The Patriots Finally Have All Their Coordinators. So Who Are These Guys?

Some of you kids aren't old enough to remember, but there was a time in America where the political parties would nominate candidates for President that we hadn't seen before. No, really. Some governor or senator would come along and impress primary voters enough to win the nomination, and we'd have to figure out who that person is and take educated guesses about how they plan to run the country. And when that happened, the experts would always say that the nominees first big decision - the one that will tell us the most about them - is who they choose as a running mate. That's the biggie that would give us a window in their soul and that we can judge them by. That is, until they get elected and all the VP does is stick their foot in their mouth and get us into wars. Then we're supposed to just ignore them. But I digress.

Well we're just getting to know what kind of a leader Jerod Mayo will be in the much more important job of Patriots head coach. (It's one thing to be Commander-in-Chief and running the Executive Branch. Try putting one of those buffoons in charge of managing the game clock or deciding when to throw the challenge flag and see where that gets you.) And after three exhaustive, nationwide searches, he's chosen his running mates/coordinators. Jeremy Springer for special teams. DeMarcus Covington for defense. And Alex Van Pelt for offense. The three decisions he will most be judged by. 

Which begs the question:

Let's take them one at a time. We've already met Springer. 

And as I pointed out, there wasn't a single special teams stat in which the Rams weren't at or near the bottom of the league:

--Field goals made: 74.4%, 3rd lowest in the league

--Extra points made: 86.5%, 2nd lowest

--Kickoff return yards allowed: 26.9 yard average, 5th most

--Kickoff return yards: 16.1 yard average, fewest

--Punting: 39.1 yards net average, 2nd fewest

--Punt returns: 8.3 yard average, 4th fewest

And their DVOA was so bad it was not only three times worse than the second worst team - New England, naturally - it was the sixth worst ever recorded. So we got that going for us. Which is nice. 

So let's look at DeMarcus Covington, who we're somewhat familiar with:

Like Springer, Covington is just 34. Which tracks because for a couple of weeks there, the 37 year old Mayo was the youngest head coach in the league before Seattle hired Mike McDonald. And like Springer, he's been an assistant. The colossal difference is the unit Covington helped coach wasn't dreadfully terrible. On the contrary, not only did the Patriots have one of the better defenses in the game, Covington's defensive line was its major strength. Christian Barmore should've made the Pro Bowl. Davon Godchaux cemented his position as an old school, gap-plugging nose tackle. And rookie Keion White got better and earned increased reps as the year went on. 

And Covington has a history of that sort of thing. In 2019 he was the outside linebackers coach, and got major contributions out of Jamie Collins (career highs with seven sacks and three interceptions) and Kyle Van Noy (6.5 sacks and DPOTW honors after a monster game at Buffalo) for the No. 1 defense in the league. 

If anything, Covington seems to represent continuity on the defensive side of the ball. Because he's the perfect example of how Bill Belichick developed his coaching staff. One of those classic cases of a guy taking a strange, circuitous route to where he's gotten. Covington was actually a wide receiver at Samford. (That's not a typo. Samford is kind of the Stanford of Homewood, Alabama.) Hee was a graduate assistant at a couple of schools before transitioning to defensive line and then becoming the defensive coordinator at Eastern Illinois. Then came to Foxboro in 2017 and worked his way up through the ranks. If he had the same last name as the head coach, the organization would be getting ripped by the talk shows. But this is exactly the sort of hire that Belichick made for 24 years. And it worked out well enough. So Covington gets the benefit of the doubt. 

Which brings us to Van Pelt at OC:

The first order of business is what kind of a system he plans on running. Because as I've stated a bunch of times here, I'm ready to retire the Erhardt-Perkins offense we've been running since Charlie Weis first opened his playbook in 2000. Mothball it. Hoist it to the rafters of The Hall at Patriots Place alongside the John Deere snowplow for future generations to admire. But give me something that produces more points than quarterbacks pointing at receivers in disgust after another 3 & out. 

And it appears that's what we're getting:

Which is fine. West Coast will work for me. Any system that doesn't keep leaving a steady line of failed receiving targets in its wake like fish chum because they couldn't figure out where the expected them to be. After 13.8 points per game, I'm not going to be particular. Any change is welcome. 

The reason I'm not going to pop some benzodiazepines to help calm me down from all this excitement though, is Van Pelt was the Browns OC in name only. The way Belichick would often give his coordinators all the responsibilities but not the title, Cleveland is one of those teams that does the opposite. Because Kevin Stefanski called their plays. What exactly Van Pelt would do on game days, or whether the mic on his headphones even worked, your guess is as good as mine. 

What we do know is that despite the fact the Browns offense was an injury-riddled MASH unit, with only two starts by Nick Chubb, five different starting quarterbacks, and the second lowest passer rating in the league (ahead of only the Jets), they still managed to finish tied for 10th in the league in points, and 11th in total yards. 

The good news is, Van Pelt has called plays a few times, when Stefanski had to miss games with Covid. Including this playoff game against Pittsburgh when the Browns put up a 48-burger:

The bad news is he also called plays in Buffalo for one season. That was in 2009. When the Bills of Ryan Fitzpatrick, Trent Edwards, Fred Jackson (1,000 rushing yards), Marshawn Lynch and Terrell Owens managed to finish 6-10 and 28th in scoring. But if I'm going to judge a man by what he was doing 15 years ago, then that puts the fact I was wearing Jorts and listening to the "Music of Glee" Pandora station on the table. Let ye who is without sin cast the first stone.

So what does any of this mean for a team presumably ready to start over from scratch with a yet-to-be-determined rookie quarterback? Does this mean Van Pelt is the guy you trust to develop your future franchise QB? Again, your guess is as good as mine. Though there is this, for what it's worth:

Having a phenomenal culture guy sounds, to put it mildly, phenomenal. But it's fair to ask then why the Browns fired him after they lost 45-14 in the playoffs to Houston. Was he scapegoated to distract from the obvious failures by both Stefanski and his defensive staff? Or was it Van Pelt failing at whatever he was supposed to be doing during that game while not calling the plays? 

More to the point, what did May and the Patriots see in him that they didn't see in the other 10 candidates they interviewed? Is it possible that he got the job because none of the others wanted it? So both sides just settled for each other because there was no one better and it was closing time at the dive bar?

These aren't the kinds of questions I'm used to asking. But when you're on your fourth offensive coordinator in four seasons and just hired two other coordinators are 34-year-olds who have never coordinated before, and one of them just game from coaching a unit that was historically bad? Then your factory setting doesn't tend to be wild optimism. 

Now there's nothing we can do but wait and find out how these guys work out. It's going to be a long offseason.