Belichick: Chiefs speed on offense “up there” with anyone I’ve coached against

[KC Wolf]

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Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has coached against a lot of different teams over his long run in the NFL and he’s seen those teams employ a wide variety of styles.

The Chiefs team that Belichick and the Patriots will tangle with falls on the speedier side of the spectrum. Belichick mentioned the speed of their offensive skill position players many times during his Wednesday press conference when discussing the challenges that his team is going to face on Sunday.

Belichick was asked if a Chiefs group including Tyreek Hill, Mecole Hardman, Clyde Edwards-Helaire and others is the fastest he’s ever had to coach against. Belichick went back to the run and shoot teams from decades ago to find a similar array of speed.

“It would be up there. Yeah, it would be up there,” Belichick said. “I mean, those run-and-shoot teams, they had four receivers on the field — you know, Mouse Davis and that style of offense that Houston ran. I would say we played against them with other teams as well. But, June [Jones] did it in Atlanta and then Mouse did it in Detroit. When you put four receivers out there and a fast back, like a Barry Sanders or somebody like that, and you put four receivers out there than run probably 4.4 or sub-4.4, I mean, that’s a lot of speed. Now, these guys have a lot of speed, too. But you talk about just speed, those run-and-shoot teams, they put some pretty fast players on the field, now — a lot of them, not just one or two. I mean, either four or five, depending on how fast the back was.”

Kansas City’s ability to use that speed to put points on the board in a hurry led to a question for Belichick about whether keeping the ball out of the Chiefs’ hands would be important this week. Belichick said it wouldn’t be as important as scoring points and that “it’s our job to go out there and stop them” whether the preceding drive was long or short.