Bill Belichick won’t make this easy for anyone. The New England Patriots coach is going to drag out the team’s quarterback competition until the very last minute. It’s likely he won’t ever formally announce which quarterback has won the starting job. Instead, he’ll send out that quarterback — who will almost certainly be Cam Newton — for the first snap in Week 1. And prior to that point, no one will say for certain that he is the starter.
It seemed to begin on Monday when Belichick would not say when he would decide which man would be QB1.
“I don’t know,” Belichick said Monday on a video conference call. “When we are ready to do it, we’ll do it.”
What the holdup?
It’s just Belichick’s style. The Patriots coach is famous (and infamous) for tightly guarding the organization’s secrets to ensure every competitive advantage over his opponents. If he tells his opponent which quarterback will start in Week 1, they will begin to prepare for that quarterback. While Belichick entertains the possibility that Jarrett Stidham and Brian Hoyer could also be in play, the Miami Dolphins will have to continue to prepare for that possibility.
So while Newton was clearly ahead of Stidham and Hoyer when the Patriots stopped allowing reporters to attend the full practice on Monday (which is typical at this time of year), New England will probably avoid formally handing over the job to Newton. Belichick will probably continue to cast uncertainty upon the starting quarterback job, because it’s one example of him doing “what’s best for the team.”
It’s in his best interest — and the best interest of Newton and the Patriots — to guard this piece of information, because it makes things more challenging for his first opponent, a pesky Dolphins team that upset New England in Week 17 last season.
[vertical-gallery id=93833]