But when Belichick was asked if the play of rookie linebacker Brandon Spikes reminds him of anyone from his past, what followed was as interesting an explanation as we’ve gotten in a while.
“I’m not really sure what his style is,” Belichick began, at this morning’s news conference. “Our defense is a lot different from what they ran at Florida. Obviously, he’s a big, physical guy, but now that we’ve had him in our defense a little bit. I think he’s got some unique skills… He does a lot of things well. It’s kind of not by the book, but effective. I don’t know. It’ll be interesting to see how he (does).”
Hmmmm…. and he was just getting started. Spikes was a consensus All-American at Florida, one of the sickest linebackers I saw in five years covering the SEC. I’ll never forget asking Alabama linebacker Rolando McClain if he was the nation’s best linebacker and having him decline to answer because he knew of Spikes’ talent.
And Belichick didn’t seem to be saying anything bad at all. In fact, he seemed to relish the intriguing coaching that’s been happening.
“Just talking to him this morning about a couple things that he was doing…” Belichick continued. “They’re not exactly the way that everybody does them, but he does them effectively, and I don’t think you need to change it. But I think it’s a little bit different. So how he adapts to certain situations might not be the same as, say, the way Jerod (Mayo) or Gary (Guyton) or somebody else does it. But I think he does it and has done it effectively. It’ll be interesting to see how those things come together. Some may change and become a little more conventional, some may be a little less conventional, but hopefully just as effective. He’s an interesting player to coach.”
That was what I was left with… that Belichick thinks this is all pretty cool. He often waxes poetically about instinctive players from his past… will Spikes be one?
“He sees some things that, I’m not sure everybody sees,” Belichick said. “I mean, he’s an instinctive player. I don’t know if he’s exactly the textbook way that you would read the plays, but he reads them. It’s interesting to work him into our system again, and being a 4-3 middle linebacker in the front and system they played, which just different from what we do, and now he’s playing more on the guard and being uncovered as opposed to being covered playing behind a defensive guy. Just a little bit different. He does things well, but a little bit of a transition, but a good one.”
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