Pats fans: Did Pete Carroll do anything for the team?

[trotsky]

I know you didn't have much success under him, but it didn't take Belichick too long to turn things around so there must have been some pretty decent players to start with. And with the success Carroll has had at USC, he obviously knows football. Or is it just *college* football he knows?

[Old and In the Way]

1. I think Carroll's personality is better suited for the college game.

Maybe it was his age, but his coaching style seemed to be too easy going....Bellichick is tougher in that respect and I think that's the big difference.

[MalachiConstant]

2. i would have to agree.

pete carroll is a great guy and one heck of a college coach. i don't think his strengths are necessarily suited to the pro game. note, although belichick did have some carroll holdovers, carroll had quite a few holdovers from the parcells era.

[ThorsHammer]

3. Thirded......very interested to see how he does w/o chow

I thought he was a mediocre pro coach, but has obviously done a great job at USC. His rah-rah act definitely suits college better. I want to see how he does w/o Norm Chow before calling him a great coach. Right now I'd consider him a very good coach, but not quite great.

[sniffa]

4. he sucked ass

he took a team from the SB and steadiLy made them crappy.
he had no discipLine/controL of the team then and he Let the pLayers dictate the atmosphere.
his game pLanning was poor.
the personneL decisions were attrocious during that era, but he didn't have much say in those matters.

[cabbage08]

5. I agree. He is better off at the college level

[WilliamPitt]

6. He left

[zacho]

7. Belichick's first year was a dud,

as was the first half of his second season with the Pats. Everything came together when Tom Brady came in and Terry Glenn came out. Everything has been magic since.

[Awsi Dooger]

8. The base stats were very good

I do sports statistical work and Carroll's at New England were excellent in some of the key categories that the mainstream media never mentions. That made me think he was an underrated head coach. As a USC alum, I was thrilled when we hired him, especially after the garbage we pursued a few weeks earlier.

I even wrote a letter to the editor of Trojan Family alumni magazine in spring 2001 praising the Carroll hiring, but the people in charge probably thought I was nuts. They didn't print it, or anything else that even threatened to commend Pete Carroll.

I agree Carroll is more suited to the college astmosphere and recruiting process. USC was a sleeping giant for 20 years primarily because we were not monopolizing the California high school talent, especially in the trenches, which should be our birthright.