Well, well, well. Even Patriots owner Robert Kraft knew that what happened this past season - while a hell of a lot of fun - didn’t go like his coaching staff thought it would.
“I think actually the team way overachieved what any of us thought would happen, and it was wonderful,” he said from the league meetings earlier this week.
That dovetails with what Mike Vrabel said in his end-of-the-season press conference from Foxborough.
"Every time you guys ask me about my expectations, I say I try not to have any so that I'm not disappointed,” he said in mid-February. “But I would say that they, now that we're done, probably exceeded expectations."
As I’ve written here and said elsewhere (All 32 podcast/NBC Sports Boston/WEEI), Vrabel and company never looked at the roster and said, “Oh yeah, we’re a 14-win team with a chance to go to the Super Bowl.” That even played into the way he coached the team - sprinkling younger players into the lineup while also managing some of his veterans, starting way back in the spring, and maintaining a lighter schedule for the likes of Morgan Moses, Christian Barmore, and Hunter Henry. That approach worked. In fact, it was damn near flawless.
But now what? Kraft was honest about altering expectations for the upcoming season. The road schedule is rough. Trips to LA (Chargers) and Seattle loom (wondering if that Seahawks game will be the season-opener). The Jaguars game could be an international tilt. Mix in visits to Chicago, Detroit, and KC, and you can understand why the big boss is being more realistic than usual.
“Yeah, we have a pretty tough schedule, I think the hardest schedule, a lot of west coast travel,” Kraft said, saying he’s hoping for a playoff berth.
But when presented with the owner’s public approach, Vrabel’s competitive edge came to the fore for all to see.
“I talked to Robert about that,” the coach said, smiling (I think he was joking, but). “He and I had a really good conversation. ... Championships will remain the goal. That will never change. Appreciate Robert's support, but we want to win the division. We want to host playoff games, and we want to compete for championships. And so we got a taste of that. We saw what that looked like. We saw the environment that it created to be able to play those playoff games at home, which was unbelievable...
“We'll play whoever we have to play. We understand what this looks like. We're going to play the division winner schedule, and that's how it goes.”
What that said to me is that Vrabel, who never lacks confidence, truly feels this roster is in good shape as they enter the next phase (the draft) of the 2nd year of this buildout. I don’t blame him. The Pats have no glaring holes, and while their biggest needs (Edge, OL, TE) remain as of the writing of this piece, the Pats have the ability to move around the board with their full allotment of picks, plus an additional 4th and three additional 6ths (11 picks in total).
“Best player available, hopefully," Vrabel said when asked about what the team will do with pick 31. “Maybe we trade up, maybe we trade out, I don't know. But, you know, I love being able to work with Eliot (Wolf) and Ryan (Cowden), Elliot and Ryan's staff, coaching, and try to bring that together. I'm trying to bring a coach's perspective on a player and the personnel side together to bring the best person in there for our football team.”
But as Vrabel has discussed before, being a good football player carries even more weight when deciding who to draft, sign, etc. That point was brought up again during the portion of his Tuesday press conference when the topic of AJ Brown was raised (again). Vrabel asked how he would handle someone like Brown, who has shown clear frustration with his own production - he wants to be known as the best receiver in football - even as the Eagles have been consistent winners.
“Now, we all understand in professional sports, players that are talented and get to this level have some sort of ego to them, and there's a balance, right? What's, you know, they have to have that edge,” he replied. “And so I think as a coaching staff, and whatever that is, you have to balance that edge to make sure that that's helping the team. Everybody wants to excel.
“What receiver doesn't want to catch the ball, what pass rusher doesn't want to sack the quarterback, what DB doesn't want to intercept the ball, what the running backs (don’t) want to score touchdowns? That's how this thing goes. So there's a balance between their own personal success, their mindset, and then how they can help the team.”
Vrabel had an ego as a player, and played alongside guys who had even higher opinions of themselves. Then, as he’s worked through the coaching ranks, he’s experienced that from a different view. Vrabel was terrific dealing with the different personalities of his players in Tennessee, and that didn’t change in year one with the Patriots. If he continues to have that magic touch, and the roster continues to grow (as you should expect it to), there’s no reason why home playoff games shouldn’t be on the table. With or without Brown, Vrabel has shown he can make it work, and now that the bar’s been raised, there’s no reason not to expect that in year two, no matter what the owner says.