It’s well-documented that rookie quarterbacks struggle against Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots. But why is that?
CBS Sports color analyst and former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo, who worked the Patriots’ Week 2 win over the New Orleans Saints, explained on the broadcast why it’s so difficult for rookie quarterbacks to face the Patriots, and it comes down to analytics.
Romo initially explained that Belichick will occasionally throw out a different formation or scheme late in a game to screw with his team’s man-zone or blitz ratios to keep opposing teams guessing. Then Romo got into why rookie QBs will have trouble against the Patriots.
“A big part of that is when Bill O’Brien goes in and watches tape, he goes, ‘OK, so tell me on third and 3, what’s his tendency? What’s the 65 percent play call?'” Romo said. “And it’s like, ‘Well, it’s 51-49 man vs. zone.’ ‘OK, well what’s the blitz?’ ’51-49.’ That’s where he gets you. He self-scouts himself better than anyone in the league. Belichick is gonna make sure that call was a throwaway to help his self-scout for numbers for the future weeks.”
Veteran quarterbacks who have faced the Patriots and Belichick before might look past those analytics and focus only on the plays that “matter” in a game. But Watson will be making just his second career start and faces an uphill battle to try to beat Belichick. Rookie quarterbacks are 0-8 against the Patriots at Gillette Stadium in the Bill Belichick era (h/t to ESPN’s Mike Reiss for that stat). The Patriots are 15-5 in Belichick’s career against rookie quarterbacks.
Thumbnail photo via Troy Taormina/USA TODAY Sports Images
