Pigskins: The Sequel

In a move that literally everyone saw coming, the New England Patriots have hired Bill O'Brien as Offensive Coordinator.

Good thing. The lack of suspense was killing me.

While there are still problems to be solved, work to be done, rocks that need to be turned over, the good citizens of Patriots Nation are heaving a collective sigh of relief today. (A much better feeling than the dry heaves the end of the 2022 season left us with, even if they have done wonders for our abs.) Our pigskin heroes - and in particular, QB Mac Jones - now have an Offensive Coordinator with actual Offensive Coordinator bona fides. We know this because we already saw it first hand back in the aughts. 

Were there better choices? Maybe more interesting choices. Yes, I wanted Kliff Kingsbury but once he said he needed a bridge year, O'Brien made the most sense. I think you can oversell his familiarity with Mac Jones but I don't even want to think about what Jones playing with another first time Offensive Coordinator in 2023 would've looked like. If there were questions about Belichick's commitment to Mac Jones, I do think this move is a vote of confidence for McCorkle. Maybe Bill Belichick saw that IG post and how Jones' teammates responded, too. Belichick respects the locker room and understands just how important those dynamics are to team success. And say this for Belichick, too; when he makes a mistake - and let's face it, the Matt Patricia experiment left a smoking hole in the earth the size of Gillette Stadium - he corrects it.

Maybe Bill Belichick just doesn't want to go out like that 2022 season.

For me, the indelible image of Bill O'Brien as Pats OC was his screaming fight with Tom Brady on the sidelines of a game (my actual favorite part of that is Brian Hoyer just kind of slipping in between the two, with a kind of "Oh, were you two talking?" kind of look on his face). Can't say O'Brien doesn't care, I suppose. 

If you were thinking the Pats needed someone to teach McCorkle the finer points of sideline etiquette, you may not be that happy with this hire. 

But I'm not one of those people. 

I want fire. 

I want all the smoke. 

Let's go?

Let's fucking go!