For the first time since being hired, Mike Vrabel spoke with the assembled media down in Indianapolis on Tuesday morning.

During the 15-minute Q&A, Vrabel hit on all the important issues currently facing him and the organization as they look to just get back to respectability before even thinking about contention.

Vrabel’s staff is complete and it’ll be an integral part of the franchise’s success going forward. He was asked about it and of course, there’s the intrigue of Josh McDaniels returning that leads the headlines.

“Just looking at the staff, very proud of the staff we were able to put together,” he said. “It’s difficult in the National Football League to be able to get every coach that you may covet or may want to get outside the coordinators that aren’t a coordinator somewhere else, just because of the rules. Teams are under contract…some teams want to keep the coaches they have, they feel like they’re good coaches. But, we were able to put together a great staff, one we’re really proud of.

“I would say I had communications with Josh in my role in Cleveland. He wasn’t under contract with a team, so we had numerous conversations. We interviewed a handful of great candidates and in the end, felt like Josh was the best fit to lead our offense just like Terrell (Williams) was the best fit to lead our defense and Jeremy (Springer) and Tom (Quinn) returning to lead the special teams unit.”

Free agency is just about two weeks away and it’s a ‘if not now, when?’ thing heading into this particular period when it comes to backing up a bunch of Brinks trucks. It’s a fork-in-the-road spot for the Krafts and it appears they got the first part right with Vrabel. Now, it’s all hands on deck and no expense is too high to get the team back to where it once was.

“Hopefully, aggressive,” Vrabel said when asked about how he believes the team will approach it. “I mean, we want to be aggressive. We want to target players that we feel like are going to help us, that are going to be outstanding players, that are going to be outstanding additions to the locker room and the community. And if that all fits and the compensation fits…but, I’m confident that we’ll be aggressive.

“We’ve started some of those discussions internally and I think having different plans, an option A. an option B…I mean, things are going to change. Everybody’s looking at the same players. So, we have to be ready to pivot and adjust and have a vision for each player, I would say at each level. There’s going to be this high level that things get done very quickly. That’ll transition then to maybe some mid-range dollars and then obviously, you look at opportunity. Free agency gets broken down into compensation and then it gets broken down into opportunity.

“I feel like we’re in a position to offer both, as far as compensation and opportunity for some of these players.”

If you want to get technical, it’s now been five years of ‘rebuilding’ since Tom Brady finally had enough. Two quarterbacks in and a combined record of 8-26 the last two seasons is as close to early 1990’s rock bottom as there is. Fans are simply tired of the product they’ve seen and the good news is that everyone over in Foxborough knows it.

Vrabel believes fans shouldn’t have to wait that much longer for meaningful games late in December again, but also preached just a little bit more patience.

“Well, we have to improve, I think that’s the goal. Our expectations aren’t going to change. It’s going to be to win the division, it’s going to be to host home playoff games and it’s going to be compete for championships,” he added. “We’re never going to put a time table or any sort of prediction on when that may happen, but it has to happen and it’s going to start April 7th when our guys come in.

“We’re going to build a program. We’re going to have a foundation. We’re going to give them something to believe in and to be proud of. Hopefully, they’re able to hold each other accountable to that standard and if not, my job’s to protect the football team…we all want to win. That’s why we’re here. That’s why I got hired. It’s to win. It’s to put a product on the field that (the fans) can be excited about. That they can care about and that they can support.

“That’s the whole goal. They shouldn’t have to wait very long, but we also have to understand that we’re not going to fix every issue on the first day of free agency or we’re not going to fill every hole on the first or second day of the draft.”