Now retired, former defensive back Devin McCourty has removed the Stepford Patriot chip and begun speaking truth about his time in New England. In one specific story that he shared in an appearance on Chris Long’s Green Light podcast, Devin McCourty ostensibly praised Patriots assistant coach Steve Belichick. In so doing, however, McCourty shed plenty of light on the realities of it’s-not-what-you-know-it’s-who-you’re-related-to life in the NFL.
“The one thing that I’ve loved about Steve is his honesty,” McCourty said, via Zack Cox of NESN.com. “I remember Steve takes over [after] Pat Graham left, [Brian Flores] is moving to linebackers coach, and Steve said Bill tells him two weeks before the offseason program starts that he’s going to be the safeties coach.
“Now he’s walking in the room, it’s me, Pat Chung, Duron Harmon, Nate Ebner. We’ve got all these veterans — I’m older than Steve, Pat’s older than Steve, he played with Duron [at Rutgers] and he’s probably the same age as Nate — and he walks in and goes, ‘Yo, I’m going to be honest with y’all. I don’t know what the eff I’m doing right now. My dad told me two weeks ago that I was even going to have this job.’ And now I’m just sitting here like, ‘I don’t know, what’s next?’ And that first year, we all just worked together.
“So now when I look at him, I think his growth has come because of the honesty, not coming in saying, ‘My dad is Bill Belichick. I was born to coach. I’m going to do this.’ No, he came in and was like, I’m going to learn from some veterans that l’ve got in this room, take advantage of that opportunity that I get, and I’m going to grow as a coach.”
What McCourty is missing is the fact that Steve Belichick only got the chance to coach safeties despite not knowing ‘what the eff I’m doing right now’ because his dad is Bill Belichick.
Surely, there were plenty of more qualified candidates who would have known “what the eff I’m doing right now.” But they didn’t get the opportunity to do the job, because the son of the head coach did.