Projo Pats Blog

Hey all --

We've just concluded a conference call with Patriots coach Bill Belichick, as there is no media access at Gillette Stadium today.

For the most part, Pats players have the day off, but Belichick indicated that there will be some walkthroughs and classroom work as the team prepares for Sunday's game with Pittsburgh.

Though several players said after Monday night's game in Baltimore that physically they were spent after three consecutive prime-time games, Belichick said the time off for the players was not to give them rest but to give the coaches time to prepare a game plan for the Steelers.

"The bigger part of the problem isn’t the players but for coaches to be prepared when the players come in here. Pittsburgh is a hard team to prepare for, and we felt better to take time ourselves from coaching standpoint to get things as close to exactly the way we want them so when do go back to the players we don’t have to make major changes," he said.

The players will be back on the field tomorrow.

Though the Steelers have a new coach, Mike Tomlin, whose background is with the 4-3 defense, Belichick said he hasn't seen much difference in the team's defense because Tomlin retained defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau and the 3-4 system they were using under Bill Cowher.

We will have conference calls with Steelers' running back Willie Parker and Tomlin shortly.

shalise

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