it was a bad rule when they put it in this year; I thought it was a bad rule from the beginning. I mean, the intent was to put it in with the idea of reversing a play like what happened in last year's Seattle-Giant playoff game, and it probably could do that. In the meantime, it opens up a can of worms in terms of every time the ball is out, doesn't matter when the whistle blew, it doesn't matter what the official signified, everybody's got to keep playing. There are a number of plays in, I won't say every game, but in a lot of games where the ball comes out late, some guys are playing it, some guys aren't...I just think it's a lot better when you go back to the old-fashioned way of playing it like we always did, you play to the whistle. When a whistle blows, the play's over. For better or for worse, it's over. Whether it's an inadvertent whistle or whatever it is, we know that signifies the end of the play. But that's no longer the case. The whistle doesn't really mean anything. As long as the ball's not definitely possessed by a player, the whistle really means nothing. That's the way the Competition Committee and the league want it, so that's the way it is. And we have to play by those rules. It doesn't really matter what we think.

FS: The key to it is in giving discretion to the ref. Too much discretion. It's black and white. The whistle blows and you stop the play. If a ref's got to think about it...

GO: This is all gray right here.

[Everybody agreeing.]

BB: Exactly. And I think that's exactly what's happening is the officials aren't blowing the whistle because they want to see whether or not the ball comes out at the end of the play. And if it does, then they're going to let it go.

GO: So how can you stop a player from trying to take it away? [Laughter] He wasn't hit, but he wasn't doing anything. [Crosstalk] It looked to me like he was trying to punch the ball.

BB: Well again, it doesn't matter what I think, it doesn't matter what you think, it's whatever the official thought that he saw.

GO: I think that you have more say than I do.

BB: No, I don't have any say. Really, I don't have any say at all. It's just a question of what they feel like happened on the play, and that's how they call it. What I tell the players, and what I firmly believe, is it doesn't matter what I think. What we have to do is understand the rule, and understand the interpretations, and then play to that set of restrictions. That's what we have to do. Now, whether we agree with it, disagree with it, like it, it doesn't make any difference, that's how we have to play.

FS: This would have been interesting: if he did run in and hit it, the ball came out, would they have given him a penalty for a late hit even though the whistle hadn't blown and the guy's still moving? So you get a fumble but it's nullified because of the [inaudible].

GO: Legitimate question, I think.

PS: One of the more animated I've seen you this year was, I think it was Asante Samuel, illegal touching...

BB: You know Pete, it didn't really have anything to do with the play. What I was talking to the officials about was the entire mechanics the procedure and their communication with the sideline. We talk about that before every game with each crew about how the mechanics work and how the communication works, and how...just keeping everybody understanding what's going on in the game. I felt like that was broken down. I didn't think it was followed so I was basically just trying to find out what was going on. I didn't know.

PS: Well that's because Al [Michaels] and John Madden were screaming, 'How can Belichick be arguing about this call?' And I said, and we were all saying, I don't think he's arguing about that it was pass interference. It's got to be something beyond that.

BB: No, it wasn't about...are you talking about the illegal contact call on Asante?

PS: Yes.

BB: No, I wasn't arguing about that. It was about the mechanics and the communication with the crew. Again, the stadium's sold out, it's loud, the other team throws a red flag or the referee makes an announcement about whatever, a taunting penalty being enforced on the kickoff or a red flag being thrown, unless somebody tells me what's happening...I can't hear those announcements, the play's 50 yards away. Those are the kind of things that need to be communicated to the sideline so that we understand what the situation is in the game.

FS: They called [Mike] Vrabel for illegal use of the hands. Was that the right guy? Because they showed the replay and he didn't look like he hit someone. Was there another guy they saw named Vrabel? Am I mistaken?

BB: No, I think they called it on Mike.

FS: Did he hit him in the face? Because we couldn't see it, that's the only thing. They replayed it...

PS: Bill can't say it but we can say it: it was a lousy call.

FS: No, because it showed him hitting, but it looked like he hit him in the chest. And Steve, in his infinite wisdom, said it must be called on someone else, because obviously he didn't hit him. We couldn't see the film.

BB: Right. I looked at that and it didn't look to me like there was anybody else that they really could have been calling so I just take it at face value. I think that they called Mike on it, and whether or not it was an infraction, again, it goes back to the whole five yard and illegal contact rule, and illegal chuck, is the guys that you have making those calls are 30, 35 yards behind the line of scrimmage. They're the ones that are trying to see where the contact...did they hit them in the face, was it at five yards, six yards? But again, those calls are being made a lot of times from...

FS: Bad angles.

BB: Right. Thirty yards behind the play. The two guys on the sideline each watch the outside receiver and the back judge watches the tight end or the inside receiver, so I know they have all those guys covered. But still, it's a tough call. Have they made a mistake on any of those calls? Yes, I'm sure they have, but it doesn't really make any difference. If they see it as a foul then it's a foul.

GO: Alright, one more call, the Troy Brown one. Because again, this seems to be a wide open, gray area. I can understand that you've got to get control of the game, you don't want guys throwing the ball, you don't want guys taunting. I understand that. They want to get that out of the game. On the other hand, this one didn't seem to be any of that. How does that rule read, exactly? What can you do and what can you not do?

BB: You cannot throw or flip the ball and have it hit an opponent, period, whether it's intentional or unintentional. Even if you have your back to your opponent and you flip the ball and you don't even know where it's going, if it hits the other player then that's considered taunting.

GO: Even though it also touched the right hand of the official there, as well?

BB: Yes. Here's the thing about officiating, Glenn. And I'm not saying it was a good call. I really didn't see the play. The play was over and I was communicating about the next play [so] I didn't really see what happened. But again, as an official I think when you try to judge intent, that's impossible. That the guy intended taunt, or intended to hit him or whatever you can't do that. It's got to be black or white. It's, 'Did he hit him below the knees or not hit him below the knees?' 'Did he throw the ball at the player?' 'Did it hit the player or not hit him?' 'Is he out of the pocket or not out of the pocket?' Not, 'Was he trying to?' You know what I mean? Intentional grounding. Was it? It's black and white. Is it rules infraction or not? Not, 'What was his intent?' And I think that's the way they try to write the rules so that it takes that out of it. Do I think Troy was trying to taunt on the play? Absolutely not. Did the ball technically hit the...I mean, that's a whole 'nuther one.

GO: I guess you've got to do it that way. I mean, we've all done this. Today we said, 'Well, we know Troy Brown. This is not his nature.' Well that's irrelevant. That shouldn't be part of the equation.

BB: Right. But at the same time, if he's trying to hand the ball to the official or the ball boy and it hits...

SD: And someone walks into the path of the football and then it's flipped...

BB: Let's just use a little common sense. But again, by the letter of the rule that's how the call was made. Let me put it that way. And again, intent's not part of the official's judgment, and I don't think it should be.

PS: I thought that one of the big turning points in the game was [Stephen] Gostkowski nails that nice 49-yard field goal and then you cause the fumble, you get the ball back, it looks like you're ready to go in again. It really seized the game. Get the momentum, then unfortunately he missed a 36-yard field goal. After that you get nothing out of it. Did you feel that was a huge turning point in the game?

BB: Sure, Pete, I thought there were a lot of opportunities there that we missed, whether it be the interception, the fumble, and then taking the ball and having it in scoring position and not getting any points out of it for one reason or another, whether it be a turnover, the missed field goal or whatever. They missed a couple of field goals and those gave us opportunities. So I think we had enough opportunities to win, I just don't think we capitalized on them well enough. That's really the story of the game.

FS: I don't think there was any turning point in the game. Because the game, even though you had all those miscues...

[Everybody talking at once about the interception.]

BB: It was a seven point game with...we got the ball on their, what, 40-yard line with a minute and a half to go. I mean, there was plenty of time and we had good field position.

FS: I didn't get a clear shot of that because I was doing handstands after you made the big play. Steve and I were behind the bench, hiding, so I didn't see where it hit him. And I went home late, obviously. [Kevin] Faulk, did it hit him high, the pass? I didn't see exactly.

BB: It was over his head, went off his hands. It was one of those that when you throw it, you wish you'd thrown it a little better; if you're catching it, you wish you would've made the catch.

PS: Because we've seen him make tougher catches than that before. He made a great one in the Minnesota game last week where he reached out and grabbed one. But a couple of unfortunate bounces in that game.

BB: Right. Well again, we just have to do a better job of taking advantage of our opportunities, and that's preparing the team, making the right coaching decisions, executing the plays, blocking, tackling, throwing, catching, covering, defending. We just have to do a better job from top to bottom.

FS: Because it didn't look like they did anything to surprise you. What they did was, Peyton Manning made some extraordinary plays. Third-and-20, he made that 44 yard pass to, was it [Marvin] Harrison, and [Dallas] Clark in the middle?

BB: Yes.

FS: The coverage looked like Rodney [Harrison] let him run a little bit behind him, but that was an extraordinary play while he's getting hit. You know, it's not like something you weren't prepared for. It just looked like he made some extraordinary personal attempts at Harrison.

BB: There's no question he's a good quarterback. He has great receivers, they have a good passing game, I mean, they're going to make some plays. And that's football. I think the hard thing is some of the plays that they made weren't hard, they were easy. And they were too easy. And then there were other times when we stopped them when we gave them another opportunity to put it back on the field. Offensively, I don't think that their turnovers were necessarily extraordinary plays, either. It's not like it was the American League Play of the Week. At times it was just plays not well-executed, for one reason or another, and they ended up with the ball – tipped balls and all that stuff, easy completions, too much easy yardage on kickoff returns. We just didn't make enough plays, and we gave up some that shouldn't have been what they were.

SD: Six-and-two now, halfway point of the season. I know you don't really evaluate the season till everything's all said and done but how do you judge your progress so far, and how do you look going into the second half of the season?

BB: Well, I think we've been competitive. We've lost two games to what I would say are two pretty good football teams. I think that we could have played better on both those days and I feel like we could have won either one of those games, but we didn't on that particular night so that's where we're at. I think that we're in position, but it will really depend on how we can play going forward. But I think we've put ourselves in a competitive position and that's good. You certainly want to be there at the halfway point; you don't want to be out of the race. One year at the Jets we were 1-6 and ended up going on a winning streak at the end of the season but it was just too late. We dug too big of a hole. But in any case, I think we're in position and we're competitive. We've got a big game this week against the Jets in the division and now we have to turn the page and move on. I think that we're in position to move on and play competitively in this league and in this division and in this conference.

SD: How do you gauge the progress of some of the new guys on your team? In particular, the wide receiving crew.

BB: Well, I think we're a lot better than we were four, five, or six weeks ago, no question about that. Certainly, there are a lot of things that we could do better, and I'm saying that collectively in the passing game, not just to a receiver, but just the execution and spacing and timing of the routes and so forth. So I think that there's still a lot of room to grow, but I think we've come a long way. We've shown that we can throw the ball and we can convert third downs, that we can hit passes in the red area where it's tight coverage, and we've beat man-to-man coverage. We just have to do it on a more consistent basis and defend it on a more consistent basis.

GO: Players on this team over the last few years have done a great job of being able to bury that last game, whether it's a big win or whether it's a frustrating loss, and come out and play well the next week. Why do you think they're so good at it?

BB: I don't know. We try to prepare for every game independent of what happened last week, last year, or what the records or anything are. Every game's a one-game season. You just try to understand what the opponents do, get a gameplan ready and go out there and execute it and do the best you can when you have an opportunity to play that week. So all the rest of it, we kind of take that out and just isolate and focus on the target. Like I said, it's a one-game season. All we're concentrating on is the one week and doing the best we can.

GO: Because in sports, a lot of times teams will go downhill after a loss or they go on a nice little ride, and this team, you look at it...

BB: Well, I'm not saying it doesn't affect us; I'd be naive to think that. But it's not something we talk about and it's certainly not anything we try to harp on or preach about or make a big deal out of. We try to make the corrections which there are always corrections to be made, win or lose and turn the page, get ready for the next team, and move on.

FS: Do these stick with you more though, ones that you gave away? Sometimes you don't get physically beaten up [you] just really gave this one away. That kind of burns your ass a little longer.

BB: Well, I think they're all hard. I think any time you lose it's hard. You replay the game in your mind over and over and over things you wish you could have done differently and things you'd like to take back, and things you, for whatever reason, wish had gone a little bit differently. But I think it's like that on any loss. And then you get to a certain point where you're done, you've mourned, you've had the funeral...

[Laughter among the hosts]

BB: It's time to bury it and move on and get on with the next game. That's the only choice. The good thing is that the last time we had five turnovers and lost in Denver, that was the end of the season. Well, we're not at that point today. So if we can learn from our mistakes and our performance yesterday as a team and move to higher ground and play better next week, then that's good. We didn't have that opportunity when we lost in Denver. That was it.

PS: Speaking of the Jets, after you guys beat them, with the exception of the Jacksonville game where they just totally got demolished, they've been pretty competitive over the last four weeks.

BB: They're very competitive, Pete. With Indianapolis and Cincinnati, this is another team with a real good quarterback and real good skill players at receiver. So we've seen that now several times. You're talking about Pro Bowl-type quarterbacks and receivers, whether it be Carson Palmer and [Chad] Johnson and [Chad] Pennington and [Laveranues] Coles and [Jerricho] Cotchery and Manning and Harrison and [Reggie] Wayne and those guys. It's that level of talent at skill positions with the Jets, and that will be a big challenge for us, no question about it. They've played very competitively. As you mentioned they had a tough day in Jacksonville, but other than that, they've...

PS: In the Indy game, I thought they had them beat. I thought they had them, and they kind of gave it away at the end. [Crosstalk] But that was a great game. They should have won that game.

BB: Yes, they played Indianapolis well. You know, they have an outstanding kickoff returner in Justin Miller. He's a big time threat. He ran one back for a hundred or whatever it was, 98 yards or whatever, in that game. So they're well-balanced in all three phases of the game. They're extremely talented in the passing game and the passing attack.

FS: The coach is a little young, though.

[Laughter among the hosts]

FS: Do you still have any? Because playing in the league, we always hated the Jets, because the Jets got all the credit. Not when you were their coach, I liked them.

[Laughter]

FS: But you know, you have that Miami, Buffalo thing. You see them all the time so it's...

BB: Sure.

FS: You never take them lightly because you've played them when they were good and you've played them when they were bad, so you always have that, you know, these are our main character-type guys. So you never really let their record play a part in how you approach them.

BB: Well, right. And of course especially with the Jets. We just played them a few weeks ago down there and [it was] the same type of thing – [on the] last possession they got a chance to come back and tie up the game. They ended that game with a lot of momentum. They came back from a big deficit and turned it back into a one-score game. [They] had the ball at the end of the game with somewhat of a chance to tie it and take it into overtime. So we have a lot of respect for the Jets. The Jets have a lot of talent – they're very talented on offense, they're very talented on defense, and they're very explosive in the kicking game. Don't forget, two years ago this was a team that was just a field goal away from the AFC Championship. So it's not a question of talent down there; there's plenty of that. They're playing hard, they're playing well, they've got a new scheme and a new system. They're adapting to it and we have to adapt to it in terms of defending it and attacking it. So this will be a big challenge for us this week. It's always tough in the AFC East. The Jets are a great rivalry and we'll have to be at our best this Sunday.

GO: A lot of times you hear that a team's had two weeks to prepare for a certain team, they're better prepared for that. They're coming off of a bye week. Do you ever concern yourself with that?

BB: Sure.

GO: And from the flip side is it not an advantage for you if, let's say, you've got a bye week and you've got two weeks to prepare?

BB: Well sure, of course it is. They have a big advantage on us this week. I mean, just think about it, Glenn, each team normally has seven days to prepare after the game's over on Sunday night. So the challenge from Monday or Tuesday, whichever day you want to say is your starting point, until let's say Sunday at kickoff, is which team is better prepared? And one team is better prepared than the other. I don't know which one it is, but one of them has to be better prepared than the other based on their film study, their meetings, their practice sessions and so forth. And then you go out there and play the game. So you can gain an edge on your opponent in those practice opportunities and meeting opportunities. Again, it's hard to measure, but hey, they have the same amount of time as you do; who is doing more with it? At this point the Jets are significantly ahead of us. They've had a lot of time to work on things in the bye week. They're better prepared and we have a lot of catching up to do.

GO: And resting their butts.

BB: Exactly. And right, being able to get a little more treatment and all that. When we were in that situation I know we felt the same way. If a team was playing on Sunday and we weren't, then we had a few days where we could get a jump on them. We knew come Monday morning we knew more about them than they knew about us at that point, [and] we'd want to try to keep that advantage as we went through the week.

FS: A Monday night game and a Sunday night game makes your Mondays that much shorter. You know, two in a row.

BB: Right. Well those schedules, with every long week's a short week and vice versa. We know that's the case. But it gives you an opportunity, if you have a little bit more preparation time, if you can utilize it efficiently and take advantage of it  that you can go into the game, hopefully, a little more better prepared than your opponent. Now that doesn't guarantee a win it doesn't guarantee anything but I think it does give you a preparation advantage and if you utilize it it could be worth something.

GO: Alright, Coach, here you go, the Eastern Mass. Volkswagen Dealers' Coach's Question of The Week: Coach, Brenden from North Quincy would like to know if you hadn't become a football coach what would have been your chosen profession.

[Laughter and crosstalk]

BB: I'd say be a lacrosse coach then.

GO: Really.

SD: That was your sport in high school at Andover?

BB: Right. And college, yes.

[Laughter and crosstalk]

BB: I grew up in a coaching family. I like the competition and I like competing on a regular basis.

[Crosstalk]

GO: There you go, the Eastern Mass. Volkswagen Dealers' Coach's Question of The Week. Brenden is now registered to win a trip for two to the pro football championship in Miami. Stop by your local Eastern Mass. Volkswagen dealer or logon to WEEI.com, submit a question for the Coach and register for a trip to the big game.

[Crosstalk]

GO: Good luck on Sunday, we'll see you back here on Monday.

[Thank yous and good byes]

GO: Bill Belichick, right here on The Big Show.

 
     
  Transcribed by the webmaster.