The Patriots Could Have Bill O'Brien's Understudy In House Already

The Boston Herald did a story with anonymous sources about problems in the locker room and dysfunction with the Patriots altogether. A lot of blame is on The two former head coaches but my mind is thinking something else. I blame Bill Belichick.

Joe Judge with everything seen from his time with the Giants and with everything that has come out about the 2022 Patriots season, needs to stay a special teams coordinator. That's not saying he could not become a head coach again but if he does, he needs to delegate to his coordinators.

Then there's Matt Patricia people slam him for the offense. Matt Patricia's run attack was the 24th best in yards for the league. His offense was 21st in passing yards for the league. His offense was tied for 19th with 19 passing touchdowns and tied for 22nd with 12 rushing touchdowns. That from a guy who had never called offensive plays before.

Was there issues on the offensive side of the ball, yes. Could Patricia have called better plays throughout the season, again yes. But for a first year guy with zero offensive play calling experience, his offense was the 26th. And that says he was not the worst and has room for improvement.

Here's where I part ways from the rest of the Patriots Nation. Bill O'Brien was signed and will not be in New England long. I give him two to three years tops and the Patriots will need an Offensive play caller understudy to learn and be on standby. Most can agree on that but the name I am going to throw out, almost nobody will agree with.

The Patriots have a guy with offensive play calling experience that needs to learn and grow as a coordinator and would benefit from being that understudy. While he wasn't the best, his team wasn't the worst in scoring. And while he didn't move the ball as well as he could've he wasn’t the worst, and that guy is Matt Patricia.

Think about it, Patricia should've had the worst offense in the NFL in 2022, He didn't. In fact his offense almost made it out of the bottom eight in total yards. And both his production in the run and in the pass were below average, not in the trash of the bottom eight for either category.

If Bill O'Brien is going to be here three or more seasons, Matt Patricia needs to be the offensive understudy and be given a ton of homework to learn the job that he already has experience for. However, that's if he wants to take the position.

I am sure there are bunch of people ready to come in and tell me all the reasons why this wouldn't work. But with all the former and current players talking about how smart Patricia is, tell me about how it could work and what steps he would have to take each year to be ready to take over for Billy O. There is a realistic path, regardless of how improbable people might think it to be to have Patricia in that role.