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Another day, another clever Bill Belichick story that helps further prove why he’s the greatest head coach in NFL history.
Cornerback Logan Ryan, who played four seasons in New England before stints with the Tennessee Titans and New York Giants, joined Fox Sports' The Herd with Colin Cowherd and explained how Belichick prepared the Patriots defense differently than other coaches he's played under:
“Talking about the referees," Ryan said explaining the conversations Bill would have with them." Knowing who the umpire is, knowing who the referee is, and knowing what penalties they call the most. If they’re a crew that doesn’t major in defensive pass interference, doesn’t major in defensive holding, we’re going to try and do that a little bit more.”
“I remember wearing gloves the color of the opponents jersey, wearing white gloves if they’re wearing white on the road… so [the referees] can’t see the holding as much, and just kind of playing ‘the game... if they’re going to call a lot of holding then Belichick might put boxing gloves on our hands during the week so we can’t hold at all in practice, so you’re going to cover with your feet.”
You can listen to the full segment from The Herd here:
Ryan went on to explain how the Patriots uniquely covered star wideout Julio Jones against the Falcons in their Super Bowl LI win. Jones was coming off of an NFC Championship game where he tallied nine catches for 180 yards and two touchdowns:
“I remember he had a bad ankle or a bad foot… during that season and he was managing his practices, they were saying he wasn’t practicing that many days because of his foot.
So we went into the game plan [against] Atlanta shadowing him to his good foot, meaning that he could only make breaks off his right foot, so when he’s on this side of the formation we’ll cover these routes, not thinking that he can break off his other foot as efficiently. So, we honestly played leverage versus a guy based off his injured ankle.”
“... he was only targeted four times and that was the least amount of targets he had all season… I think it ended up helping us get a Super Bowl victory.”
After starting 13 games for New England that season, Super Bowl LI was Ryan’s first Super Bowl start of his career. He tallied six tackles in the game, his last in a Patriots uniform:
“[Belichick] just did some things that I never saw or never did before, in my NFL career that I thought was really interesting. Obviously I see why that you try to have every advantage that you can in the game that’s legal.”
Make sure to follow Mike on Twitter @mikekadlick, and follow @WEEI for the latest up-to-date Patriots and Boston sports news!
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