Breakfast with(out) Bill
Absence makes for one-sided table talk
PHOENIX — I sat down for breakfast yesterday with Bill Belichick. He seemed kind of distant.
He and his fellow coaches had come out west to join their bosses, as well as the straw bosses who run the NFL, for the annual league meetings. That’s where members of the rules committee annually conspire with commissioner Roger Goodell against the Patriots. Bill knows this better than the rest of us, but he was kind of mum on the subject.
When I went to charm school, one thing I was taught was the best way to get a conversation going is to break the ice with small talk. So I asked something I was sure a lot of people back in New England were wondering about since Super Bowl LI ended with Tom Brady’s jersey inside some Mexican editor’s sports coat.
“How come nobody stole your hoodie?” I asked.
Not wanting to cause an international incident by getting into a beef with Mexico over some dirty laundry, Bill thought it best not to comment. Who could blame him with a wall going up and all.
I did wonder what he might think the hoodie was worth on the black market if Brady’s soiled game jersey was valued at $500,000, but I didn’t ask. Why pry?
Instead I did it the way it’s done these days. I spoke to one of the FOBs instead, who insisted, “A dollar more than Brady’s!” Of course. Who would quarrel with a spokesman from a society more secretive than the Freemasons? Not me. Back to my oatmeal.
Breakfast at 6:45 a.m. is a tad early by sportswriter’s standards, but according to deeply held beliefs in New England, Bill usually would have had lunch by now as well as done hot yoga, a Zumba class, watched tape of 12 college seniors and every AFC East opponent’s games since 1971, balanced his salary cap, worked on variations of the Pythagorean theorem and taken 100 throws right-handed and 100 lefty with his Paul Rabil-model lacrosse stick. No wonder the guy was kind of quiet.
Our silent rendezvous yesterday was in a hotel where it costs $11 for a coffee, unless you want cream. Then it’s $17. That’ll put a damper on conversation, not to mention your appetite, so it was kind of quiet at the table. But the morning before, his boss, Bob Kraft, said he hoped Belichick coached until he was 80. I would have asked about that but Bill had kind of a faraway look.
When someone brought me a fruit plate, I noticed there was nothing on the table for Bill, including a name plate like the other 15 AFC coaches arrayed around the room had. I assumed the NFL figured, “It’s not like he’s invisible. Who doesn’t know Bill Belichick?”
Later in the day, the owners were going to vote on a rule change that would prevent what it called “the leaper” block attempt on a field goal or extra point. You remember that became Shea McClellin’s specialty last season. He looked like Edwin Moses hurdling the line and slapping down kicks so New Englanders knew this was now a conspiracy to stop the Patriots. It seemed logical to ask Bill if he believed the Philadelphia Eagles offered that change just to hurt his team.
The competition committee claimed it was an unsafe play. Well, isn’t running through the line more unsafe than jumping over it? I intended to ask about that but Bill’s mind was somewhere else. I understood. He was already hatching a plan to have McClellin roll under the blockers next year.
I didn’t want to ask why he decided to blow the bank on Stephon Gilmore for $14 million a year when he’s paid Malcolm Butler minimum wage his entire career because In Bill I Trust, but I have to admit the last time I saw Gilmore he was about 15 yards behind Chris Hogan. It makes you think, unless you’re a Patriots fan.
What was on my mind was if Bill was considering doing his hair like Gilmore’s in a kind of a bonding thing with the new guy? Sources say, you know. Then I realized with a hoodie that could get kind of bulky in the back. Bill seemed a little detached so why ask?
I did have one other thing on my mind though. Lately it seems there’s been a lot of pictures of Bill joking here and cutting up there, attending sports events and playing golf at Pebble Beach with Ricky Barnes. I was wondering what happened to “No days off!”
Then it hit me. Barnes’ dad once punted for the Patriots. Bill wasn’t taking a day off to play golf. He was working on special teams in disguise. “No days off! Now hand me my 60-degree wedge.”
It was kind of quiet at the table with just me and Bill and one bowl of oatmeal and it was getting late. In Gainesville, Fla., where the University of Florida was holding Pro Day, it was already 10 a.m. I had a few more questions but Bill had drifted away. I thought, poor guy is so tired he came to breakfast disguised as an empty chair, which up to that point I thought was a pretty clever way to keep things intimate.
Soon I learned otherwise. He was again a step ahead of his peers. He wasn’t here disguised as an empty chair. He was in Florida disguised as a scout studying Gators in Gainesville.
Judging by his record for drafting Gators from Gainesville, it seemed his time might have been better spent over a bran muffin. Of the eight Gators he’s drafted in 17 years, only Jeremy Mincey hasn’t been a bust. Only three remain in the NFL and none are in New England, unless you include Aaron Hernandez, whose uniform number is now W106228 not 81. Unlike when he was a tight end, whenever we see Aaron these days he’s covered . . . with prison tats and handcuffs.
Maybe avoiding Gainesville might have been wiser than avoiding breakfast, because there’s only so many mistakes you can make with an omelet, but there was no sense asking. Bill was gone.