Patriot Reign

by Holley, Michael

• ISBN13: 9780060757946
• ISBN10: 0060757949
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-09-01
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publications

Summary

When Bill Belichick arrived in New England, the Patriots were a laughingstock, an organization with a losing record, spiraling morale, salary cap problems, and a bloated payroll filled with a who's who of underperforming players. Belichick was supposed to change all that. But there were many questions: Could he turn it around? Could he win without Bill Parcells? He is smart, certainly, some would say a genius, but could he inspire and motivate a team to win it all? After his mediocre run as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, and the strange end to his relationship with Parcells and the New York Jets, what kind of head coach could he be? Four years later, he has two Lombardi trophies in his hands, and the Patriots organization has become the gold standard in professional football. How did they do it? With unprecedented access granted by Belichick and his staff, author Michael Holley takes us deep inside the heart of a champion. A fly on the wall for two years, Holley captures Belichick at his most candid in team, coaches, and production meetings. What emerges is a portrait of a complicated man who is cerebral, yes, but also tough, demanding, stubborn, funny, profane, and a master strategist. With his brain trust -- Scott Pioli, Romeo Crennel, Charlie Weis, and Ernie Adams -- Belichick has imposed a winning system and painstakingly selected players who thrive in that system. Holley provides, for the first time, insights into how Belichick and his coaching Cabinet prepare for opponents, evaluate talent, run the draft, and how they design their offensive and defensive schemes. Readers will also learn the real stories behind the controversial Drew Bledsoe trade and the cutting of Lawyer Milloy, and how Belichick fought to keep the team together. Frank, uncompromising, and stunning, Patriot Reign is required reading for football fans who want to understand what makes a champion tick.

Author Biography

A former columnist for the Boston Globe, Michael Holley is one of the most respected voices in sports media. Holley gained national exposure on ESPN's Around the Horn and recently became a co-host of I, Max on Fox Sports. He divides his time between Boston and New York.

Table of Contents

Introduction	ix
1. The Art of the Game	1	(17)
2. The Foxboro Triangle: The Krafts, Parcells, and Belichick	18	(19)
3. Tom Brady and the Reconstruction	37	(17)
4. Dissecting the Greatest Show on Turf	54	(12)
5. Patriot Reign	66	(18)
6. Reversal of Fortune	84	(26)
7. Wait Till Last Year	110	(20)
8. Rookies and Replacements	130	(14)
9. Finding the Missing Pieces	144	(16)
10. The Meat Market	160	(13)
11. "They Hate Their Coach"	173	(16)
12. Belichick Versus Parcells	189	(19)
13. Patriot Reign Revisited	208	(25)
Epilogue	233	(6)
Acknowledgments	239

Excerpts

Patriot Reign
Bill Belichick, the Coaches, and the Players Who Built a Champion

Chapter One

The Art of the Game

Bill Belichick has moments that few people see orimagine, moments when he is no longer the premierstrategist of his profession. These are thetimes when he could be the guy in the next cubicle,any other father, husband, or son. Thesebreaks from brilliance make him a strongercoach. They remind him that briefly steppingaway from his football vision can actually allowhim to see more of it.

There are times when the diagrammed playson the erasable board in his office are for an audienceof two -- his sons, Stephen and Brian. Thereare times when the brainteasers he attempts tosolve are provided by members of his family, notby other coaches. "Do you know what 'discrete'means?" he said one day after a conversation with Brian. His younger son -- who attends Brookline's DexterSchool, John F. Kennedy's alma mater -- was studying vocabularywords. "Discrete" was one of them. "It's not thesame as 'discreet,' " Belichick said. "Brian's class is goingover words that have similar sounds with different meanings.That's a good one."

There was the time he tried to put on one of his favoritesweaters and could barely get it over his shoulders. Laundrymistake. He called his wife, Debby, to talk about it. Heheard a lot of laughter coming from the phone. "It's notfunny," he said with a smirk, even though he knew it was.

What most surprises people who don't know him is howmuch he enjoys a good laugh, usually when he's away fromwork and sometimes when he's at it. He earned a reputationfor giving bland descriptions during his press conferences,where his personality is the sacrifice to protectingthe goods. Press conferences are part of his game plans -- he prepares for them at least fifteen to twenty minutes perday -- so he is especially conscious of saying or implyinganything that will give an opponent an edge. By the time hewalks into his morning briefings with the New Englandmedia, he has already broken them down. He has predictedthe incendiary topics of the day, sketched an outline of howhe will respond to those topics, and offered suggestions tohis players on how they should respond too. He has masteredan indifferent look during these conferences, yetwhen they are over he can easily recall details about latearrivingreporters, opinion-makers he hasn't seen in awhile, and questioners he didn't recognize. When his conversationis no longer on the record, it's as if some hiddenmasseuse has suddenly relieved him of tension points.

He can be relaxed during television production meet-ings, depending on the broadcast crew for the game. He'sbeen extremely loose with Phil Simms, Greg Gumbel, andArmen Keteyian of CBS. He trusts them enough to jokewith them. Once he went into a meeting seeing if he couldneedle Simms. "Phil, I've heard you've been ripping the shitout of me," he said to the former Giants quarterback."That's all I hear from people: 'Simms is ripping your assduring the broadcast.' " Simms didn't fall for it. He knewthat Belichick wouldn't leave anything to hearsay and thatif he had indeed ripped Belichick, the coach would knowexactly when it happened, down and distance included."Bullshit," Simms said. "All I do is talk about how smartyou are. We call you the smartest coach ever every week."Belichick laughed, leaned back in his chair, and acted as ifhe were getting ready for a card game with his friends.

It helps that Simms has known Belichick since 1979,but that's not the only reason Belichick respects him andhis crew. He is even more impressed with their preparation.They are often dressed casually in these meetings -- T-shirts, baseball caps, flip-flops -- but they always have aplan for what is going to be discussed. Simms is indeedtheir quarterback, so they all watch film and jot down observationsto present to Belichick. Their hard work makeshim so comfortable that he often sits in the meetings, feetpropped up, telling stories. He once told them that he ran amarathon and was spotted by Giants fans. "They saw me,and one fan says, 'Look, there's Belichick of the Giants.They still don't have a running game!' "

On some days when things are quiet at Gillette Stadium-- after the Saturday morning walk-through and beforethe Saturday evening coaches' meeting -- Belichick isvisited by one of his three dogs. Sometimes he entertains Tom Brady -- a sports fan with an appreciation of sportshistory -- by telling tales about the old Giants. He oncecalled defensive lineman Richard Seymour into his officeso they could watch tape and talk about some of the dominantplayers of the NFC East in the 1980s.

He may have been born in Tennessee and raised inMaryland, but he's got a lot of Northeast humor in him. Hecan be clever, sarcastic, and profane. Coming from his of-fice it's not unusual to hear the voices of Frank Rizzo andSol Rosenberg, the characters dreamed up by the JerkyBoys, the notorious telephone pranksters from Queens.When he isn't listening to their funny stories, he tells a fewof his own. He tells one about a family vacation in Europein the mid-1990s. No matter where they went, the Belichickssaw dozens of Europe's aged churches. They sawlandmarks and a certain recurring icon. At one point Brianturned to his parents and said, "Who is this guy? We're seeinghim everywhere."

The "guy" was Jesus Christ.

"I don't know if I should tell that story," Belichick says,shaking his head. "People are going to think we're bad parents."

He has gone from twenty-six-year-old coach-peer tofifty-two-year-old coach-teacher. He has learned to be moreof a negotiator with his own team, making compromises insome areas -- or at least being able to listen -- without sellingout his core beliefs.

Patriot Reign
Bill Belichick, the Coaches, and the Players Who Built a Champion. Copyright © by Michael Holley. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

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Excerpted from Patriot Reign: Bill Belichick, the Coaches, and the Players Who Built a Champion by Michael Holley
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