When receivers join the New England Patriots, they face a number of significant hurdles. First, there’s the playbook, which is notoriously large. They have roughly 1,000 passing plays on offense. And then there’s the second hurdle: getting quarterback Tom Brady’s trust.
During an introductory press conference on Thursday, first-round pick N’Keal Harry was informed that Brady is notoriously tough on his receivers.
“That’s something I’m looking forward to,” Harry said. “I’m the type of player that wants to get better, I want to get coached hard, so I’m looking forward to that.”
Basically: bring it on.
The Patriots offense features a number of option routes, where a receiver must read the defense and diagnose the opposing coverage. Typically that’s a quarterback’s job. But in the Patriots offense, both receiver and quarterback must make the same and proper defensive read. Otherwise, Brady will throw the ball one place while the receiver is in another. This takes practice and intellect. It requires the receiver to think like Brady, and it’s not easy to think like a quarterback who is probably the greatest of all time. But Brady isn’t always patient during that learning process, and is known to yell at receivers in the wrong place at the wrong time. Former Patriots receiver Cordarrelle Patterson may have said it best.
“You better get where the hell you need to be at the right time or you ain’t going to get the ball,” Patterson said during the 2018 training camp.
Harry needs to adapt a similar approach — and he seems open to it.
As for the playbook, Harry already has a copy and he’s been studying.
“Like I said earlier, with this transition, it’s all the work you put in, the time you put in, the effort you put in,” he said. “So that’s what I’ve been doing the past couple of weeks and that’s what I’m going to continue to do.”
