Bill Belichick

Bill Belichick
William Stephen Belichickis an American football coach, and the long-time head coach of the New England Patriots of the National Football League. Belichick has extensive authority over the Patriots' football operations, effectively making him the General Manager of the team as well. He was previously the head coach of the Cleveland Browns...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth16 April 1952
CityNashville, TN
CountryUnited States of America
I have all the respect in the world for Rodney Harrison. I told him that when we brought him here, and he's made great contributions to this team. There's no question about it. Unfortunately, he had a tough setback last weekend and so did the team, but that's the way it is. We're playing San Diego this week. Unfortunately, he won't be with us. I wish he was, but he's not.
Overall, there are still a number of things we can do better. We had problems with penalties in the first half, no question about that. We weren't as sharp as we need to be in execution or in terms of assignments.
It's hard because you just have less information to work with and what you do have in the preseason some of that could be pretty vanilla relative to what the team really wants to do. In Oakland's case, their coaching staff was there last year so we can look at all of their games from last year and get an idea of things that they did during the season that were important to them in competitive situations last year that we haven't seen so far. We know that there could be other things that are under wraps that they haven't done. We just have to be ready to make some adjustments during the game. I think that's the way it always is. There's no question that this is the hardest game.
Al's never really hired a defensive coach, Al's hired offensive coaches, ... That was the first question I asked him when I came out here was, 'What am I doing here?' A big part of Al's involvement with the team is on the defensive side of the ball.
Al's never really hired a defensive coach, Al's hired offensive coaches. That was the first question I asked him when I came out here was, 'What am I doing here?' A big part of Al's involvement with the team is on the defensive side of the ball.
It was special and I knew that at that time. I told the owner (Modell) that several times too, when he had some questions about how the coaching was going.
The guy can certainly play outside linebacker. We know he can play defensive end. I imagine he can move inside and play defensive tackle. There's no question he can play tight end. He probably can play offensive tackle. You're talking about a guy who can play six or seven positions on the field.
He certainly deserves, and I'm sure will get, a good opportunity (elsewhere). He's going to be in the league. There's no question about that.
I don't know, ... Day to day. We'll take it day by day. That's the way it's been for the last however many months. That's, I think, the only way you can do it.
I feel like I've had a strong relationship with Robert [Kraft] and his family since I was here in 1996 and I think it's gotten stronger every year that I've been here with the Patriots. The more things we do together, talk about together, work together on, the closer we become and the more we rely on each other. I feel like our relationship is very close and continues to grow closer every year as we grow older together.
It's the business that you guys are in too. We try to get as much information as we can and make the best decisions that we can for the football team.
Some guys, football comes really easy to them; they can see what all 22 players are doing, can see what all 11 guys are doing on their side of the ball, how it all fits together. It's easy for them.
It's really important to him. He understands what you want to do. If it's not right, then it's important for him to get it right and to figure out exactly where he should be on the play or how he should play it.
He kind of knows the right thing to do without being told. He just knows how to get open and he has a good understanding of passing game concepts. He knows where the other receivers are. He understands where he needs to be, and when there are traffic problems, he almost always does the right thing to clear that traffic up.