If BB gets down on a player the reason is he is consistently not doing his job. BB doesn't let it get personal, particularly with players who are doing their job, as the Ty Law situation proved. Apparently what you don't like about Bill is he runs this team based on consistent discipline. He doesn't make exceptions based on personal relationships or out of fear of possible repercussions, as the Lawyer Milloy situation underscored. And that consistency puts the ball squarely in the players court. He won't shock you if you were paying attention, and players who do appreciate that consistency.
There are two things he's looking for from these players - consistent effort and consistent execution. Sometimes he waits a couple of seasons to see if a young player can or will make the consistent effort and develop consistent execution - if the roster allows. Other times with veteran players he determines after several games that one or both is not going to emerge. Either way once he determines a player cannot or will not cut it in this
system, he cuts his losses. Teams that don't take that approach end up with festering little cancers that tend to spread to the weak willed and the young on the roster. You either embrace the system and perform well within it, or you are of less than no use to him.
Players don't end up in Belichick's dog house if they just do their jobs. Gabriels job was to learn the system and perform competently within it on the field. Freelancing, whether by design (stubborness) or out of necessity (because you just don't get it), even if you make a few plays along the way, undercuts the system and the team and he just won't tolerate it. The reason this team has succeeded over time even in the face of raw talent deficits and injuries, is because it operates on the principle that the strength of the wolf is in the pack. The system can generally cover for deficits if the players execute within it. The list of no-names and lesser knowns who have made crucial plays at critical junctures is lengthy. They made those plays not because they possessed world class talent, but because they were where they were supposed to be when they were supposed to be and they made the play that unfolded as a result.
