The 'Patriots Way'-ward Part 2 (3 0f 3)

The Patriots organization and those who control the direction of the franchise, through their red, silver and blue colored lenses, multiple championships, generally favorable media coverage and a cash cow merchandise empire, have not recognized one of the oldest principles, which dictates “change is inevitable, but stagnation is a choice”. Sure, for over 20 years the organization had established a standard of excellence never seen before in organized professional sports. This standard has created wealth, prosperity, notoriety and profitable reputations among those who’ve been exposed to it and have succeeded within the organizational structure.

Lower-level executive and scouting staff members have been afforded opportunities to run their own professional programs; assistant coaches have been tapped to lead professional and college football programs and former players have been given a leg up in the coaching and media industry. Everybody wants a piece of a winner; publicly traded stock companies often report that an executive had decided to leave in order to accept a higher profile position with a competitor. An outstanding customer service representative at one company is offered the ability to manage a customer service department elsewhere.

The same has happened with the Patriots, but one of the key mistakes that can be noticed is that for years, the leadership seems to have grown to believe that the same credo of ‘next man up’, which is expected of the players, applies within its front office, scouting departments and coaching staff. However, if the replacement only brings a template profile without any new talents, intangibles or insights to accompany their rise, the process has the effect of turning the entire operation stale; in essence it becomes the same old messages with different faces delivering them.

"Change is inevitable, but stagnation is a choice". Additionally, with the turnover of key personnel within all levels of the organization, the Patriots’ ‘secret sauce’ so to speak, has proliferated throughout the NFL. The recipe has been revealed to other team owners, executives, scouting departments, staff members and coaches. If one fails to change within this ultra-competitive environment that increasingly applies pressure to win, it is relatively easy to overlook the effects until it is too late. In Part 2 of this series, we discussed how former Patriots’ assistants and executives have fared in other locales in the NFL. The lower-level assistants and office staff working for former Patriots’ employees, who generally live a nomadic career, take elements of that ‘secret sauce’ with them. There was a time when the Patriots were the gold standard of innovation; now the organizational methods have become old hat; coaches and executives study the tendencies of those who don’t embrace change and will take advantage.

The guy that wore #12 was able to keep the team somewhat ahead of the current due to his knowledge of the game, intangibles, attitude, productivity, ability to hold others accountable and leadership. When he walks out of the door, there is a noticeable void that cannot be copy pasted with the same resultant outcomes that had become commonplace with him under center. The old saying “change is inevitable, but stagnation is a choice” applies here as well. Yes, the Patriots realized that they did not believe paying an older quarterback on the same par as other elite passers in the league would enable a prolonged term success; however, it was somewhat a wishy-washy proposition which forced the player to take the bull by the horns and control his destiny as he exited the only professional team he’s ever known. I believe that the Patriots made the right choice in letting him leave; it was an indicator of a need to change. However, in any professional endeavor, you cannot change a key element without making additional changes elsewhere either staff-wise or schematically. As a result, in the 2020 season the Patriots turned the quarterback position over to a player that had little to no institutional knowledge of how the team was organized, was coming off of injuries and had little to no time to get up to speed with ‘the system’. Instead of being innovative with the intent to exploit other teams’ weaknesses, the offense sprinkled zone-read concepts that the player was comfortable with, into the long- standing offense, which had become predictable and easy to prepare for...especially with an individual under the center that did not have a nuanced understanding of it.

The same issues are pervasive on the defensive side of the ball; the coaching staff doubled down on reliable older players because “they know the system” as a result of not drafting effectively or with the purpose of taking account of the changing profiles of the players available. For instance, ‘thumpers’ or ‘playing ball in a phone booth’ types of linebackers are no longer critical. Currently, the trend is obtaining players that can run sideline to sideline, play physical at the point of attack, yet still have the speed to make tackles, pass rush and cover running backs and tight ends. Older, slower players may have the experience and knowledge to diagnose a play, but they no longer can make impact plays as consistently because they lack the speed, quickness and physical attributes that can disrupt a play before it develops. As a result, the Patriots are forced to deploy these players in zone coverage in order to keep the plays in front of them with help coming from other positions in case they are compromised as a way of mitigating the damage. In this scenario, a competent, well-run offense can rarely be attacked.

Fortunately for the Patriots, it is a team that is good enough on paper to make the playoffs. However, based upon a twenty-year run of success that set extremely high baseline expectations for those within the organization as well as the fans and the press, more must be done if the leadership wishes to continue making meaningful steps forward.

In this vein, I would suggest that the Patriots hire several young, innovative offensive and defensive minds in order to refresh and reinvigorate the organizational knowledge base. Cast a wide net, find and hire individuals within the college, JUCO and high school ranks in highly competitive environments that think towards the future, rather than the present day and give them non-prominent positions on the coaching staff and front office under nebulous titles such as “offensive/defensive assistant” on the coaching staff and “football operations associate” in the front office.

These innovative minds with fresh ideas and new voices can then be slowly integrated into the offensive and defensive sides of the ball as well as the scouting department, which coincidentally serves the purpose of widening the scope of players the team is looking for in the draft. Among the benefits of such a practice are: 1) The team could potentially experience significant salary cap savings if it is able to hit on draft picks more frequently by turning younger players on cheaper contracts into immediate contributors; 2) The wasteful ‘redshirting’ process can be discarded in favor of drafting players for specific roles that are needed for positional competition. In this scenario, players will play freer and more confident with realistic aspirations of being productive, leading within the locker room and individual positional groupings; and 3) Free agency spending is decreased this practice should be utilized by teams that are willing to overpay in order to get to the next level of contention, not just making Wild Card Game appearances. If your team is not on the doorstep and retooling, there is no need to pay well above market value for talent. Trusting an infusion of new ideas can prevent risky signings.

If the integration of newer ideas along with differing player profiles is successful and coaches are promoted to prominent positions elsewhere based upon the performance of the team, the knowledge base stays intact through a natural progression of elevation within the organization. In this manner of operating, the team can stay one step ahead of ‘brain drain’ consequences by dipping into the same innovative well repeatedly. This process also assists in taking a lot of work and oversight off of the head coach’s plate, so he can focus on implementing gameplans as he gets older, thereby extending his coaching shelf-life. Adhering to such a process that is grounded in innovation, will also make other organizations again, play catch up; no longer will they be able to rely on older, antiquated tendencies, formations and coverages which they have learned to exploit through the Patriots’ growing reputation for internal inflexibility and continuous brain drain.

I believe that there is merit in doing the same things that worked previously while putting a particular emphasis on execution (if you do it correctly, it is a winning formula). However, if the personnel is physically and psychologically overmatched and the coaching staff is not forward thinking in terms of ideology or philosophy, the margins between winning and losing will continue to be unfavorable. Likewise, team ownership would be well served by encouraging innovation; staying ahead of the curve is a better recruiting tool than relying squarely on what has been accomplished in the past. A newer generation of players in which social media, branding and the understanding of market value plays a prominent role, demands that organizations adopt methods that cater to some preferences while still emphasizing a winning culture. The Patriots still face a long road toward again being perennial participants in high level playoff football games. However, on a positive note, there is an existing foundation of institutional knowledge and experience that can be built upon with the correct mix of personalities, effective ego suppression, competition within the hierarchy of leadership and the willingness to embrace the future while appreciating the past. “Change is inevitable, but stagnation is a choice”

Update: Patriots' offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, has been hired as the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders; and the Patriots' director of player personnel Dave Ziegler has been hired as the General Manager. It is expected that select members of the coaching staff and front office will go to Las Vegas with them.

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