Inside Pats’ week coaching up prospects
Players rave about Belichick's attention to detail
INDIANAPOLIS >> As a college senior, Georgia Tech linebacker Charlie Thomas figured he had played football long enough to know what to expect from a Patriots practice.
A punting drill is a punting drill. It didn’t matter if the coaches was preparing for the Super Bowl or leading a group of college players, as they did with Thomas and others last January in Las Vegas. The ball booms, the coverage players cover, the return team forms a return, and it’s on to the next drill unless the play is a total disaster. Well, he was wrong. During one practice at the East-West Shrine Bowl, an annual showcase for draft prospects where the Patriots coached one team for a full week, Bill Belichick stopped everything. He confronted the punting unit that had failed to execute to his standards. He forced both sides to run it again.
Everything else on the day’s schedule could wait. Thomas was stunned.
“He don’t play (around),” Thomas said.
Speaking Wednesday at the NFL Combine, several of the 70-plus prospects who played under Belichick and his assistants recounted similar stories about their experience at the Shrine Bowl. The Patriots coaches were demanding, blunt, sometimes brutal yet always effective in their messaging about what it took to play in the NFL. That experience, they added, has helped them navigate the draft process with draft day now less than two months away.
“It was very structured and disciplined. They’re straightforward,” Thomas said. “They’re going to tell you what you’re doing wrong, what you need to do to get better, and they’re going to be completely honest with you.”
On practice days, Patriots coaches ran morning meetings to install chapters of their pared-down playbook. On the field, players practiced before throngs of scouts, including twice in pads. Later, they returned to the classroom to review the film of practice and correct their mistakes. Everything about the Patriots’ plan had a purpose.
“They were with us pretty much 24/7. There wasn’t anybody standing back and letting things happen,” said N.C. State linebacker Isaiah Moore. “They were always coaching us, always talking to us, making sure we were doing things the right way. They were big sticklers about those things.”
“(Belichick) was coaching us and scouting on the field, just different than I’ve seen a head coach do,” Mississippi linebacker Tyrus Wheat told NESN.com. “Coaching everybody, the defense, offense, QBs, Dline, O-line. Just different.”
Of course, for Thomas, Moore, Wheat and Co., publicly praising a prospective employer is a wise move. Perhaps the only move. But Moore and Wheat have the Patriots’ respect already, as players the staff reportedly became “enamored with” at the Shrine Bowl. According to the NFL Network, the coaches couldn’t stop raving about Moore’s leadership, which shone through as a three-time captain who called signals in practice and the exhibition game.
Another player who impressed, Penn State defensive tackle PJ Mustipher, was named the Practice Player of the Week among defensive linemen, an honor bestowed by the coaches. Mustipher said he laid the foundation for his success in Las Vegas with Patriotlike preparation, firing up clips of their defense the week before he left for Las Vegas so he could familiarize himself with Belichick’s scheme.
His eyes were drawn to No. 92, defensive tackle Davon Godchaux, who routinely occupied offensive linemen and freed up his linebacker teammates to make plays. Mustipher, at 6-foot-4 and 315 pounds, carries a near identical build to Godchaux. In Las Vegas, the Patriots handed him the same tools and twogapping techniques during practices, and Mustipher thrived with some constructive criticism from Belichick.
“(He said) if you get the guard going away, play back into the tackle,” Mustipher said. “It wasn’t really anything crazy, but stuff like that, little pieces I can take and add into my game.”
Then, after his West Team won 12-3, all the practices, drills and meetings, Mustipher asked the Patriots for more.
“I appreciated the coaching staff while I was out there,” he said. “I told them I’d love to be reunited with them in May.”