{"id":102729,"date":"2021-01-23T09:04:23","date_gmt":"2021-01-23T14:04:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=102729"},"modified":"2021-01-23T09:04:23","modified_gmt":"2021-01-23T14:04:23","slug":"matt-patricia-hire-jerod-mayo-steve-belichick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2021\/01\/23\/matt-patricia-hire-jerod-mayo-steve-belichick\/","title":{"rendered":"How the Matt Patricia Hire Affects Jerod Mayo, Steve Belichick"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>For better or worse, former <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/nfl-teams2\/lions\/\" target=\"_self\">Detroit Lions<\/a> head coach<strong> Matt Patricia<\/strong> is back with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/nfl-teams2\/patriots\/\" target=\"_self\">New England Patriots<\/a>. Patricia has a long history in New England, serving as the defensive playcaller in 2010 and 2011 before officially earning the defensive coordinator role from 2012 to 2017. The Patriots didn\u2019t hire a true replacement for Patricia, but <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/B\/BeliSt20.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Steve Belichick<\/a><\/strong> and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/M\/MayoJe99.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jerod Mayo<\/a><\/strong> have served a similar role in 2020. Will Patricia\u2019s return affect these two, and what does <strong>Bill Belichick<\/strong> have in mind for the long-term futures for these three?<\/p>\n<h2>How the Matt Patricia Hire Affects Steve Belichick, Jerod Mayo<\/h2>\n<h4>The Short Term<\/h4>\n<p>Matt Patricia entered the NFL as a defensive coach and has spent his entire career working on the sidelines. However, early reports indicate that this might not be the case moving forward. According to <strong>Albert Breer<\/strong>, Patricia is going to spend his time serving in essentially <strong>Mike Lombardi<\/strong>\u2019s old role. Breer adds that this plan is not finalized, but it\u2019s hard to imagine the role changing significantly since Patricia has already been re-hired.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">My understanding is Patriots coach Bill Belichick and Matt Patricia are working out a role similar to what Mike Lombardi&#39;s was in New England. Again, still a work in progress, but Patricia is expected to work on projects, be a resource to Belichick.<\/p>\n<p>Should be interesting.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Albert Breer (@AlbertBreer) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AlbertBreer\/status\/1352735544653053952?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">January 22, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>For those unfamiliar, Mike Lombardi spent 2014 through 2016 serving as the Assistant to the Coaching Staff. This essentially made him one of the most important personnel evaluators on the team, and New England hasn\u2019t had that role occupied in a while. Patricia doesn\u2019t have the largest background in this regard, but it\u2019s safe to assume Belichick trusts his ability to evaluate talent after working together for such a long time.<\/p>\n<p>This means that, in the short term, Steve Belichick and Jerod Mayo should retain their respective positions. While the Patriots didn\u2019t have an official defensive coordinator in 2020, Steve Belichick essentially served that role as the defensive playcaller. Mayo, meanwhile, is the inside linebackers coach but also had a large influence on the defense. This power dynamic should stay the same in 2021, although changes could be coming after that.<\/p>\n<h4>The Long Term<\/h4>\n<p>Steve Belichick will probably stay in New England for the long haul. After all, he is Bill Belichick\u2019s son and could even inherit the head coaching position if and when his 68-year old father decides to call it a career. Because of this, it\u2019s hard to imagine Belichick\u2019s role changing any time in the near future.<\/p>\n<p>The same cannot be said for Jerod Mayo. Even though he has yet to call a defense, Mayo is <a href=\"https:\/\/profootballtalk.nbcsports.com\/2021\/01\/13\/report-jerod-mayo-is-expected-to-interview-for-eagles-head-coach\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">already receiving interest<\/a> for head coaching positions. Even though he didn\u2019t get the role, Mayo interviewed for Philadelphia\u2019s then-vacant head coaching job and reportedly made a great impression. This shouldn\u2019t come as too much of a surprise, as Mayo was considered a coach on the field during his playing days.<\/p>\n<p>Quite frankly, Mayo\u2019s current situation is very similar to where <strong>Brian Flores<\/strong> was following the 2017 offseason. Like Flores, Mayo is a relatively inexperienced coach that reportedly impressed during his first interview. The lack of experience probably scared the Eagles away, but Mayo should earn a head coaching job at some point in the next two years. When this happens, the Patriots are going to need to fill a massive hole on their coaching staff.<\/p>\n<p>Enter Matt Patricia. Having Patricia work as a coaching assistant is essentially Belichick\u2019s way of holding on to one of his favorite defensive coaches. Patricia and Belichick both know Mayo will move on to bigger and better opportunities before long, at which point Patricia will probably return to the sideline and effectively take over Mayo\u2019s role on the coaching staff.<\/p>\n<p>Main photo:<br \/>\n<a id=\"X9JauuLaTE5_HetFv6ICfw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/914299192\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'X9JauuLaTE5_HetFv6ICfw',sig:'NSVMLRawOTBX-6EMRVsmuCSd0-xjhGP3YbE6GjkaCo4=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'914299192',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How the Matt Patricia Hire Affects Jerod Mayo, Steve Belichick &#8211; What will happen to the defensive coaches with Patricia back in New England?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2376,"featured_media":102731,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6431],"tags":[430,61,5452,1455,38,7311,40,7448],"class_list":["post-102729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-patriots","category-nfl-teams","tag-bill-belichick","tag-football","tag-jerod-mayo","tag-matt-patricia","tag-new-england-patriots","tag-new-england-patriots-roster","tag-nfl","tag-steve-belichick"],"modified_by":"David Latham, Managing Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2376"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}