NFL Notebook: Patriots' coaching alignment raises eyebrows, but personnel choice puzzling to league

INDIANAPOLIS — When you say it out loud, what Bill Belichick appears to intend to do with the Patriots' coaching staff seems puzzling at the least, and arrogant at worst.

From all indications from the chatter around the combine, the Patriots appear to be headed toward having tight ends coach Nick Caley do the heavy lifting on offense, with an assist from Joe Judge, who will help with the quarterbacks, and Matt Patricia will work with the offensive line.

"It's bizarre," said one Patriots-connected source.

But the truth of the matter is most around the league think the Patriots, with the heavy involvement of a 70-year-old Belichick, will be able to figure out the coaching well enough.

But what they've done on the personnel side — and the start it got off to in Indy behind the scenes — has elicited an even stronger reaction in NFL circles.

It's not to say that new director of player personnel Matt Groh is not competent or not smart or won't work hard at his job — people around the league raved about him in those areas. But his career path to this position ... just doesn't happen, not in New England and nowhere else in the NFL.

Groh spent six seasons as a college area scout, before two as the national scout, and last season as the director of college scouting. Groh has certainly done some pro personnel scouting in his duties, but that has not been his primary focus. As the de facto Patriots' general manager, that's now the bulk of his duties. 

In contrast, Groh's predecessors in this role had years on the pro personnel side. Scott Pioli had six years. Nick Caserio had three. Dave Ziegler four. Patriots personnel consultant Eliot Wolf has nearly 20 years of experience on the pro personnel side. Belichick could have easily tabbed Wolf, who was an assistant GM his final two seasons in Green Bay and Cleveland, but chose to go with Groh, the son of former Belichick assistant Al Groh, likely due to seniority within the Patriots — which is why you end up with Mick Lombardi bolting to Vegas to be Josh McDaniels' offensive coordinator (Lombardi would be behind Caley with the Patriots).

A high-ranking personnel executive from an NFC team gave us some insight on why Belichick's decision on the personnel side is so curious.

"I've done every job that you can think of ... at the top level of personnel, you're dealing with the pro side way more," he said. "The draft ... everyone has that wired. You have your system, your scouts, and they're doing the same work, the same evaluations year after year. It's really plug and play on the college side. You have your system for evaluating, and you stick with that. Plus, the college job is more about how you develop these players in your program. You can identify the players you want, but how many make instant impacts? Development by the coaches and their maturation are the most important factors.

"On the pro side, you're not only dealing with free agency and figuring that out, but you're dealing with the agents for your own free agents and players basically year round. There's the cap to figure out, extensions to prioritize. Plus you're evaluating the rest of the league to identify who you might add via trade, street free agency, tryouts, etc. It's all-consuming. I can't imagine going from only the college side to handling it all. I can't think of any other team that has done that.

"Most personnel departments are wired, they're plug and play if you lose someone like Ziegler. You have a depth of experience, and if someone needs help, they are there. The way the Patriots are set up right now, you need Eliot to swallow a lot of his pride — a guy who has interviewed and was a finalist to be a GM multiple times — and just set things up for Groh, who has much less experience. That usually doesn't go too well."

By going with Groh, Belichick also seemed to bypass two people who were ahead of him on last year's personnel totem pole, Brian Smith and Steve Cargile. 

Director of player personnel: Dave Ziegler.
Personnel coordinator: Brian Smith
Pro scouting director: Steve Cargile
College scouting director: Matt Groh.
National scout: Tucker Ingraham
National scout: Camren Williams, Brandon Yeargan
Pro scouts: Sam Fioroni, Jordan Hein, Josh Hinch, Marshall Oium
College scout: Justin Hickman, A.J. Howard
Area scouts: Alex Brooks, Chris Caminiti, D.J. Debrick, Matt Evans, Taylor Redd

What the NFL have now is very green compared to NFL standards, and that started to show in Indy.

Two player agents said they met with new and very young Patriots personnel staffers about free agents at the combine. It didn't go well.

"He had obviously been given marching orders and really didn't know what he was doing," one agent said. "They seem to be flying by the seat of their pants. I guess they are expecting Bill and Matt (Patricia) to handle a lot of this stuff when it comes down to it, but this is the most unprepared I've seen them ever. It feels like they're going to miss out on some stuff." 

Like the coaching side, Belichick has often handled a lot of the personnel duties, especially on the pro side, so it's assumed Belichick will have to do a lot more there — along with everything else at this point — and Patricia helped in that area last year. But entering the crucial team-building period, no one is really sure what Belichick has in mind.

Indeed, this is largely how the Patriots have gotten into this spot with coaching and personnel. New England could have, if it really wanted to and would spend the money, retained many of the people who left over recent years. But those on the coaching and personnel staff basically couldn't wait to leave.

Why?

"Nobody knows what the heck Bill is doing with anything," said one league source. "It has always been that way to some extent, but it's gotten worse in recent years. Ask anyone there, nobody has any idea what their future is or what their career path looks like. If he wanted to, Bill could sketch out what the future looks like there, certainly for key people, but no one has a clue. People are securing their promotions and futures elsewhere."

NICKEL PACKAGE

1. If you're turning up your nose at the prospect of Robby Anderson joining the Patriots ... good luck. There's a reason why Belichick has been after him for years, and just look at the crappy situations he's played in so far in his career. He had 95 catches and over 1,000 yards with Teddy Bridgewater. Imagine what he would do with a real QB with a real team. He'd be worth every penny the Patriots might have to pay him, and you know he would produce.

2. Get your popcorn ready for the Kyler Murray-Cardinals negotiations. This is expected to get ugly very fast.

3. The Patriots are not expected to be major players in free agency this year. Many of their initial contract talks in Indy started off well below market, especially with their own free agents. The good news: the Patriots seem to be taking a wait-and-see approach with some of their defensive players, and they are focused on getting faster. 

4. You can take all your fancy draft receivers and stuff them in a sack. Give me Georgia NT Jordan Davis all day long in the middle of the Patriots' line for 10 years. He's definition of a globe guy — there are only so many people walking the globe with that type of athletic ability.

5. You'd figure that Cardinals and former UMass receiver Andy Isabella would be a natural fit for the Patriots. The former 5-foot-9 second-round pick ran a 4.31 40 and 6.95 three-cone drill at the combine in 2019. Seems a slot profile for the Patriots. But according to a league source the Cardinals, who are stocked at receiver, have basically tried to give Isabella away since last year and there have been no takers, including by the Patriots. "He profiles as a slot, but he's not a slot ... that's the issue," a league source said.