Bill's follow-up

August 11, 2007

Patriots coach Bill Belichick held a conference call with the media today (4 p.m.), recapping the preseason opener against the Buccaneers. He opened with the following statement:

"We got back late last night, or early this morning, whatever it was. We went through the tape this morning and met and went over everything and started our preparations for this week when the players come back in tomorrow, the full week prior to the Tennessee game. We are just kind of banging away here.

"As I said last night, I thought there were some good things in the game. There were some other things that we need to work on and that's evident. We will just make sure that when the players come in tomorrow that we’ve identified those things and make sure we get the corrections made and start to hopefully string together another good week of practice and meetings and continue to improve as a football team. We have a lot of things to work on.

"Tennessee will present a different set of problems than Tampa did, so that will be good. We have a lot of exposure to a number of different things here in the first couple of games and hopefully that will help our overall preparation for the season and the opener."

A few other nuggets from Belichick:

In terms of playing time, Belichick felt the coaching staff got a “good look” that will help in evaluations across the roster. “Almost everybody had a pretty significant amount of playing time,” he said.

Asked specifically about rookie Justin Rogers’ second-half sack, Belichick agreed it was a nice play by the sixth-round pick from SMU. “The back tried to cut him, Justin used his hands to push the blocker down and get by him. It was a good play.”

Belichick felt the front seven on defense could benefit from Friday night because Tampa Bay used zone, trap, misdirection and cutback running plays, and had players with different running styles mixing into the game. Belichick praised Tampa Bay offensive line coach Bill Muir and his scheme and said it was a “great learning experience” for the front seven.

When asked about Rodney Harrison, he said the 14-year veteran has had a good camp and that he’s so intense and passionate about the game that he still needs to be taken of drills (i.e. scout team, special teams) at times.

In terms of usage of mostly three-wide sets, Belichick made it a point to note that “it’s not a big novelty” as the Patriots have used that alignment plenty of times in the past.

SUNDAY LOOK-AHEAD: The Patriots are scheduled for a 2:30 p.m. practice (closed to the public) on Sunday. We’ll plan on filing our next update at that time.

Posted By: mreiss | Time: 04:49:55 PM | E-mail | Link

Bill's follow-up

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