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Jerod Mayo responds to Bill Belichick’s criticism, social-media posts by players
"As soon as we turn this thing around, then we’ll be OK."
FOXBOROUGH — Bill Belichick clearly has a bone to pick with Jerod Mayo and the Patriots are getting fired in January.
And after Mayo opened himself up to criticism by initially labeling the Patriots as a “soft” team on Sunday, Belichick has taken several opportunities to call out New England’s new head coach and defend his former players.
“I’m kind of hurt for those guys because to call them soft — they’re not soft, they were the best team in the league last year against the run,” Belichick said of his former players Monday on ESPN’s “The Pat McAfee Show”. “Those guys went out there and did it even though we couldn’t score many points offensively, so I don’t know — I feel bad for the defensive players on that one because that’s a tough group.”
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Belichick continued his salvo against Mayo on Monday night during his appearance on the “Let’s Go!” podcast with Jim Gray and Tom Brady.
“I think when you criticize your team publicly like that, it doesn’t always go over well,” Belichick said. “Now, every coach has their own style and maybe sometimes that can be effective and all, but ultimately I always felt like when a team played bad, that was my responsibility, too.
“We might’ve had bad playing, but we had bad coaching that led to bad playing. So I think it’s always best to kind of take a look at yourself and do what you can do to help the team. And then, you know, if you have constructive criticism as a coach, that’s your job.”
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Speaking on Wednesday morning, Mayo was asked if he was disappointed to see his former coach dole out multiple criticisms toward him.
Perhaps in his most fitting tribute to Belichick, Mayo opted to look ahead instead of harp on the verbal barbs doled out against him.
“Like I said, my main focus is the guys inside of this building,” Mayo noted. “Not only the players, but the coaches and the rest of the staff. As soon as we turn this thing around, then we’ll be OK. It comes down to wins and losses. Like, that’s what it comes down to and that’s what you’re ultimately judged by.”
For most of Wednesday’s press conference, Mayo did a solid impression of Belichick’s tried-and-true media maneuvers — shifting talk of his comments and last week’s loss to the Jaguars into a focus on New England’s upcoming home game against the Jets.
“The message for those guys — it’s all about the Jets, and we’re moving forward,” Mayo said. “Obviously, there’s a lot of noise out there. And I said, we are what our record is. We have to get better. That, ultimately, is my responsibility. And look, I take all the blame. It’s fine. It’s moving onto the Jets.”
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Even with Belichick’s pointed comments, veteran defensive tackle Davon Godchaux said that he didn’t take much from both Belichick and Mayo’s recent quotes about the team.”
“I don’t think Bill means no harm,” Godchaux said, per Alex Barth of 98.5 The Sports Hub. “I think people took it the wrong way … like I think people took Jerod the wrong way [calling the team soft].”
While some of the aforementioned “noise” described by Mayo was self-inflicted after his immediate postgame comments on Sunday, a pair of Patriots wide receivers have also made their coach’s job more difficult because of social media.
Mayo had to field questions on Monday about both rookie Ja’Lynn Polk’s cryptic Instagram post following a disappointing game in London and KJ Osborn posting an exchange between him and sports agent Brandon Abdala about his role on the team’s depth chart.
Even with those distractions, Mayo stressed on Wednesday that the Patriots won’t change their stance on social-media usage or implore players to avoid using it as an outlet moving forward.
“For me, it is what it is,” Mayo said. “Like if you’re winning games, there’ll be noise. I mean, we’ve done this for a long time. It’s very cyclical. Sometimes narratives are already written, it’s just about a different cast of characters.
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“What I would say is we know that the only people who can go out there and win football games — it’s not the media, it’s not your mom calling you and telling you X, Y, and Z, or someone at the grocery store. No, it’s about the guys that are in this building.”
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