It was a layup, really.
The morning after the Patriots' loss to the Bills, which left Bill Belichick's team with a losing record and in third place in the division for the second time in three years (and a record of 25-26 since Tom Brady walked out the door), the coach had ample and numerous opportunities to admit what has been obvious to anyone with eyes:
Belichick's own decisions, in terms of the coaching staff and the direction of the offense, were directly responsible for the Patriots vastly underachieving this season.
And Belichick didn't do it. Not even close.
Of course, considering how his own team has bungled so many situations that are considered routine by other more competent squads — like goal-to-go situations, not lateralling a kickoff return with overtime approaching, 3rd and long pass coverage against good QBs, or covering kickoffs — it's now par for the Patriots' course that Belichick mangled this as well.
"Our record is right around .500, which is what it's been kind of all year," Belichick said. "With that, some good things and some not-so-good things, so nobody's satisfied with that. That's not our goal. We need to try to improve on that. Need to improve on it. So, that's all of us. Accountability everywhere, starting with me, coaching staff, players, each unit are all things that we will address. That process will start probably later today.
"As we do every year, (we'll) evaluate everything, and try to make the best decisions we can to move forward, to be more competitive, to have a stronger team in the future. So, Robert [Kraft] and I will talk about that, talk about that as a staff and certainly individual conversations with many of the players, as we always do, well, all the players but there's some that are obviously more urgent or will be more timely than others. But it'll be a comprehensive course of action as it always is. I don't see the process being really any different, but we need to have better results. That's really the bottom line. That's where we are for today."
Paying lip service to accountability isn't the same as falling on a sword that is apparent to everyone.
Just look at these numbers comparing last season, with a rookie QB and lots of new faces on offense, and this season with everyone returning for Year 2:
How much of a deep, introspective dive do you need to do?
Instead of real accountability, we got this:
"As I just said, we'll evaluate everything that we've done. From me on down to everybody else and evaluate things and make improvements where we feel like we can. Again, there were a lot of positive things over the course of the year in all areas that we can build on. But in the end, it wasn't what we want it to be or need it to be. So that'll all be – we'll look at everything."
I tried to give Belichick a final chance to take ownership over this (as did Tom Curran later), and he passed.
Q: Your offense, your stats took a dramatic step back this season, do you think the decisions you made in the offseason for the coaching staff, some of the personnel decisions, do you think now that the season is over, that you put your offense in the best position to succeed this season?
BB: "Well, every decision that we’ve made has always been made with the intent to do the best thing for the football team. That’s the way it always will be. That’s what it’s been, that’s what it’ll be going forward. At different decision points, you have different opportunities and as those go along or come along, we’ll continue to evaluate them and always do what we feel is best for the team."
...
Q: So many of us on the outside deferring obviously to your expertise, resume, experience, and everything said, ‘obviously, he knows better than we do,’ but, it did seem a dubious choice. In hindsight, did we have a point?
BB: Again, at that point in time and every point in time, I always made what I felt like was best decisions for the team. That’s all I can say. You can have your opinion on them, whatever it is, I understand that, but I always did what I felt was best for the team, in every area, at every point in time, since I’ve been the head coach of the New England Patriots. I’ll always continue to do that. I’ll put the team first and do what I feel is best for the team. Whether you agree or disagree with that, that’s up to you. I respect that, but I’m always going to do what I feel is best."
That was as bad as the Fail Lateral.
What about the decision to have defensive and special teams coaches run your offense ... want a mulligan on what you said about good coaches being able to coach any position?
Negative.
"Yeah, really, it’s pretty much the same question that I think Greg [Bedard] just asked," Belichick said. "Again, always do what’s best for the football team and at different decision points, we’ll always do what’s best for the football team. That’s what we’ve done, that’s what we’ll continue to do."
Seriously, how easy would it have been if Belichick just came out and said something like this:
"Obviously, the decisions I made in regards to the offense heading into this season were wrong — if you look at any of our stats, they would tell you that," a fictional, human Belichick could have said. "I take full responsibility for that. I made the decisions that I thought were best, and those were obviously wrong after 17 games and five months of work. I want to apologize to Robert and Jonathan Kraft, our coaches — they work at my direction — and our players. I did not put them in the best position to succeed, that's obvious, and a failing on my part. We will go immediately to work to get it fixed, and I expect to do that. This season was not acceptable, not in any shape or form."
If Belichick said something along those lines, how much better would everyone feel about where things are headed at One Patriot Place?
Instead, after hearing Belichick deflect any responsibility for anything, really, it's fair to start to wonder whether, at 71 years old in April, he totally gets it anymore and, as he said multiple times on Monday, still does "what's in the best interest of the team."
He even threw Mac Jones under the bus, when asked if he would be the starter next season, with comments that were far from the flowing words Belichick had for his first-round QB heading into this second season.
"Mac has the ability to play quarterback in this league," Belichick said. "We have to all work together to try to find the best way as a football team, which obviously the quarterback is an important position, to be more productive than we were this year. So that's incumbent upon all of us. We'll all work together on that. Again, look for better results."
You can't get more tepid than ... "the guy can play in this league." You know who else can play in this league? Bailey Zappe. Tyler Heinicke. Jarrett Stidham.
Since Belichick wouldn't take accountability to the public and media, it falls on the Krafts to make sure he does, if they allow him to continue to coach this team. Belichick was asked if he wants to come back for a 24th season.
"Yeah, I think I just talked about that. Process will start today," he said.
That's not, "Robert and I talked and we're ready to go forward with 2023." That conversation has not taken place yet.
It's very interesting that shortly after the conclusion of Belichick's press conference, the Krafts sent an email to season ticket holders (confirmed by the team) that left little doubt they are extremely unhappy with this past season:
Just got my season ticket email from the Patriots. pic.twitter.com/bdAJ9DJD17
— Joe Murray (@JoeyMurr) January 9, 2023
The key parts:
"While we always want to be playing games with playoff implications in Week 18, our expectation was to perform better throughout the season and to advance through the playoffs."
"We can assure you that no one in our organization is satisfied with the results from the past season."
"In the weeks ahead, we will be making critical evaluations of all elements of our football operations ..."
"... we anticipate presenting you with an improved product on the field ..."
What exactly that looks like, how it happens ... remains to be determined.
All we know is Belichick wasn't ready to admit his blatant failing to the public. We'll see if he does it behind closed doors with his bosses.
OTHER BELICHICK TIDBITS
On the suspensions of Jack Jones and Jake Bailey:
"Both the players last week were – those are separate matters, but both players have been contributors to the team and hopefully will be in the future. I’m not going to comment on the suspension part of it, there’s been a grievance filed and so forth, so that will all run its course. We’ll deal with that as it comes, but yeah, both players are talented players that have contributed to the team, and I think have a future with the team. At least that’s how I feel at this point, yep."
On getting bang for buck with record 2021 free-agent class:
"When you look at the National Football League and the salary cap situation, it’s the same for all teams. What we try to do is we look at it over a time frame. One year is a Polaroid snapshot, but actually there are multiple years involved. At some point, the reconciliation has to come. Our spending in 2020, our spending in 2021 and our spending in 2022, the aggregate of that, was we were 27th in the league in cash spending. Couple years we’re low, one year was high, but over a three-year period, we are one of the lowest spending teams in the league. Had we averaged that out in those three years, you would have had the same numbers. Whether it’s two low and one high, two medium, three mediums, two sort of high and one really low, whatever it is, there’s an average that comes. That’s the three-year average, we’re 27th in the league in cash spending.
"I thought that in retrospect, the free agency, we added a lot of really good players to this football team. Some guys have been very productive for us, some guys have had less production than some of the highly productive players, but overall, we’re a much better football team with the players that we added. Including the players that we resigned to the team that were free agents, that may not be considered free agents, because they didn’t come from other teams, but they were not part of our team, after the 2020 team but remained on the team in 2021 and many of them are still here. They were actually part of free agency, of the process. I think when you look at the aggregate of all those players, that we improved our team quite a bit with that group of players, yes."
Browns request permission to interview Jerod Mayo for defensive coordinator
They just fired Joe Woods. The only reason Mayo would leave Foxborough is if Belichick refused to make him sole defensive coordinator. There's no reason why Mayo should leave here.
Another log onto the Kraft/Belichick fire.