Chandler Jones spent four seasons playing for Bill Belichick, and the biggest lesson he learned had nothing to do with football.
Jones began his career in 2012 with the New England Patriots after they selected him 21st overall in the draft. He since has blossomed into one of the top edge rushers in the game, with his best years coming with the Arizona Cardinals.
But the foundation for him was set in New England. And during an appearance on the "NFL Players Podcast" with his former Pats teammate Logan Ryan, he told a great story about how Belichick established a great culture in New England.
“One thing I really admired about Coach Belichick is that I felt like he didn’t just care about the football player part of you. He made sure that you understood the importance of the people around you," Jones said. "And not just your teammates, but also the janitors. Bill, when we first got there, he would put pictures of these people up on a screen. And these would be the janitors, the people that worked in the cafeteria, the nutritionists, and he would ask the rookies and the new people around the facilities, ‘Who is this?’ He made sure the rookies knew who the janitor was, what was their name, where are they from.
“I think doing exercises like that, it goes a long way – I carry that to this day. That’s all I do, and that was instilled into me as a rookie, and even to this day I sit there and I talk to the janitor and I have a conversation just coming from that exercise, and I’m 10 years in. So I’m pretty sure there are a lot of different exercises that he did that kind of carried with me to this day to other teams and it kind of spreads throughout the organization.”
For all the criticism that the Patriots have gotten for not being a “fun” organization, more often than not guys who go through that system marvel at it. And it sounds like that will be part of the team’s fabric well beyond when Belichick leaves the Patriots.
LISTEN on the Audacy App
Sign Up and Follow Audacy Sports
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram