After the Patriots’ loss on Sunday, head coach Jerod Mayo said his team was soft. The man who brought in many of those players does not agree.
Bill Belichick, who was Mayo’s boss in New England and who signed, drafted and traded for most of the players on the current roster, told Pat McAfee today that he doesn’t think the players on the team are soft.
“Defensively, the Patriots led the league in rushing defense last year, yards per carry, No. 1 in the league, and this year they’re way down in the 20s somewhere. It’s the same guys,” Belichick said. “It’s a lot of the same players, and in some cases I would say more, so I’m kind of hurt for those guys, because to call them soft? They’re not soft. They were the best team in the league last year against the run. Those guys went out there and did it even though we couldn’t score many points offensively. I feel bad for the defensive players on that one because those guys, that’s a tough group. . . . Those guys are all tough players.”
Belichick clearly doesn’t take kindly to his former top assistant Mayo denigrating the quality of the players on the roster that was largely built by Belichick. And Mayo’s “soft” comment came on the heels of him saying last week that there were a lot of holes on the roster that he inherited and it would be more than a one-year rebuild. Belichick and Mayo worked together closely for many years, but they’re not on the same page about what kind of team Belichick handed over to Mayo this year.
