New England officially introduced Vrabel as their next head coach on Monday.
The New England Patriots officially introduced Mike Vrabel as their 16th head coach in franchise history at Gillette Stadium on Monday.
Here are the top takeaways from his availability.
Accountability and entitlement
New England’s new head coach is known for telling it straight. So it wasn’t a surprise to see Vrabel use his opening press conference to send a direct message to his new players about the process of starting over.
“Everybody got here and will get here through a different avenue. Maybe we drafted them. Maybe we signed them as a free agent. Maybe we will sign them as a free agent. But none of that will matter,” Vrabel said.
Among the starting over process could lead to some major changes for some already on the roster, which Robert Kraft noted that Vrabel is already quite familiar.
“We’re going to earn the right to be here every day. We’re going to remove entitlement from our football team,” he said.
After a season in which New England lacked an identity both on and off the field, the hiring of Vrabel brings a proven culture builder back into the organization. That culture is solely centered around accountability.
“I want to provide a program that provides their ownership but also their accountability of each other and one that they’ll be proud to be a part of and that they’re going to fight for,” Vrabel said.
“When you get hit in the mouth or you’re down or the chips are against you, then you can take a snapshot of what your company or your team looks like, and then you’ll find out what kind of culture you have. But that culture is going to be built on winning, a competitive spirit throughout our roster and throughout our players and throughout our coaches and our staff and the ability to put the team first and care about somebody other than yourself.”
Front office
Perhaps the biggest question following the hiring of Mike Vrabel was what happens next with the personnel department? Vrabel mentioned current Executive Vice President of Player Personal Eliot Wolf, who was in attendance on Monday, on multiple occasions and how the most important thing for the organization is a shared vision “for what we want to do and how we want to work and how we want to acquire players.”
While there was no clarity on who will ultimately have final say on roster decisions, Vrabel did allude to changes on the coaching staff and in the front office.
“Eliot and I will have conversations,” he said. “As it relates to the staff, nothing’s been finalized. Nothing’s been determined. As with any staff, there’s going to be turnover. There’s going to be new coaches and new faces, some that I will have history with and some that I won’t.”
As for the reported hire of experienced front office staffer Ryan Cowden, who worked with Vrabel in Tennessee, Vrabel would not confirm his additional to the personnel department. Cowden is reportedly set to join under Wolf, which Vrabel knows will create a positive dynamic of people being on different pages at times.
“I’m just excited to sit down with Eliot and his staff,” he said. “We don’t always want to be on the same page. That’s not the environment we want to create. But we want to have a shared vision, and there’s also different ways to get there. I’m embracing that everyone’s going to have a different personality… We’re going to have diverse ideas, and that’s critical, and to be able to have those types of conversations is something I’m looking forward to.”
Coordinators
Changes will also be coming to the coaching staff, where Vrabel will make two key hires with his offensive and defensive coordinators. Despite some rumblings of Josh McDaniels and Tommy Reese for the offensive coordinator position, Vrabel said his plans are “far from solidified.”
As for any coach on Vrabel’s staff, they will have three jobs.
“They want to teach, they want to develop, and they want to inspire our players by making a connection,” Vrabel explained. “We’re going to make strong connections with our players so that we can coach them and we can push them. I’ve really believed in this system, and I believe in having great teachers, great developers, and also coaches that will inspire our men by making a connection so that they know exactly what makes them tick.”
Along the offensive side of the football, the key for Vrabel will be aggressiveness but not recklessness as he tailors things to his player’s strengths.
“We have to be able to take chances,” he added. “The creativity. We want to be, I would say, versatile enough if the players can handle it. You look at zone scheme in the run game, being able to run gap scheme to things that the defense may do, be under center, be in the gun.
“But it’s also important to understand that everybody has access to this and everybody has experience with different types of offense, but it’s what the players can get good at. How much can you reasonably do?”
The biggest thing Vrabel’s offense must do is maximize 22-year-old quarterback Drake Maye. The dynamic QB was one of the reasons this job was his top choice, and now surrounding him with great people is the top goal.
“Drake is going to be his own person, but I’m going to give him some things that I feel like are necessary to help us win football games,” said Vrabel. “We have to be a very efficient passing football team.”
Building the trenches
On a roster that is currently depleted of talent, Vrabel will have roughly $130 million dollars in cap space and the No. 4 pick in the upcoming NFL Draft to help restock the roster. As his teams have always played a tough brand of football, it was no surprise that his focus centered on rebuilding the trenches.
“You look at the teams that are able to protect the quarterback and dictate the flow of the game offensively, making sure that up front we’re sound, we’re strong, whether that’s through free agency or the draft, that’s something that’s critical,” Vrabel said.
“The D-linemen, they’re getting better every year. They’re getting more disruptive. They’re getting bigger, more powerful. So as they try to disrupt our quarterback, we have to have some things that counterbalance that.”
It’s no secret the Patriots offensive and defensive lines were a weak point on the roster last season. Beyond ranking near the bottom of the league in pass block win rate on the offensive side of the football, New England’s defensive front ranked similarity in run defense and pressure rate.
“When you look at statistically what wins in the National Football League, our ability to affect the other team’s quarterback and our ability to provide for an efficient quarterback and passing game is a high contributor to success,” Vrabel explained. “There’s a lot of ways to do that — by protecting the middle of the pocket and all those things that we’re going to talk about as we move forward.”