Mike Vrabel discusses decisions to be made on Patriots front office and coordinators

17 hours ago 1

After firing head coach Jerod Mayo following a Week 18 win over the Buffalo Bills, the New England Patriots have hired Mike Vrabel as the team's 16th head coach

On Monday, Vrabel met with the media for the first time as head coach, and while he answered many questions, one of the most pressing was about whether or not he had roster control, something that Bill Belichick had but Mayo didn't.

"Well, I think the most important thing is that there's a shared, organizational vision for what we want to do and how we want to work and how we want to acquire players," Vrabel said. "Just excited to sit down with Eliot and his staff. I've met more with Eliot over the weekend. I've had conversations with him, but I need to sit down with his staff and figure out where we're at, what we need to do. I'm confident that those types of decisions are all gonna sort themselves out."

After Mayo's firing, Patriots owner Robert Kraft stated that executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf is expected to stay on, but he also left the door open for front office changes with a new head coach.

New England will also have to fill out a coaching staff under Vrabel, something that the former linebacker said isn't finished yet.

"No, that's far from solidified," Vrabel said. "We want to put the most talented coaches in front of our players. When they stand in front of these players, I want the players to embrace what every coach is teaching. I will tell you this. As, long as I'm the head coach here, our coaches will have three simple jobs...

"They want to teach, they want to develop and they want to inspire our players by making a connection. We're gonna make strong connections with our players, so we can coach them, and we can push them. I've really believed in this system, and I believe in having great teachers, great developers and also coaches that will inspire our men by making a connection, so that they know exactly what makes them tick."

While we don't have the answers yet, it will be very interesting to see who Vrabel ends up recruiting to be his offensive and defensive coordinators in 2025, as they'll have a ton of responsibility.