Patriot Reign

I didn't realise just quite how long it has been since I last posted - time flies when you're having fun (or when you're just incredibly busy). Anyway, I have been continuing to learn by reading interesting books about NFL. The Draft was really good as I had no real idea of what is involved in the draft process. My other half suggested that I read Patriot Reign by Michael Holley next, as it's a fairly easy but interesting read.

Full disclosure before we go any further: I would consider myself a Patriots fan. This is mostly due to the influence of my other half, and having read Patriot Reign, I can totally understand the reasons for choosing to support this team. I'm sure there's a chance the author is a little biased - he is from Boston, so is probably likely to show more favour towards the Patriots than other teams. However, Holley goes into a lot of detail about Bill Belichick and his staff, their way of thinking and doing, and how that is different from what a lot of teams do, and it is clear that Belichick is extremely intelligent and has the ability to see things in non-conventional ways. It is very interesting to understand how players that might not fit into another NFL team would fit into the Patriots team, and vice versa. I get the impression that the Patriots' management is ruthless but fair, giving players a chance even if they don't fit the traditional or conventional criteria used to determine whether they would be good players. Shorter than they 'should' be? Maybe it doesn't even matter - the player might be stronger, or faster.

What I also find amazing is the time and effort put into studying and learning about other teams and how they play, and how to play to beat them. It shouldn't really be surprising, but the fact is that they work incredibly hard. I also love how he seems to find management/coaching teams that gel, how nice Belichick just seems to be, and how much they all really love the game.

It's interesting to learn about how they had to change tactics in order to bounce back from a terrible season and then won a Super Bowl. One of those things that could bring a tear to your eye!

I am trying to keep up with some current NFL affairs as well, reading news on NFL.com. However, with it being off season and me not really knowing a lot about the current college football players, I'm spending most of my NFL learning time reading material such as Patriot Reign in order to better understand the sport, some teams and their processes as a whole. Next up is War Room, also by Michael Holley and mostly focussing on Bill Belichick again. Onwards!

Drafts

As mentioned in my previous two posts, I've been reading The Draft by Pete Williams. I'm probably about two thirds of the way through now - work and general life make progress slow! 

It finally settled into the 'year inside the NFL's search for talent' that the front cover promised. I suppose some background knowledge is required at first, hence lots of information about other draft years and how it used to work. It follows 2004-5, and now that I'm a good way through the book I can see which players it was actually following as well.

The outcome of the draft that year hasn't yet been fully revealed, and it's something I have no prior knowledge of. I'm interested to find out what happened (yes, I know I could look it up on the internet but it's not the same). Some of the players I'd heard of and I know they are current NFL stars, but there are plenty that I hadn't heard of, and now I'm not sure whether they a) didn't get drafted, b) got drafted and flopped, c) got drafted and are just 'okay' players who don't have a lot of hype surrounding them or d) got drafted, are pretty good players but have never been in any of my fantasy teams, thus drastically reducing the chance of me having heard of them. 

I knew that college football is a big thing in the States, and I assumed that scouting for the NFL would therefore involve watching a lot of college games. What I didn't know is just how much work goes into scouting on the NFL teams' part, how much work goes into recruiting on agents' parts, and how much preparation is involved for the players themselves. I guess I'd figured that scouts turn up to college games and then pick the players they like (providing they're still available at the time of the team's draft pick). I never realised how much the players are 'shown off' in the pro bowl, senior bowl, pro days etc and had never heard of the combine or the Wonderlic. It's pretty interesting to gain more understanding on how teams/scouts assess players, and how much difference to the players' ratings certain scores are (for example, how quickly they can run forty yards). It's fascinating how tiny, tiny differences in times (fractions of seconds) have such an impact on a player's appeal. Learning things like that make me understand why the money is such a big deal - agents spend thousands of dollars getting their players trained up enough that they put on a good show, with the aim of getting them drafted as high as possible - higher draft picks mean higher signing on fees, which means more money for the agents. And the differences between the first round and even the second round are huge.

So there's still so much to learn. Luckily it's fascinating!

More Reading

I'm still working my way through 'The Draft' as mentioned in my last post. It's still a really enjoyable book, although little things about the amount of assumed prior knowledge annoy me. For example, there is no explanation of certain terms (such as 'redshirting' someone - although my other half informed me that it's a term used in numerous sports), yet when talking about certain people they are reintroduced each time they crop up. I'm assuming the chapters were written independently of each other, but I really don't need reminding each time that Al Groh was (during the years the book is describing) the head coach at the University of Virginia. I learned that the first time it was mentioned.

I guess that the book is written for an American audience which would explain the assumed prior knowledge - I would imagine that even if you don't like football or understand the ins and outs of it, you pick up a certain amount of knowledge just from it being so dominant and omnipresent.

On the whole, I'm still finding the book a great read - it continues to be incredibly interesting and I do keep wanting to find out more. So on I go!