Some immediate takeaways from New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel’s first press conference:
1) Vrabel’s initial message came across clearer than Mayo’s: Based on what little we had seen from Vrabel as a coach, the feeling was that he would be a less gentle type of leader with an emphasis on discipline, making him a more hard-nosed guy compared to Jerod Mayo.
Instead, Vrabel turned out to be a better balance of the two, with the former linebacker doing a much better job of laying the groundwork in terms of how he planned on approaching things when it came to his overall message.
“We’re going to earn the right to be here every day,” explained Vrabel. “We’re going to remove entitlement from our football team. We’re going to get everything that we’ve earned from the head coach to the position coaches, all the way down to the players. We’re going to earn the right to be here every single day.”
“I always say that I don’t want to get into too many messages that will be geared for the players, but I hold those conversations. Those are special conversations between the coaches and the players, but we want to treat every player the same way they treat the team, and we want to treat every employee the same way that they treat the team.”
“If they care about the team and they come here with a great attitude and a willingness to work and help the team, I’ve asked Robert [Kraft] to do everything that we can for them, to support them and their families. That’s the type of environment that I want to build, and I’m excited about it.”
2) Vrabel cares about his players personally: For anyone who expected Vrabel to just be a hard-nosed guy without much empathy, he certainly cleared that up on Monday.
One of the biggest topics of discussion that Mayo talked about last year at this time – and rightfully so – was how important it was to care as much about the player not only for what they did on the field, but also as a person.
Vrabel really emphasized that point, saying that having a relationship with every player, whether it’s him or someone else on the staff, is incredibly important to him.
“This connection piece, man, getting to know these players. We’re going to put so many points of contact around our players that I understand that I’m going to have a different relationship with some players than I do others,” said Vrabel. “I’m going to have a relationship with every single one of them, but then there’s going to be other ones that may not be as strong, but they’re going to be with the position coach.”
“We’re not going to have a whole lot of roles. We’re going to start with being on time, and being respectful, and being able to communicate like anybody else would outside this building. If you were late for an appointment, if you had something going on, that we’re going to have people that are around the players for them to be able to trust and say, ‘Hey, I’ve got this going on.’”
“I’ve tried to do this in Tennessee that if somebody walks in the door at 7:45 and there’s something on their face that they’re wearing something, they’re holding on to something, that something’s not right, I would rather give that player 30 minutes or 45 minutes however much amount of time that he needs to take care of a situation, than the seven hours that he’s going to waste wearing it through the day.”
Most of these guys – as crazy as it may sound – are still just young men who are still growing, whether it’s on their own, as husbands, as fathers, whatever the case may be. Having been in their shoes and knowing how tough it is, it’s something that Vrabel truly believes in, and that’s something that should certainly work in his favor when it comes to getting through to the players on his new team.
3) No real clarity on coordinators: Vrabel said the process when it comes to who will potentially be in staff is “far from solidified,” noting that there is still some work to be done there. However he did convey that, as Mayo also mentioned in his own press conference, Vrabel’s priority was making sure whoever he does ultimately hire will prioritize helping their players develop, as well as be someone guys will embrace learning from.
“That’s far from solidified,” said Vrabel. “We want to put the best, talented coaches in front of our players. When they stand in front of these players, I want the players to embrace what every coach is teaching. And I will tell you this, as long as I’m the head coach here, our coaches will have three simple jobs. They sound simple, and they’re probably not as simple as we want to make them be, but they want to teach, they want to develop, and they want to inspire our players by making a connection.”
“We’re going to make strong connections with our players so that we can coach them, and we can push them. I’ve really believed in this system, and I believe in having great teachers, great developers, and also coaches that will inspire our men by making a connection so that they know exactly what makes them tick. We all have stuff outside of here. Every single coach, every single player, every single person in our building is going to have something outside of football with their family, mentally, physically, They’re all going to deal with something. It’s going to look different, and it’s going to smell different, but it’s something. We got to deal with it. When they come in the building, do everything that we can to help them do their jobs.”
One interesting bit is that Vrabel is clearly also eying guys who are elsewhere to add to his staff, saying during an appearance on 98.5 The Sports Hub’s Zolak and Bertrand that they’ll need to be patient as the rest of the postseason plays out before they can go through the interview process.
“Well, no timeline,” said Vrabel on that hiring process. “I think just going through good, solid, strong interviews, don’t want to rush through anything and make sure that we’re getting the right pieces.”
“It’s always interesting just dealing with the first time and coaches. There’s some patience that has to happen with coaches that are under contract, maybe at another place, or maybe they’re working in college, and how do you want to interview and just that whole dynamic of just doing it properly and not rushing into anything.”
4) Vrabel and Wolf appear to have a good relationship: Current personnel executive Eliot Wolf seems to be someone who already has a good relationship with Vrabel, with the head coach mentioning that Wolf is someone he’s already spent a fair amount of time with.
The most important thing with Vrabel is the fact that he and Wolf already seem to have a shared vision, which Vrabel emphasized when asked about what control he would have over both the roster and the draft.
“I think the most important thing is that there’s a shared organizational vision for what we want to do and how we want to work and how we want to acquire players,” said Vrabel. “There’s numerous ways to acquire players, through free agency, trade, draft, post-draft process, after training camp. So again, I’m just excited to get to sit down with Eliot and his staff. I’ve met more with Eliot over the weekend than I have … had conversations with him, but I need to sit down with his staff and figure out where we’re at, what we need to do.”
“I’m confident that those types of decisions are all going to sort themselves out. We don’t want to always be on the same page. That’s not the environment that we want to create, but we want to have a shared vision, and there’s also different ways to get there. And I’m embracing that everybody is going to have a different personality. I don’t want my staff to be like me. I don’t want all our players to be similar. We’re going to have diverse ideas, and that’s critical. To be able to have those types of conversations is something that I’m looking forward to.”
5) Vrabel going to put ‘great people’ around Maye: When asked about how he planned on helping quarterback Drake Maye reach his potential, Vrabel said that his goal is to “put great people around him,” as well as spend time helping him with things like in-game management and helping him continue to develop as a leader.
“Put great people around him,” explained Vrabel. “I would say that my involvement will be as it relates to game management and situational awareness, and where we are on the football field and trying to develop him as a leader of the offense. And when a quarterback, when they call the play, you want to say it like everybody’s going to believe that it’s going to score a touchdown. With that type of emphasis on how everything is going to operate.”
“And Drake is going to be his own person, but I’m going to give him some things that I feel like are necessary to help us win football games. We have to be a very efficient passing football team. When you look at, statistically, of what wins in a National Football League, our ability to affect the other team’s quarterback and our ability to provide for an efficient quarterback and passing game is a high contributor to success.”
“There’s a lot of ways to do that by protecting the middle of the pocket and all those things that we’re going to talk about as we move forward. But how we protect the football, how we’re aggressive but not reckless, understanding where we are in the game and the situational awareness that I feel like I’ve developed over six years and in my past year in Cleveland.”
In the end, Vrabel’s goal is to set a foundation and bring everyone together, both in the building and with the fans. That’s the thing he’s most focused on, and that journey appears to be underway.
“I want to galvanize our football team,” said Vrabel. “I want to galvanize this building. I want to galvanize our fans. The most important thing are the players. There’s some of them right here. I want to provide a program that provides their ownership, but also their accountability of each other, and one that they’ll be proud to be a part of and that they’re going to fight for. You guys are going to ask me questions about culture, which I’ll be happy to talk about and discuss. One thing I’ve realized about culture is that you can find out what your culture looks like when your family, your business, or your team is at its low point.”
“It’s not when you’re winning Super Bowls, or it’s not when you’re 7-1 or 10-1 because then everybody’s waving towels and everybody’s happy and they’re excited to come to work. But when you get hit in the mouth, or you’re down, or the chips are against you, then you can take a snapshot of what your company or your team looks like, and then you’ll find out what culture you have.”
“But that culture is going to be built on winning, a competitive spirit throughout our roster, throughout our players, and throughout our coaches and our staff, and the ability to put the team first and care about somebody other than yourself. I’m excited to do that.”
“I’m excited to get to work.”
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Ian Logue is a Seacoast native and owner and senior writer for PatsFans.com, an independent media site covering the New England Patriots and has been running this site in one form or another since 1997.
