Morning sports update: Why Rob Ninkovich believes Bill Belichick will stay around for Patriots rebuild
"He loves that process, so I do not see him going anywhere else except for being the head coach of the Patriots."
The Patriots were thoroughly beaten by the Rams on Thursday, 24-3. The loss means New England is now 6-7, and facing an increasingly desperate playoff picture.
After the game, Bill Belichick insisted that Cam Newton would remain the team’s starting quarterback.
Rob Ninkovich thinks Bill Belichick will stay around: Given that the Patriots’ playoff odds fell to approximately six percent after the loss to the Rams on Thursday, analysts are beginning to assess the team’s future.
Looking beyond the 2020 season, New England’s path forward is — for the first time in decades — unclear. With Tom Brady gone, the next major question falls on the status of Belichick.
The legendary 68-year-old coach has been with the Patriots since 2000, leading the franchise on what has been the most successful run in modern NFL history with six Super Bowl wins.
But would he want to see the team through a potential multi-year rebuilding process?
One former Patriot, Rob Ninkovich, thinks that the longtime coach might do just that.
“Yeah I do,” Ninkovich responded during a Friday segment on “Get Up!,” ESPN’s morning sports talk program. “I think he wants to continue coaching. He still loves coaching. I think he’ll coach as long as his health will allow him to coach.”
For Ninkovich, an important aspect of Belichick’s possible motivation to stay are his sons being on the Patriots’ coaching staff.
“You look at the things he has, as far as his sons with him in that building,” Ninkovich explained. “We all know that coaches put a lot of time in early. When you have kids, and you’re not able to be around them, I think he enjoys the process of having his two sons, Stephen and Brian, with him in the building, learning underneath him.
Stephen (outside linebackers coach) and Brian (safeties coach) are both a source of enjoyment for their father in his day-to-day, as he recently explained.
On top of that, Ninkovich still sees Belichick enjoying the fundamental tasks involved with coaching and leading the Patriots’ organization.
“He still loves the game, he loves the process, breaking down film, going through contract negotiations, evaluating players,” Ninkovich added. “You see him taking the trips out to schools. Before COVID, he’d be at all the colleges, evaluating the players, going to workouts. He loves that process, so I do not see him going anywhere else except for being the head coach of the Patriots.”
Trivia: The last (and only) Patriots team to make the playoffs at 9-7 was in the 1998 season. Who was New England’s leading rusher that season?
(Answer at the bottom).
Hint: He was a first-round pick out of the University of Georgia.
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- Lawrence Guy on the Patriots’ playoff chances: ‘We ain’t a bunch of quitters’
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Cam Newton’s postgame press conference
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On this day: In 2001, Antoine Walker scored 42 for the Celtics in a 102-93 win over the Knicks.
Daily highlight: Patriots cornerback Myles Bryant provided New England’s play of the game on Thursday with this rolling interception.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CIo-rTgJ3-g/
Trivia answer: Robert Edwards
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