The big thing about preparation and success is the price has to be paid in advance.
You have to put in the work before you get any results.
If you can eliminate all those things then you can actually make progress on being a better football player and and win in games.
Was there ever a time where you kept a player on the roster who might not made it from a talent level but sheer work ethic sort of kept them around not only because they were improving but because they made everybody else prepare harder?
Yeah, absolutely. Let's start with Tom Brady.
Welcome to The Knowledge Project.
I'm your host, Shane Parrish.
In a world where knowledge is power, this podcast is your toolkit for mastering the best what other people have already figured out.
Today's guest is Bill Belichick.
Coach Belichick is an eight -time Super Bowl champion who's widely considered the greatest football coach of all time.
He is the only head coach in NFL history to win six Super Bowls, all with the New England Patriots.
He's currently the head coach of the University of North Carolina football team.
And this conversation needs no introduction.
This is amazing. I'm so happy to have coach Belichick on.
It's time to listen and learn.
When I thought about where to start, I think the place that came to mind was the sign you had in the Patriots facility.
And as every employee walked in, they read these four things.
Do your job, work hard, be attentive, and put the team first. Right.
Why did you want everybody in the organization to read that on the way into work?
Well, that's really our game plan every day.
It didn't matter whether it was a day in the off -season, a day in training camp, or the day before the AFC Championship Game, or the day of the AFC Championship Game.
Those things never really changed, that we all had a job to do whatever that happened to be, every job was important, every member of the team was important that they do their job well, and being attentive and working hard is really the formula to getting better.
That's how you improve.
You figure out what it is you need to do better and that's by being attentive and listening to people who can instruct you or help you get better and then putting the work into to make that positive change, then always thinking team first. That's that's always the most important thing what do we need to do to win and what can I do to contribute to winning clause.
And so, regardless of what the task was, what was a coach, a player, staff member, really any employee, it kind of fit for all of them.
So, and again, because we played and practiced in the same facility, as I said, it didn't matter whether it was the AFC championship game or whether it was a day in March or a day in June, it was the same every day and so we strove for that consistency.
What does it mean to work hard?
There was a term in your book that stuck out to me called eye wash.
Working hard. Sometimes people can come in and put in their time and check the box.
You know, player can come in, put on his gear, go out, run around, break a sweat, take a shower and say, well, I, you know, I practiced today I, well, but if you don't really accomplish anything, then that really is not, not working hard. It's actually we refer to it as a day off.
No days off actually means you come to work and you go to work, you know, come to work, check the box, kill the time, and then leave. You need to be productive while you're there.
So you know, that is really just a way of saying, yes, we're going to put in the work.
But we need to accomplish the things that we set out to accomplish for that day and then build on those tomorrow.
Was there ever a time where you kept a player on the roster who might not have made it from a talent level but sheer work ethic, sort of kept them around, not only because they were improving, but because they made everybody else prepare harder.
Yeah, absolutely. Let's start with Tom Brady.
Tom Brady was a fourth -stream quarterback his rookie year.
He had three players ahead of him and, you know, he just worked his way up and no team keeps four quarterbacks at any level— high school, college, the NFL.
It's really almost unheard of.
And he would be exhibit A Steve Neal.
You know, a guy who never played high school football, never played college football, was a wrestler in college and then became, you know, an offensive guard started for us for seven years, Julian Edelman, who played a quarterback in college and then became a receiver and upon return, two positions that he never played in college in the NFL.
Um, and became very good at them.
So yeah, absolutely.
That work ethic and that day -to -day improvement when you just stack those days together on top of each other for a sustained period of time, it levels out the talent.
Sure talent's important, but guys with a great work ethic and who really are committed to improving can catch a lot of players with more talent who don't work as hard. Is there an example of a player who just had outrageous talent but didn't work hard at all that sort of ended their career a lot earlier or they never made it you know they got to the big league and then they sort of just faded away.
Yeah sure I mean there are lots of them unfortunately you know I referred to one of them in the book that you know talked about coming in and being a running back and you know being a combination of you know two great running backs that were in hall of fame and you know I think he had barely a hundred yards in his entire career.
So it's you know talent's one thing but the application of turning that talent into being a productive football player and a great teammate is is it's hard to do it.
It's not that easy and talent gets you through high school, it might get you through college but once you get to the NFL level that talent that field levels out and there are only a few players that have such elite talent that they they don't have to work very hard and stayed better than a lot of their competitors, for the other 95%, if they don't stay on it, they're either going to get replaced or in a lot of cases, players that don't trade hard will get injured and their careers will get cut short that way because they don't, you know, commit to a good training regimen.
Are competitive people competitive everywhere?
I think of like you, Michael Jordan, Tom Brady, and you're always competitive in everything everything you're doing and I'm wondering if that's a trait of hyper competitive people or just the ones that reach the pinnacle of success.
No I think it's I think it transcends everything it's unbelievable how competitive guys are a literally over nothing I mean it could be for a t -shirt those guys are making millions of dollars and it's for a for a t -shirt or you know not having to run a couple sprints or an hour later on curfew they'll compete And it, and, and honestly, it isn't even necessarily for the prize at the end.
It's just to be able to say, you know, I won, I competed and, you know, I, I beat you today, or, um, if they don't win just the, the love of the competition, the love of the prize, uh, and, and fighting for that, the, the pride to say, Hey, you know, um, we would have a lot of team competitive events, like, uh, for example, trivia, you know, or know your teammate.
And, you know, ask questions about different teammates of, you know, maybe what position they played in high school or maybe another sport they played or, you know, some other random fact about teammates.
And play offense against defense, or the wide receivers against the DBs, or the O -line against the D -line and the rookies against the veterans.
and you know create different competitions and whether it was free throw shooting or cornhole or trivia or you know all different things like that.
Guys that like to compete love to compete and it was a lot of fun actually to move some of the targets around for the competition.
You know some guys are good at free throws some guys are good at trivia some guys are good you know closest to the hole golf shots you know whatever it is but it's just fun to see compete.
One of the best things we did Shane was we would have usually one of our rookie offensive and defensive linemen would compete against each other to catch a punt.
Right so you put a you know offensive tackle and a defensive tackle back there and and you know you go one at a time and the punter would would punt and you know we'd make sure that it was at least four seconds hang time so you know the ball was up in the air and then whichever you know the other group would have to do extra sprints or the group that one would get out of bed check or you know whatever it was but it was a good way of team building because all the players were rooting for their their guy who had never caught a punt in his life probably right you know watching Vince Wilfork and Matt
Light back there catching punts you know trying to track the ball and catch it and of course I made him punt you know so the returner had the sun in his eyes You know had to deal with that, but you know to watch those guys do something they hadn't done before for some type of reward was you know, it's a great team building exercise and they, but they do, they love to compete.
competitors are, the guys who really love to compete are honestly the guys that get the most out of their talent.
Because they just are determined to work hard, prepare and go right to the very end.
They might not be as talented as somebody else, but they play and compete to the max.
You mentioned the last dance in your book, what was your reaction to watching that?
I mean, I thought it was awesome.
Jordan's one of the greatest competitors in any sport ever and you know just you know his competitive spirit is you know up there with the guys he played with like Lawrence Taylor at North Carolina those guys they still compete all the time on the golf course so I thought it was you know a great insight into it.
You know Brady's a tremendous competitor Julian Edelman Brueske every time about Brueske he came back from stroke and continued to play you know some of those guys Rodney Harrison it's it's just, it's at an elite level, which it should be in the National Football League but it's just at an elite level.
I think one thing that surprised a lot of people when I talk to friends who maybe casually follow sports, it was how much Jordan's teammates had maybe a not -love relationship with him always.
And do you think that's true?
I wasn't around him enough to comment about that.
But I think if you don't really like to compete, then a top competitor will kind of wear you down.
And it kind of, I don't want to say resist to it, but you know just to resist and compete at that level.
So I have seen that from time to time.
But the guys that really love to compete love to compete and they just join in there and compete with them.
One of the things you said in the book is, you cannot win until you keep from losing.
which reminds me of Inversion from Charlie Munger.
What does that mean in a football context?
Oh boy, where we start.
Anything that prevents you from achieving your best, that you control.
So it's not the opponent.
It's something that happens internally.
Examples would be, you know, guys getting suspended for performance enhancing drugs, or guys that wouldn't hydrate and would pull muscle.
You know pull hamstrings, pull grinds, pull calf because they weren't fully hydrated.
Those aren't that's not Buffalo.
That's not the Jets.
That's us and in the game, I'd say two of the biggest examples, well there's a lot of them but let's start with penalties.
Pre -snap penalties.
So penalties that happened before the snap those are our fault and you can't blame them on the other team false start illegal motion and too many men on the field delay a game like all that that's that's our inefficiency that's not our opponents and really for the most part post whistle penalties plays that happen after the whistle of blood has blown hitting a guy out of bounds taunting illegal celebration you know stuff like that where you just get carried away emotionally in the moment and cost your you know, personal fouls roughing the pass or roughing the punt or stuff like that that really
happens after the play is over.
Those are examples of beating yourself.
You know, you can't win until you keep from losing.
Those plays aren't because of what the opponent did.
Those plays are because of either our lack of concentration, communication, discipline, whatever happened to be.
And I'm not just putting on the players, I'll put it on the coaches, too.
You know, that's our responsibility to eliminate those.
And other things, turnovers, for example, when when the offense turns the ball over and the defense doesn't make a good play, it's just the offense fumbling a snap, fumbling a hand off.
The ball goes off of receiver's hands, pops up in the air and the defense intercepts it.
Plays like that that don't have anything to do really with good defense, the offense just gives the ball away, you know.
Snap the ball over the guy's head, the quarterback's head.
Snap it over the punter's head, drop the snap.
Oh stuff like that just plays that are poorly executed by us.
So as you can see, it's a long list, Shane.
Uh, some of them are off the field and some of them, you know, some of them are on the field, you know, in college football would be, you know, being academically ineligible.
I mean, that's, you know, that's not your opponent's fault.
That's, you know, that's, that's a lack of commitment and, uh, you know, doing the required academic work to be eligible to play.
So those are all the examples of you can't win until you keep from And if you can eliminate all of those things, then you can actually make progress on being a better football player and winning games.
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I remember reading something a while ago, but the difference between being beaten and losing and it sounds like what you're saying there is kind of hinting at that.
Yeah absolutely. You know we've always said more games are lost than won in the National Football League and when I say lost I'm saying those type of things missed opportunities, missed assignments, poor clock management.
Just fumbling the situation more than the other team you know really playing well to win.
A lot of times if you just kind of get out of the way and let the other team make a mistake they'll make one and you can capitalize on and take advantage, not all the time again you know as you go deeper into the season and play better teams and playoffs and things like that that happens less frequently but in a lot of close games when you go back and really look at the way the game the outcome of the game was the team that lost really probably should have won.
Or had many good chances to win.
And just kind of messed it up.
And more than like I said the winning team going out there making all these spectacular plays.
So again the big thing is you know number one keep from losing.
And number two make the plays you're supposed to make.
I mean sure there's some great plays out there.
But before we get to the great plays let's just make the the plays that you know you're supposed to make.
Just the the regular ones, the normal ones, and that's execution, concentration, and discipline to do it all the time.
You tell your players to focus on the drawer, to help them focus on what matters.
What is the drawer and how does it help?
Drawer is a was a saying that that we use to, especially at the end of the year like as you get into the holidays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's, and then the playoffs, you know the end of the season is in sight and wherever you are, you you've put in all the work back into the spring training camp, you know, 10 12 14 regular season games, whatever it is, and now you're really coming, you know, coming down to home stretch. And the drawer was just a way of saying unless it's a family or personal thing that's really important, put it in a drawer dealing with it after the season.
Do you need to go to sign these cards at the mall do you need to you know go look for a new electronic whatever it is now can you put those things aside and just finish the season spend that time on preparation for our opponent spend that time on you know rest recovery training so that you're you're absolutely best when we really need you here in these last few stretch weeks and and as you know you know Shayne when you get to a certain point it's a one -game season.
You know if you lose you're done.
And if you win you got to play another week so when you get into that scenario put it off until next week and if you're in it next week put it off until the week after that.
But this is what we've worked all year for put those things in the drawer and then and then open the drawer when the season's over.
Now we would joke about it and you know guys would say, hey Coach you know my drawer is getting pretty full here so you know what maybe you need a bigger drawer or maybe you need two drawers.
But the idea was to put those things on the back burner and focus on the very special opportunity that we had in front of us, which was playoffs or championships.
One thing that seems to have evolved since you started coaching is that time becomes more fragmented now.
Players have cell phones, they have more distractions, you know, I don't have an hour to sit there and do a meeting.
I have all these competing things for my attention.
And how have cell phones changed the locker room culture and made coaching easier or harder or technology in that way?
Well, first of all, we don't have cell phones and Apple watches and things like that in our meetings so that they're not part of the meetings, but when the meetings are over, you know, a lot of times the guys raised to see what, you know, messages and texts and so forth are there, um, you know, and my thing on that has always been, again, other than, you know, family and very personal situations, you know, the guys that are most important to each of us are the guys in that locker room.
You know, the guys that you, you know, win and lose with, live and die with each day and that you count on them and they count on you.
So it was really very important for us to focus on those relationships and I tried to downplay the, you know, how many likes or thumbs up or whatever you get on different social platforms, I don't even know what those are.
But what's more important is what the guy next to you thinks about you and the respect that you guys have for each other and the trust that you have in each other.
And that's something that, you know, on a football team you just you earn every day.
Every day you come to work as a coach, you know, you earn the trust and respect of your players and your other coaches by being prepared, by showing that you're there to help the team and you can help the team win.
And, again it's the same thing for every player and when you earn that every day you build that trust and you build a cohesive team and when you don't, you know, those are the players that again that other players don't don't trust as much. Is he going to run the right route, is he going to be at the right depth, is he going to block the right guys, is he going to be in the right gap and that causes when you don't know what your teammates going to do, that causes a lot of hesitation on your part and you're kind of waiting to see what he's going to do instead of knowing what he's going do and then
you can aggressively do your job because you're confident of the people beside you and I learned a lot about that with the especially with the Navy SEALs those elite teams I mean you know Blue Angels would be another example.
You know those guys fly 18 inches apart and you know the amount of trust and preparation and in teamwork that's involved in something like that going you know 600 miles an hour or seven or whatever it is is pretty amazing but you know the SEALs it's the same thing like everybody's got a job to and you learn your teammates so well that you can, even in a dark room, you know pick out his, you know, his silhouette or something about him that identifies him and, and you know, each of you count on each other to do their jobs and accomplish the missions.
And you know that's, obviously, that's at the highest level football.
We're not talking about life and death here, but we are talking about the championship level of performance of having that same type of trust, and believe, and confidence in your teammates so that you're never questioning what they do.
And you can be more aggressive in doing your job.
And there's never that look over your shoulder of, is he where he's supposed to be?
If you know he is, then you can perform better.
So those are kind of the themes that we try to instill there.
I remember talking to a Navy SEAL once and he said, when things get hard, you're doing for the person next to you when you want to quit or when you want to give up?
Or how much of that is in football too?
I think there's definitely a carryover on that.
You're playing for the team, but you're playing for the guy beside you too.
And especially in a sport like football or in a real battle situation like the Seals are involved in, you're talking about potentially get hurt or or worse in a SEAL situation where you know that guy beside you like you have to count on him to do his job and you do yours for the same reason to protect each other.
One of your most famous press conferences you said snapface or something and I literally spit out my water when I heard you say that.
I was listening to the about social media you're like snapface or whatever the hell it is like yeah well I've battled those social media platforms and now I'm actually on one, so college football has kind of changed that a little bit.
I mean I'm not too active on it but I am on it but but again look, I don't really have anything per se against social media it's just you know prioritizing it and as I said I think that in a football locker room the relationships between the players, the team and the coaches are are paramount more so than people you've never met or seen or or heard of before, what their opinions are, and so I always try to encourage our players to not be too consumed with that, but, you know, don't worry about the guy next to you.
That's the one that matters the most. How is technology changing the way that players prepare in the sense of, you know, the story that comes to mind is certain Jayden Daniels' last year using VR to get more reps.
Walk me through how technologies changing and where it's really impacting people who are willing to put in the work.
Yeah, that system that Jaden Daniels was referring to is one that he used at LSU and then also used with the commanders last year.
It's actually one that we have as well.
It's one that's very hard to get.
It's only available very selectively and so I'm pretty familiar with it.
And it's an incredible system that enables you to see the game in a pair of goggles in real life and real space and it actually feels like you're getting hit, it feels like you're right in the middle of the game, but you're actually able to see things, what you do and then you can program in, what your opponents do to create a very realistic picture.
And then you're also able to adjust the speed so you could actually play the game at, let's call it 105 or 110 percent of the actual speed so that theoretically you're having to even quicker than you would in a real game situation.
So, I can see, you know, how that could really help especially for skill positions like quarterback or you know, positions like that where you can, you have to see a lot of things very quickly and identify quickly what, you know, what decision you're gonna make.
That's true of every position but quarterback especially when talk about distributing the ball, and also for a player who's injured.
So, let's just say that you had a leg injury and you weren't able to practice or run full speed for a couple of days, you could actually see the game through this product and get your recognition, your reads, without actually having to run and, you know, be involved in in a situation that physically you're just not you know not ready for.
But I'd say a lot of the other technology is just you know things that maybe make it go a little bit faster ways of grouping plays together grouping situations together that you know allow you to research and analyze those things a little bit quicker.
But that's probably about across the board about the same for everybody they all we all have the same opportunity on that.
I mean Ultimately, a lot of those situations come down to preparation, but also maybe a gut feel of the way the game is going.
You said in your book, the price of success is paid in preparation.
But you also said it was a way of working.
What did you mean by that?
Well, I think the big thing about preparation and success is, is the price has to be paid in advance.
You have to put in the work before you get any results.
So there's no way to honestly know how good your preparation is or isn't, that's why I always try to emphasize keep preparing, keep working, you don't know what the other guy's doing.
He might be, you know, working just as hard as you are and that preparation, you know, it can't be after the fact or they, oh, I wish I would have studied more.
It's too late at that point, you have to do it on the front end.
So, um, getting in condition, um, you know, studying, preparing all your film and your opponents and all that.
Like those things are, are all have to be done on the front end.
And, you know, a lot of times, uh, there's, I'd say a little bit of a tendancy to just sort of let up on the preparation.
Well, I've watched them film.
Well, I've done some extra sprints.
Well, I've done this.
I've done that. Well, is that, is that enough?
You know, is it really enough?
And if you do more will it make a difference, not to the point of diminishing returns, but to the point of, you know, comprehensive preparation.
So, that's really what we try to emphasize on that.
The way that I think about that is sort of the, you know, the pain of losing is sharp, but it's over fairly quickly.
But the pain of regret, not putting in the work, not doing the things you didn't leave it all in the field that lasts forever.
Exactly. that's exactly it.
The pain of regret is much more than than the pain of preparation, absolutely.
I think you had a 24 -hour rule sort of after win or losses you have 24 hours to think about it and then you move on.
That's right yeah you play the game you go back you analyze it you what do we do well what do we do poorly what do we need to do better what adjustments should we have made what coaching errors did we make and so forth and then you you factor all that into you know how does that affect this next week.
Sometimes there's a lot of carry -over.
Sometimes the player team you play the following week is completely different and some of those lessons may not really become applicable for a week or two weeks or three weeks until you see a you know similar type of opponent say like a scrambling quarterback you know maybe you play two or three weeks where those quarterbacks aren't too mobile and when you get up against another scrambling quarterback you go back and look at how you know how do we need to handle this better against this type of an opponent so on but yeah you look at all those things after 24 hours win or lose or draw you you take
your lessons and and you decide how you're gonna incorporate any of those things into this week's preparation in practice what we're going to do differently or maybe do more of or do less of whatever it is and then you're done with that and you move on to opponent and and spend the next five days six days whatever it is of just you know digging in on that opponent and and what they do.
Talk to me about the relationship between the best talent in the world and you know you're playing in the NFL you're coaching in the NFL and confidence.
Well again it's all relative you know Shane I mean as good as the players are in the NFL um, the guys on the other side of the ball are pretty good too and uh, you know, I'd say every team generally speaking every team has about, you know, five or six players that are elite.
Have elite payments, elite contracts and then you might have some younger players in their first through fourth year, you know, two or three, four, whatever, those that are elite players that just haven't hit those top contracts yet.
But they don't necessarily match up in the same position.
might have a tackle or might have a guard. You might have a linebacker.
I might have a corner and so forth.
So the way those elite players match up is is very specific from game to game and how you want to match them, your, your matches against theirs and how you want to deal with that is you know that's a big part of it.
I think the confidence thing is really interesting, I think what really separates the great players is their ability to do it even when the bullseyes on their back every week like it was with Tom Brady like it was a Lawrence Taylor like it is a Patrick Mahomes like it is with you know players like that Lamar Jackson and so forth every week the the teams are geared towards stopping those players and game planning against them or putting their best guy on them or how are they going to handle And for those players to continue to be productive in spite of the game plan and attention they get is what truly
makes those players, you know, great and elite.
And I think that, you know, when we had Kobe Bryant come in and talk to our team, I think it was around 2018, 19, somewhere in there.
And, you know, Kobe talked a lot about evolving, you know, and he said, um, you know, look at when I was 22, 23, you know, I could just get the ball and drive by anybody and score.
And he said, I can't do that anymore.
I still score but I found different ways to score.
Moving without the ball, jump shots and you know being better in pick situations and all those kind of things.
That you know he said, I found I found ways to evolve my game.
Because I just couldn't do the things I used to be able to do as well.
But there are other things I found that I can actually do better.
And I thought that was a great message for all of us to hear, that as we go through our careers, do the things that are working, do the things that you can do well, but also, evolve, continue to learn, continue to find ways to be productive that are maybe a little out of your comfort zone, or are not, you know, habitual for you now.
But if you can become good at them, they can be great tools for you.
Are there any other people that you brought to speak from sort of different sports that sort of had a different message that resonated with you or the team and just stands out in your mind?
Oh yeah, we had a lot of them.
Yeah, we had a lot of them and it was great because, you know, just the guys, you know, they hear a lot of football stories but it's good to hear all the ones.
One of the ones I thought was particularly entertaining, a couple of them, one was Paul Asciante.
They won like 14 national championships in a row.
They won like 160 some games in a row, matches in a row.
I mean, and at the Patriots, we were favored in almost every game.
You know, not every game, but most every game for quite a while.
And so yeah, I brought coach Asiante and I said, you know, here's a guy that's won like 13 straight national championships and won 160 some matches in a row.
I'm talking about being favored now, like they're favored.
And in, in like, let's listen to what that's really like.
And he was great. He talked about, it doesn't matter whether you are or aren't or how many you have or haven't won.
Every day is an opportunity and you make the most out of each day and you just get better each day.
And you don't worry about what you've done in the past. You just, you look at today's opportunity and make the most out of it.
It was great. So one of our coach had one of our players takes his hand up and says, Hey, coach. I have a question.
What squash, I thought it was a vegetable.
Jimmy Johnson, you know, we were going into the playoffs and Jimmy came up and he was doing a, you know, a story on somebody.
And I said, Hey, would you mind, you know, talking to the teams and say sure.
So he said, yeah, let me tell you a little playoff story here.
You know, when I was in Dallas, we were getting ready for the playoffs, and we're in a special teams meeting.
I was standing in the back and I see, I see one of our, one of our players back there kind of dozing off and not paying attention.
And he said, he wasn't a, he wasn't a starter, but he played a lot.
in special teams and he said it just really annoyed me and so I went over I flipped on the lights turn the lights on me and I went over to him I said that's it you fall asleep in this meeting uh we don't want you this is your primary job you take your playbook and and go see a job manager you're done you're cut and everybody like whoa you know that woke everybody up and it you know it's right before the playoffs so you know any questions um yeah coach um what would you have done if I'd have been Troy Aikman?
Can you say well I wouldn't have turned on the lights I probably would have gone over to him and nudged and said hey Troy pay attention and the message was if you have a lot of pelts on the wall you you might have a little more slack.
If you don't have a lot of pelts on the wall you don't have any room.
You don't have any room.
You can't live on what you've done because you haven't done enough you better know where you are and until if you're Troy Eggman and Tom Brady you you go but he goes those guys would never do that anyway but you that you might be able to survive that but if you if you don't have that kind of resume you haven't had that kind of production for this team so nobody wants that you're replaceable they'll find somebody else who will stay awake in the meetings and who will be more attentive And it was pretty funny.
I'd just nudge him and say, hey, pay attention.
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Oh, we had a few of those Yeah, we had a few of those And honestly, those are tough ones, you know Shane because when you send a player home it hurts the team.
It doesn't just hurt the player.
It hurts the team, because you need the timing and the communication and the teamwork out there.
But I try to treat them all the same.
But I do think Jimmy Johnson, I believe that.
And Coach Parcells, same thing, did the same thing.
There were certain players got a little more grace than others based on what they had done for us.
And they, I would say, kind of earned that.
So, um, I tried not to do that, but there were times when, you know, when I did, but I try to treat everybody the same, even though they're not all the same.
Uh, but you certainly want everybody to feel that, you know, we're all team members and it's not, um, you know, we don't have, uh, an elite society here.
We have different ranks and certain players can do some things and other players couldn't.
So, I try to make it as consistent as possible, but at the same time, uh, I think have to be flexible in a professional football environment for some latitude and maybe for some it's called exceptions to your rules.
You sent one player home from the Super Bowl for having somebody in his hotel room, was that a hard decision or was that a, how did you make that?
Was that team first and you violated the rules?
You're out or, you know, I made it very clear before we went down there that, you know, it was a business trip and yeah we had a great year and And we were all celebrating the Super Bowl and, and, uh, and what we had accomplished to get there.
Uh, but here are the rules and, and you don't have to break the rules.
Go to the other person's room if you want to be with them.
But our floors are secure.
And, and at the Super Bowl in particular, there's a good reason for that.
Um, you know, with Super Bowl tickets and guys with valuables and stuff like that, if it's not one of our on the floor, I don't know whether that person is a friend of our players or an intruder.
There's really no way to know, and no matter, you know, I mean unless I knew the person for some reason, but you know what I mean?
You just don't know who that person is.
So our policy was, players only on the floor, period.
That's it. And so, um, you know, it was unfortunate because I wasn't trying to say, Hey, you can't have guests or you can't you know be with your friends or your companions or anything that wasn't it.
It's just don't do it on that floor.
Do it somewhere else.
I don't care. And again, I was trying to protect the players by not having people on our floor that we didn't know that could roam in and out of rooms or could you know and if you don't if you don't remove those people then you end up with you know potentially somebody leaves their room and that person walks in then you have a big mess on your hands.
So that was our policy, not just in that game, but everywhere.
But unfortunately, because that game was, you know, we're there for five days.
I just felt like it was a blatant violation of our rule.
I want to come back to confidence for a sec.
One of the followups I meant to ask, was there ever a moment where you had your confidence shaken and how did you handle that?
Oh, plenty of times.
Um, I mean, honestly, Shane, there were times when, you know, I wasn't sure if we were going to win another game the entire year, you know, and you know, we ended up winning a lot of them, you know, but sometimes you just see, um, problems and maybe you want to fix them, but you just don't have the resources to fix them.
Where you've tried a couple of different things and it still, isn't really the way you wanted and you can see in the future some real problems coming up with your opponents and some matchups and whatever the case might be and you're like I mean I don't know like I mean I'm trying to fix this but I just don't feel very confident that that we actually are gonna be able to handle it the way we need to and and ultimately you know in most cases it wasn't maybe as bad as what I thought it might be I was expecting the worst and that usually didn't happen so that's a good thing but yeah I don't know if that's
a lack of confidence or what the exact word is but yeah you definitely have those apprehensions and certainly opening day is a is a is a difficult day because you don't know very much about your team you don't very know very much about your opponent's team and unless you have a really veteran team you don't know exactly how the team is going to react in certain situations, particularly tough and critical and competitive situations.
So, you know, even though you have a good team, how are they going to react when, you know, you're really in a tight ball game and that's something that you don't know until you've been in a few unless you've been in a few with those guys and it's the same guys.
And, when you first started in the NFL, you worked for nothing.
You worked part time for nothing, and then you switched to full time for nothing.
And one of the things that you said was, I did anything and everything.
And I think of this as like a taste for salt water.
You do the hard things, but you were snapping the football, but you were like, oh, the benefit was I got to listen to coach talk to the QB.
Walk me through like how that's changed today and what people miss when they hyper -specialize.
Well I think one thing that that I see with you know some of our younger staff members coaches and things like that is they're very concerned about their title you know.
Can I be the can I get this title, can I get that title and the coaches of you know can I be the run game coordinator, can I be the blitz coordinator, can I be the zone coverage coordinator, can I be the I mean it's like one of those titles for like they don't impress me I know what your job is I mean do you need that title to you know validate what you're doing or is it for somebody else and I'm not really interested in helping somebody else.
I mean we all know what we do here.
I mean honestly I was a general manager for almost 30 years of my NFL career and I never had a general manager title now.
It's never important to me.
I didn't care about what the title is, you just – you do the job that you have to do.
So I see that but for me when I look back at it retrospectively Shane the big thing was I was so low on totem pole that I did all the jobs at the very bottom of the organization.
I shot film, I lined the fields, I moved equipment out there, I ran all Xerox copies, I you know made notebooks, I sharpened pencil, I did all those things.
And as you move up in the organization, it really helped me because I understood how everything functioned, you know, at the, you know, at the level of, you know, making things work, you know, deliveries and, you know, mail and stuff like that.
I mean, all those things that needed to happen.
I understood kind of the process of it, how it worked and what was hard about those jobs and what wasn't hard about those jobs.
And, and as I, you know, gain more responsibility in the organization, I was always able to show appreciation for the people that were doing those.
Like, Hey, I know this is really hard, or Hey, I know, this is a tough week, I could sense what you're going through.
And I think that built some camaraderie and trust there, but also it helped me understand how everything worked.
And there were multiple times when people would come to me and say, oh, coach, we can't do this, you know, we can't do this, we can't do that.
and I said wait a minute I've done that job before we can do that here's how you do it here's this is how you make this work and and so I felt very confident about all the aspects of the organization how they fit together and you know scouting and coaching and I have said equipment and video and security and travel and all those things because I was a part of those in one form or another at different points in my career.
So, I think you know for a lot of people you know when I talk about we need to start at the bottom, you really need to understand how the organization works, there's a lot I want to skip those steps.
There's a lot you know, I just want to jump up and coach the linebackers or the tight ends or whatever it is and I mean that's okay, but it would really help you to understand what happens in an entire organization and if you want to really move up and become a and a head coach those will be very valuable for you because you'll understand you know the different intersections of various departments and how the organization works and where the conflicts are you know and sometimes you just you know kind of two people doing the same thing or nobody doing one thing and you miss that intersection somehow
and that's just part of it but you know how do you avoid those and how you make that more efficient so I I really try to encourage our, are the younger people, you know, to do those jobs and embrace them.
Don't, how quickly can I get done with this so I can go do something else, no, embrace the job and embrace the process and, and, you know, understand it because it's going to help you in the long run.
And the other thing is, you know, as I mentioned a couple of times in the book with, you know, Josh McDaniel's and Nick Asario and Brian Dabel.
If somebody has one of those jobs and they're really good at it, and they say, well, I want to move you, you know, I want to move to more responsibility.
And I said, well, I want you to move to more responsibility too.
But first you got to train somebody to do your job because what you're doing is really valuable.
And that's when Brian Dabel hired Josh McDaniel's to replace him.
That's when Josh McDaniel hired Nick Acerio to place him.
And so, uh, but it forced those guys to make sure that the person that was replacing them was not only good, but they trained them to do the things the way they needed to be done.
And, and that really heightened our efficiency, but also enabled them to move up to responsibility, move up in responsibility.
And so, um, that really worked out well.
I was you know I thought that that was for me that was a good way to handle it because those guys were very invested in making sure their replacement did a good job because they knew they were going back to do that job if if that person if their replacement failed.
A lot of people when you ask them to do sort of the un -glorious task they just look at you and say that's not my job.
Yeah. Yeah it's not my job or I'll get to it you know tomorrow or get to it next week or whatever and those are you know I I mean I don't like to have those type of people you know around when sometimes it's it's inevitable you have to put something off I mean I get that.
But the quicker you get it done the quicker you can move on to something else and be more productive and you know the more you procrastinate it.
And it just slows everything down.
So, there's gotta be a priority system.
I mean, I'm fully aware of that, but people that want to put stuff off and kind of hope that it won't need to get done, they didn't do very well in our organization.
One thing you mentioned that stands out to me, I think of this like stepping stones where people have a job, but they see it as a stepping stone to the next job.
Right. So they're never fully present in the job that they're doing, because they're always looking ahead and those people don't actually tend to do very well at the next level.
Absolutely. And like I said, then they miss some of the things that they really need to understand at the level that they're at.
And again, that's just part of do your job, you know, that's as part of it is, is everybody has an important job to do.
If you're trying to do somebody else's, then you're probably not doing yours well enough and you know, be patient and you know, your, your opportunities will come as long as you show that you can handle the responsibilities that you currently have. But you're right.
A lot of times, there's a big rush to move ahead and that a lot of times also bring sloppy work, incomplete work.
And honestly, just a feeling that I'm not really confident promoting that person because they're more interested in what they are going to be doing than what we need to do right now.
How would you define discipline?
Discipline is, is, is doing the right thing over and over again, doing it every time.
It's just continuing to do it every time.
In the national football league, the players are very skilled and talented and, and I would say, you know, all of them can do something.
Um, they can all go out there and produce, you know, plays at a very high level.
So the discipline is what really separates the players, is their consistency and their discipline to do it over and over again, so you can count and depend on them, you know, at a very high rate.
Are there any stories in your mind that stand out about discipline or consistency involving players you've coached?
Well, I mean, I told the story of Edelman, you know, catching balls before the Super Bowl, tennis balls and stuff like that.
I mean those kind of things that you know the players do, they have a routine and you know if a guy's played eight, nine, ten, whatever years, if they skip a day in their routine.
I mean is it gonna be the end?
Probably not, but they're just so disciplined and so consistent to just continue to do it and maybe even do just a little tiny bit more to make sure that they're prepared for the game.
especially the big games that that's just who they are.
So I mean I really respect that but you know it's a little bit like the shopping cart you know when nobody's looking are you going to take a shopping cart back and put it in the you know where it belongs or just leave it there in the middle of the parking lot.
And it's the same thing with a really disciplined player and teammate.
Is he going to be disciplined to, you know, go in and get treatment after practice, you know, even though it's two days before Christmas, or, you know, whatever it is.
Where is he just disciplined to not let something get in the way of his productive routine.
And that's, you know, the guys that do that, I would say, for the most part, have had very long and productive careers.
And the guys that haven't, have careers that go to a certain point with talent, but they don't have the same, the same kind of longevity and consistency of a player like Matt Slater or Devin McCourty or Tom Brady or guys like that.
People keep saying, you just keep waiting for those guys to drop off whether a year older, they're a year older, they're a year older.
But you don't see the drop -off because their routine and their discipline is so consistent that they're able to sustain that level of performance.
You know, far longer than really what the expectations in some cases are.
Do you believe you can motivate people, and if so, how?
I think you can definitely motivate them.
And it depends on the person.
I think there are different types of motivation.
We could, there were times where I think you could really motivate a player by just flat out challenging them based on something that somebody else said or intimated or something that might have happened in the past. think you could, you know, motivate people by, you know, especially, you know, sometimes maybe a more selfish type of player.
You could motivate by, you know, making him see what the reward is for himself as opposed to the team.
An example I like to use, Shane, is if you have a receiver and you want the receiver to come in and block on a running play, and come in and block a safety which is a hard job you know some receivers don't really want to do that or really not too excited about that they want to catch passes but if you say well look if you come in and block this guy and we need you to block them as a team we need you to block them if you come in and block this guy then the next time we come in and you'll do the same thing but fake it and we'll be able to throw you a pass when the defense comes up to solve the play
well the players not coming in to block them because you asked and to block them and we need really need you to block them.
Julian Edelman would do that, but not everybody would necessarily do that, but when they understand, okay, if I come in and do it this time, that opens up an opportunity for me the next time, then they might do it, right.
And so now, I get what I want he gets what he wants.
There's some management motivation in there, but in the end, both parties are to accomplish their goals.
I get the team goal, the player gets the individual goal, he sacrifices for the team but for the other reasons.
So again, I think there are different methods of doing that.
It really depends on you know how the player is wired and maybe what circumstances you know you can use.
Certainly when you've lost to a team previously, that's a pretty good motivator for most of these guys because you know you you take those losses personally and since we lost as a team that is everybody it's not you know one guy got a pass caught on him or one guy got tackled or I mean it's it's a full team loss so a lot of times you can you know you can generate a lot of energy towards your opponent by you know referencing that you know that that loss or situation that might have happened in a previous encounter.
As a leader, how did you know when to be hard on players and when to sort of back off?
I am thinking, you know, when a player makes a critical mistake in a game and they know they've made a mistake, what's your role in that moment?
Well, again, I think it depends on the state.
You know, if it's, sometimes, you know, something that unexpectedly happens and maybe the player made a bad decision or maybe he did something that he's caught that pass a hundred times and he's dropped it once and this is the one time you know some of those are a little easier to handle I'd say the ones where you know you've told the player 10 times this is what you need to do when this happens and then they don't do it I'd say the reaction is a little bit different in that situation you know how many times they have to be told you know what maybe maybe you know you just don't want to do it we'll
put somebody else in there to do it as I can see that you you're not you know you just don't care enough to follow your assignment so you know it kind of depends on those I think one of the biggest things in football is correcting mistakes and we all make a lot of them but when during the game when time is of the essence and you don't have much time you need to figure out what went wrong pretty quickly and fix it so let's say defensively we came off the field and we'd given up a 20 yard run and maybe a 15 yard pass and another third down conversion and say okay I like what are the issues on these
plays well let's say the 15 -yard run would be if one person knows that that they messed the play up and just says hey it's my fault I messed it up like that was we were in good shape I was right there I should've made the tackle I just missed the tackle I'll make that play the next time well great that it up for everybody.
We all know we're gonna do the same thing we did the last time and this time I know that you know my teammate is gonna make the tackle versus you know kind of a blame game or I was here I don't know I should have been there should I do this and should I do that and what I do deep and this and that and then it's you know what's the issue how do we fix it right and so if you know you did something long just own it all right admit it and and let's move on.
Sometimes it's not that simple sometimes you kind of have to figure out well I did what I thought I was supposed to do you do what you were supposed to do he did what he was supposed to do we still have a problem okay now that needs to be fixed and so but again identifying mistakes and fixing them quickly is really the name of the game and if as a coach you know when I would say look that would that play was it was a bad call I shouldn't have called that defense against that personnel group or against that formation.
That's my fault, it's all me.
I'm not going to do that again.
Forget about that play.
It's not going to come up again because I won't call it again in that situation.
Okay, well then alright, well stop worrying about that play.
Let's worry about something else.
Owning up to those mistakes and making the corrections is key.
If you don't know what it is exactly, then that's when you have to figure it out pretty quickly.
Whether those are players or coaches or some combination, because if you don't you're just gonna keep you know you keep dealing with the same issue over and over again and you know none of us want that.
When I say the words on to Cincinnati what does that mean to you.
On to Cincinnati well it first of all means it was a long night in Kansas City.
You know we got we got totally beaten in that game out coached, out played, out everything they were just a far superior team than we were and as a head coach have to look at that and say, you know, I didn't have our team, you know, where they should have been and we didn't play well, we didn't do anything well, and it starts with me.
But that game's in the books, it's over and there's nothing we can do about it.
We can't get it back.
So, or we just have to move on to Cincinnati and make sure that we don't perform next week like we did last week, you know, don't let one game become two bad games.
Don't let it become three bad games.
Don't let it become a habit change the things that we need to change.
So we played Cincinnati the following week and you know our players did a great job of putting the Kansas City game behind us and focusing on what we needed to improve on and do better and get ready for Cincinnati who was you know a very good football team as well at that time and so you know we're able to do that and you know it It became, you know, one of those catch phrases, but really the idea was move on and let's start getting ready for next week.
It's kind of similar to the situation we had in 2001.
It was a shame where we buried the ball.
You know, we lost to Miami.
We didn't play very well, obviously, didn't coach very well, and we came back and, you know, we just took the team out there.
I got a I dug a hole.
I took the ball. You know, we put it in all ground.
We put the dirt on the ball.
We stomp on it. We spit on it.
We kicked it. We, you know, took our frustrations out but that was the funeral.
Game's over. It's done.
We lost. Buried the ball.
Buried our feelings.
Move on. I'm not saying that was, you know, this great thing, but visually, it sort of, the point of it was, put the game out of your mind, it's over, we've had the funeral, life goes on.
I've heard you say we're building a team, not collecting talent.
What's the difference?
The difference is it so it fits together so that the team is functionally as efficient as it can be.
Not just a bunch of guys wearing the same same uniform with different numbers but a group of people who function well together, you know, as a team and when you think about football, Shane, football is a team of teams right?
You, you have the offense, you have a defense, you have a hands team, you have a punt return team, you have a nickel defense, you have a dime defense, you have a goal line offense and so forth.
You have all these teams and they all come together to form one championship team.
And so you know the idea is whichever team you're on, you need to be the very best team that you can be in that situation.
If it's a hands team, if it's a punt return team, whatever it is like that is critical to our success and you have your responsibilities on that team.
I have my responsibilities on some different teams, but ultimately we all come together, and those shared responsibilities and those shared teams, so that we can operate together functionally as a team, are really what we're trying to accomplish.
So, it's not just getting a bunch of guys who, you know, can do, have good skills and can run fast and jump high or whatever.
I mean that helps of course, but they have to be able to operate as a team and as a team of teams and you know a lot of that is the mentality, is a willingness to communicate and work with and efficiently cooperate with your teammates so that collectively we can accomplish our goals when when our units out on the field.
How has coaching changed in the past five years?
You know outside of rules changes and things like that you know there are some trends and I know I You have to react to the offense right the offense have three as three tight ends on the field You're not going to be playing the same defense that you have when they have three receivers on the field So defensively a lot of what you you have to deal with now You can say look we're gonna play the same thing and make them adjust to us But I mean there are certain matchups that just become You know difficult to sustain that philosophy so Again, what I'd say is it's important to defensively be able
to adapt to what the offense is doing because ultimately you don't control who they put on the field you just have to stop them.
You know offensively on you know you take the talent that you have and try to make the most of it.
So I would say in college football which is where we get our resources from in the NFL.
You know some of that's a function of of what's available you know what's coming out what they're teaching in college what type of players they're developing, because that's really what you have to choose from.
So I do think there are some trends, but fundamentally it really comes down to having good solid fundamentals and doing the little things right that will enable you to win your 1 -on -1 match -ups.
And I would say, I don't think those have changed too dramatically over the years.
On the way out of the building you had a sign that read, ignore the noise, manage expectations, And speak for yourself and don't believe the fuel or hype.
Can you walk me through those?
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Um, Well, speak for yourself as is, you know, pretty obvious.
Um, you know, if you have any comments to make, just make them, you know, personally, you know, don't say things like, well, Shane's looking really good this year, I mean, he should probably have 15 sacks the way he's he's rushing the passer, you know, and start making expectations and reactions for other people, things like that.
Ignore the noise. I mean there's so much air time that's filled whether it's on the radio, on the internet, on TV of people talking about football all right and players and matchups and everything and again with all due respect and look I've been part of that too so I understand but you know, with all due respect, the people that talk about it haven't been in our building.
They haven't watched us practice.
They haven't watched us prepare for the game.
They don't know what our matchups are.
They don't know what, you know, then when our game plan is.
So with all due respect what they say as it relates to us that it doesn't matter.
If other fans want to listen to them I mean, that's great.
But you know when they say well, you know, Shane Parish has got to shut down Belichick or they're gonna lose.
that's you know it's just hot air.
So ignore the noise is just ignore what other people who aren't really no don't know what they're talking about are saying and focus on what the people in our building in this room are saying.
What your teammates are saying.
How they can, how you can communicate with them.
How you can anticipate a play and and help them react to it and that kind of thing you know.
Don't feel the hype you know when things are going good.
I mean people can't wait to you know, you're 3 -0 and they're selling Super Bowl tickets and they're already talking about you know repeats and all this stuff and our thing was don't don't add into that if other people say it we can't control that once we say it now now we have to own it you know and so Belichick says you know, we should be in the AFC Championship game and we've all played four games, well then everybody else has to react to that.
Shane what do you think about what Belichick said, Tom what do you think about what Belichick said, Grock, what do you think about, you know, it just creates a distraction so fueling the hype or believing the hype that four games into the season we're talking about an AFC Championship game is having a ridiculous, it's just way too premature.
So, you know, don't deal with that one.
What was the last one.
Ignore the noise. Don't feel the hype, speak for yourself.
Manage expectations.
Manage expectations.
Right. And so what are realistic expectations this week?
It's to beat the team we're playing.
Like our focus is on beating Buffalo this week.
That's who we play.
That's where we're at.
Um, you know, in terms of winning the division, you know, which is eight weeks away from now, don't talk about winning the division.
like that's not an expectation.
We can't achieve that right now even if we wanted to.
It's only the fourth game of the year.
Now if this was the game to win the division then, okay, let's talk about winning the division but until we get to that point, you know, manage the expectations.
The expectations are to have a good day today, have a good week, and to win this game.
Those are our weekly, you know, and expectations.
You know, not where we're going to be in January, who we're managing expectations of like this guy should go out and you know he should have two hundred two thousand yards receiving.
Why don't you just worry about what you're gonna do and you know stop talking about what other people, what your expectations are for them.
That's speaking for yourself but that's also managing expectations or a player's saying well I expect you know and I expect to go to the Pro Bowl.
Is that your goal to go to the Pro Bowl or is our goal to win a championship and let's go back here for a minute you know what what are our expectations, like let's think about what's first things first. Put the team first, you know, and that's team, teammate, self.
That was the whole, you know, progression of, you know, trying to put the priorities in order for each of us.
I want to end. I usually end with one question about success, but I actually want to change that a little bit here and flip that around.
And I want to talk about the Atlanta Super Bowl.
You're down 28 to three.
And the thing that astounded me as a fan who's watched a lot of football and a lot of games Was that nobody was sort of like hanging their head.
You know, you look at Brady on the sideline You're down 25 points and he still had confidence Yeah, you know Shane, it's funny.
Sometimes you play a game and you feel like you have control of the game But you don't have control of the score and that was that game I felt like we had pretty good control of the game but we didn't control the score at all.
There are other games where you have control of the score and you don't have control of the game.
You know maybe you're ahead by 10 points but, you know, they fumbled, they threw an interception, you've got a lucky break and and you're ahead but you really haven't been able to move the ball, you really haven't been able to stop them, they've just fumbled it away a couple times and you'd kind of maybe got a lucky play to you know get your points and so you feel like you don't have control of the game but you're ahead on the scoreboard and what you really want of course is to have control of the game and control the score.
But in that game we had a real confidence at halftime when it was 21 to 3 that you know we'd given up a touchdown on a third and goal from the 12.
We gave up a pick six.
We fumbled going in.
Um you know we missed some opportunities uh to you know maybe tie or could have even been ahead in the game at halftime 10 -7 or maybe 10 -10, something like that.
And so yeah the score was bad but we felt like we were had control of the game.
Well then they go out and score make it 28 to 3 and now I'm thinking you know we might have the game at 25 points is a lot to make up and there's a lot of things that have to go right.
So two two -point conversions and a strip sack and two kickoffs where we tackled them inside the 15 yard line so they couldn't get in the field goal range and another sack and another holding penalty and literally everything went right for us in the last you know 20 minutes of the game.
There was no lack of confidence because we actually felt like we had control of the game.
We were moving the ball, we were playing good defense but we just had a couple of bad plays in there that that skewed us and skewed the score.
But once that kind of settled down you know we we were okay and and then once we kind of got rolling again we had some plays that we needed to make and we made them you know on both sides of the ball hand and the kicking game on those kickoffs so everything had to go right and and it did and we were very fortunate in that one.
I really appreciate you taking the time today Coach Belichick and thank you for writing the Art of Winning.
I loved reading it it was a great read.
Thanks Shane I appreciate it.
Thanks for the opportunity to be on it was a pleasure, enjoyed speaking with you and I look forward to catching up down the road.
You know I just would be remiss if I didn't you know say how much you know Michael Lombardi has contributed to my career and indirectly to this book.
I mean a lot of the things that that we talk about and I talked about here are things that I share with Mike or that Mike helped me do and you know it's great to be able to work with Mike you know at North Carolina.
But he's a great motivator, very well organized, very efficient, and you know is an excellent partner to you know to build the program down there.
So I really appreciate all of not only Mike's help but his guidance and you know his the daily coach and the you know the motivation that he puts out on a daily basis is something that you We all look forward to and enjoy Carolina.
I'm looking forward to getting down there and watching it, Dan.
I look forward to having you, Shane.
Thanks for listening and learning with us.
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