Image courtesy of NFL.com
If you’re as old as I am (35), you may not remember the Bill Parcells and Pete Carroll days vividly, but you know what some bad football looks like.
Currently, it’s about as bad around here as it’s been since even before those guys. There’s one coach who has seen it all from the 90’s up until now and it’s Troy Brown. Brown played for Parcells and Carroll and knows what non-playoff teams and Super Bowl teams look like. On Tuesday morning when assistant coaches met with the media at Gillette Stadium, I asked Troy if he’s seen any similarities now to those 90’s teams and what his message has been.
“We’re all in it together,” he said. “That’s the bottom line. The team is the team and good leadership doesn’t allow division to happen in the locker room. I think we have that on this football team. We’re going to keep plugging away and trying to get better play-by-play and day by day.”
I also asked Brown if there was any messages from Parcells or Carroll during some ugly days that he still remembers and may try to impart on his wide receiver group or the team in general.
“Yeah, stick together,” he said. “Don’t let anybody divide you. Don’t let anybody come between you and ignore the noise.”
Brown also said the positivity has remained high around the building, despite the obvious dire situation the team is currently in.
“It’s been all positive from what I can see. Everybody’s here participating and going out to practice today. We’re going to take this thing one play at a time.”
When it comes to the reciver group, Brown believes he can do more to try and get production out of a group that hasn’t scored a touchdown on 34(!) consecutive drives.
“I can coach better. I can do a better job with that group and look at myself in the mirror and look at everything I’ve done wrong or haven’t been perfect on,” he said. “I can coach better, starting with that and we’ll move on from there.”
Heading out on the road this weekend might be the best thing for the team. It’ll allow them to get away from all the negativity surrounding the organization, but, Brown cautioned that it doesn’t matter where the Patriots are, everything needs to be better and better in a hurry.
“It helps, but noise is noise,” Brown added. “We’ve just got to block it out. They’ve got radios and TV’s out there too obviously. We’ve got to block the noise out and find a way to play our best football. It starts there.”