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In Their Own Words: Tedy Bruschi
Sometimes you just need to sit back and appreciate what a special player Bru was.
https://www.patspropaganda.com/in-their-own-words-tedy-bruschi-sometimes-you/
Look at this! It’s the return of video to PatsProp! I am posting this clip not only because obviously Tedy Bruschi is awesome, but as a reminder of the years of experience that he had that enabled him to make plays. There was a lot of experience gained by a great number of young Patriots this season, experience that will only aid them in the long run.
https://www.patspropaganda.com/look-at-this-its-the-return-of-video-to/
Since it’s Packers week I could’ve been a jerk and posted just the Super Lowlights from 1996. Instead let’s take a look at that whole season which really was when many of the seeds of the first dynasty were planted.
Tedy Bruschi, Willie McGinest, Ty Law, Ted Johnson, Lawyer Milloy and Adam Vinatieri weren’t born clutch players who knew how to perform on the biggest stages. This season was as much a learning process for those guys, where they learned what it would take to win a championship.
On a side note I wouldn’t mind seeing these mid-90’s uniforms brought back as throwbacks at some point. I still have a reversible Drew Bledsoe one that I bust out from time to time.
First we start off with Tom E. Curran’s Patriots go from rebuilding to remarkable. I love when the TEC drops some Patriots positivity on us instead of awkward hand gestures.
Next we have another gem from Mike Lombardi which goes into how the Patriots evolved this off-season and an in depth look at Bill Belichick’s bad weather game philosophy.
Tedy Bruschi is developing a man crush on Devin McCourty, and must be having a hard time containing his homerism while doing ESPN appearances.
Finally we have an excerpt from Peter King where he talks about how the last four seasons have basically proven that the charade known as Spygate didn’t really give the Patriots any kind of an advantage.
New England’s gone from winning two-thirds of its games with the benefit of taping illegally, to winning three-quarters of its games and scoring six points more per game without taping – and with so many new pieces on offense.
Look, the last thing I’m going to do is start dredging up all the Spygate baloney again but finally we can point to some stats when the morons who think the only reason the Pats ever won a game was because they were taping defensive signals start yapping again.
Below is a fan-shot video from last night’s halftime presentation for Tedy Bruschi. I don’t know if Tedy said anything before the game to the team, or if they let him “break it down” in the locker room afterwards (the tradition he started), but it was clear that the Patriots played with a fire that was a defining characteristic of Bruschi’s career.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yc__
Saturday Night, not a bad time for some Bruschi highlights!
https://www.patspropaganda.com/saturday-night-not-a-bad-time-for-some-bruschi/
This season’s addition to the must-listen Patriots list has been Mike Reiss and Tedy Bruschi’s podcast. Nowhere else will you hear two people who are more knowledgeable about the Patriots (unless you count BB’s weekly radio appearances on WEEI’s Big Show).
Tedy was a founding father of the “Patriot Way” and his insight and commentary is as good as it gets. Especially in this setting with Mike Reiss where Bruschi doesn’t need to worry about coming off like he biased towards the Pats.
This week Tedy answered a question that I submitted and I transcribed his answer below.
PatsPropaganda: Was there ever a time that a Bill Belichick game plan really surprised you?
Bruschi: Many times, I remember once we were against the Buffalo Bills. Where the real excitement starts is on 3rd down day. Because once you win on first down, second down you get them in those medium to long situations and that’s when you can throw all these complex schemes at them. We got the game plan and I looked at it and there wasn’t one down lineman. There were a couple defensive ends but everyone was sort of walking around. You could basically not put your hand down so you’d be running around trying to confuse the protection. That was a really different wrinkle we used for the Buffalo Bills one week. Especially when Rob Ryan was there, he’s now the DC of the Cleveland Browns. Him and Bill used to come up with some funky stuff where we would say “Rob-o we need some help deciphering this”. Linebackers were in the A gaps with linemen right next to them. It made it fun and interesting because you knew when you went in there on Wednesday or Thursday you’d have a chance to do something unique.
Some really great stuff from Tedy, though it probably makes a lot of Pats fans squirm to think all those complex and fun defenses were coming from one of the Ryan brothers. It certainly provides some insight into the effect Rob Ryan had on Bill Belichick from a game plan perspective and that type of scheming certainly sounds a lot like Rex’s style as well.
It’s also interesting to note the Patriots busted a similar defense out last season to help generate pressure, this time it was five linebackers and six defensive backs so it was dubbed the “Five and Dime”. But again there were no down lineman and everyone was just wandering around trying to create confusion.
Some Pats fans probably wonder why we don’t see more of this. Personally I think it’s because with a young defense you want them to be able to do the fundamentals first and foremost. Once you have those down (i.e. 2011) you can start to get a little more cute with your defenses and how you disguise them.
From the real 54 to the fan 54….