Once again, Belichick simply does not believe in creating a culture of losing. You can’t ask players to work their asses off all offseason, and then betray them by trying to lose on purpose. You can’t expect players, whose livelihood depends on their tape to get paid, to go out and deliberately play poorly so the franchise might get a prospect they want. And you can’t teach a team to lose on purpose and then magically turn them into winners. You can clean house of the high paid players who might not be around when you are championship level again, and I thought Belichick might go that route if Brady left, especially given the dead money they already have, but that doesn’t appear to be the approach Belichick is taking. Instead it appears that Belichick’s approach to the postBrady era is the same approach he used when he took over the Patriots, only this time he re-signed team leaders instead of importing them from previous stints. He is keeping the leaders who can teach young players how to be champions, and he will take the opportunity to fix the cap and fill holes through the draft and future free agencies. The difference this time is that while he has a big question at QB, his team on the whole is much better than the one he inherited from Pete Carroll. There are big holes at TE and WR, but the OL and RB units are strong. And their defense, while weakened in free agency, still has the look of a top 10 defense, with and exceptional secondary.
Overall it should fascinating to see how he goes about it, and whether he can actually replace Brady, and after the 20 year Dynasty we just enjoyed I’m completely willing to cut him as much slack as he needs to get back to the top. And as much as I love Brady I think Belichick is far more likely to get the 7th Lombardi.
