Might as well start the war with the New Orleans sports media nice and early. The Times-Picayune of New Orleans has a piece up by Peter Finney today, looking forward to the showdown between the unbeaten Saints and the Patriots a week from tonight.
In looking toward the game, Finney says:
Despite three losses, the New England Patriots speak for themselves, a perennial contender whose coach speaks to no one.
Finney is going by the commonly-held belief, especially among those outside New England, and in the national media, that the Patriots coach just doesn’t speak to or cooperate with the media.
Apparently Finney didn’t catch Belichick’s press conference this morning, which begins on a light note (the microphone was too high for the coach) and proceeds to talk about missing out on Wes Welker in the draft, and then (about 16 minutes in) getting into a fantastic in-depth conversation about roster decisions and what goes into them. Mike Reiss for one, really appreciated the session with Belichick.
One of the many misperceptions that the media puts out there about Belichick is that he doesn’t give anything to the media. In fact, it is the exact opposite.
While Belichick doesn’t give injury or contract information and doesn’t play the human interest or cliché game that some columnists are after, when it comes to pure football talk, few speak more and none provide anywhere near as much insight. It would be nice if some in the media, both locally and nationally acknowledged that fact.
The coach who “speaks to no one” followed that press conference with a one-on-one session with WCVB’s Mike Lynch, and then with radio call-ins to WFAN-New York and SIRIUS NFL Radio, and will appear on WEEI’s Big Show in the 5:00pm hour today.
