Belichick Talks Joint Practices with Eagles, Wasting Time with Worrying About First Team/Second Team and More
The New England Patriots are in the City of Brotherly Love to prepare for their second preseason game of 2021.
New England is set to face the Philadelphia Eagles on Thursday at 7:30pm ET at Lincoln Financial Field. Prior to their second day of joint practices at the NovaCare Training Facility in Philadelphia, Patriots head coach Bill Belichick addressed the media via video conference.
Here are some additional highlights from Belichick’s Tuesday morning media meet:
On the ‘agenda’ for Tuesday’s joint-practice with the Eagles:
“Today’s practice will be a lot different than yesterday. We will be working primarily in the red zone area. We will be getting a lot of snaps there…and we’ll take advantage of the opportunity.”
On opportunities to work on game-changing plays in practice:
“You never know how many times that will come up, but you always have to be ready to put them into action. Plays that are critical, game-winning, or game changing… you want to make sure that you are ready for those. Whether it be ball-recovery, onside kick, two-minute drive…whether it may be. Those critical plays are the ones you need to make sure that you can execute as well as possible. I’m not always sure how much time we will spend working on them, but we will make sure we’re ready for them.”
Follow-Up: On the best way to prepare for those [game-changing] situations:
Every situation is different. Really, it is based on the team that you are playing, and what they do. Blitzes, schemes, formations, they all factor in and are specific to your opponent. You have to watch those situations, and discuss them and execute based on what you see. The mental side of preparing for those sequences is just as important as the physical.’
On players working with the first, or second units during practice:
“We tell our players from the start, not to worry about who is out there with you, but to focus on you, your job and how to do it right. That is what we, players, coaches, etc. do every day. Work on fundamentals and focus on your own development. Worrying about who is out there with you is totally a waste of time, and it's not productive. It’s more important for positional groupings to play together at this stage (i.e. the offensive line, plays with the offensive line, etc,), but ultimately it’s more important to focus on the individual.”
On the physicality of yesterday’s practice
“Coach Sirianni [Eagles head coach] and I discussed that, and we thought that it was a good practice. I thought the tempo and the tone was good. I think they got a lot out of the day. I know that we did. It was as close to an in-game scenario as you can get. You work together with your team and work against different schemes. But we always make our best efforts to have good, working-practices. I thought that having the officiating team out there to make calls and keep things in line helped a lot, especially with the hand-to-hand stuff (i.e. pass coverage, pass rush, hand blocking)…those are the areas that we can learn from. But overall, a good day”
On the return of Chase Winovich:
“Right now, Chase needs to just get his reps in, now that he is back on the field. He has been cleared to practice, so we'll take it day by day. We will work him back into the areas that we believe he can work.. He will do his best, as he always does. It’s good to have him back.
