The Blueprint: How the New England Patriots Beat the System to Create the Last Great NFL Superpower (Paperback)

by Christopher Price (Author)
Key Phrases: practice squad, New England, Super Bowl, New York (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Given the almost perverse ratio of fans and media attention on the one hand (massive) to the minuscule number of NFL games (a mere 16 per team in regular season, compared to 162 in baseball), the level of attention paid to each play, press conference or trade is astounding. So when Bill Belichick took over as coach of the famously inconsistent New England Patriots in 2000 and quickly turned them into what Boston Globe sportswriter Price terms the unlikeliest dynasty in the history of the NFL, the coach's low-key recipe for success was bound to be anatomized within an inch of its life. Fortunately, Price's account of the team's elegantly simple transformation from league laughingstock (his stories of their 1970s foibles are legion and hilarious, to nonfans at least) to Tom Brady powerhouse is a breeze to read; neither pumped full of steroidal sports hyperbole or weighed down by bloated play-by-play. From the soap opera that was the Bill Parcells era to the high drama of Drew Bledsoe's injury, when he unwittingly handed the quarterback crown to an untested Brady, this is a highly diverting read perfectly timed for the start of a new season for a team that, in Price's mind, has become the gold standard for the rest of the National Football League. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist
Penned by a New Englander who's covered Boston sports for the past 10 years, this volume may run parochial for many readers. Still, it's hard to argue with the recent success of the Patriots, who have won three Super Bowls since 2002 and, but for a play-off loss to Indianapolis in January, would have been in it again this year. Price traces the Patriots' history, from its AFL days in the 1960s through the team's many losing seasons, as well as its changes of ownership and personnel, arriving in the '90s with the hiring of Bill Parcells as coach and the team purchase by Robert Kraft. The pieces truly fell into place with the hiring of coach Bill Belichick and the emergence of quarterback Tom Brady. It was Belichick's reliance on his linebacker corps, on some smart and versatile JAGs ("just average guys") to step in where needed, and on his young quarterback—not to mention very sophisticated defensive schemes—that made it all work. Football fans who can't seem to get enough of the game will enjoy this profile. Moores, Alan --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; Reprint edition (September 2, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312384858
• ISBN-13: 978-0312384852
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #92,602 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Worth the read!, November 4, 2007

By	Jase3gt (Londonderry, NH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Blueprint: How the New England Patriots Beat the System to Create the Last Great NFL Superpower (Hardcover)

When I read the first chapter of this book, I thought that the book was going to be a watered down version of "Patriot Reign" by Michael Holly.
But the second chapter goes all the way back to the infamous beginnings of the New England Football team. It mentions the Boston Braves who later became the Washington Redskins. It talks about the deplorable conditions that the teams had to deal with in the early days when they didn't have a stadium and then when they got Schaefer Stadium. It describes all the interesting characters that were on the team throughout the years.
The rest of the book goes on to cover the modern day Pats and their rise to the team they are now. Whether or not you like that Pats or Bill Belichick, it talks about his career and how he's changed the way he's coached and even the things he's changed within the NFL, such as the way they choose defensive players and such, especially under the salary cap.
It does bog down a little bit but it's still interesting and was a pretty quick read. I did like this book a lot more than Patriot Reign.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, January 28, 2009

By	J. Curtis "Chip from CT" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Blueprint: How the New England Patriots Beat the System to Create the Last Great NFL Superpower (Hardcover)

Unfortunately, this book contains very little new material for the informed Pats, or NFL, fan. Most of this information has been written before. Too many pages spent on past Pats history, which has been chronicled elsewhere. Almost half the book is wasted on rehashing old feuds and sorry history.

In the introduction, the author says his model for this book was Moneyball, but he falls way short of that goal. Badly edited, lots of annoying errors and too many repetitive quotes used throughout the book.

Based on the title it is reasonable to expect more detail on the inner workings of the Pats -- and the who, what, when, where and HOW -- of their successful blueprint, but it just isn't there.

Suggest reading Halberstam's book for a better look at the inner workings of the Pats, if not an actual blueprint of how they conduct their business.

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good pre-Super Bowl Reading, December 26, 2007

By	J. A. Walsh (Boston, MA, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Blueprint: How the New England Patriots Beat the System to Create the Last Great NFL Superpower (Hardcover)

Sped through Price's account just before Christmas and it was light and enjoyable, but I would caution that: 1) it is a little light on new material or insight for Pats fans who follow the team daily in the papers; and 2) it is not - as advertised in the introduction - really much like Moneyball.

If you watch the games, listen to WEEI, read PFW, etc., this book is going to be a little like a walk down memory lane. Price spends a lot of time on recounting particular series in some of the Patriots key games during their dynastic run. While there is some history here - being in my 20's I really enjoyed the stuff on the Sullivans, Kiam and Orthwein and the first chapter serves as a great primer on Pats history - Price really focuses most on the Bledsoe/Parcells and Brady/Belichick eras.

Some of the most rewarding moments come when Price does dig a little deeper and talk about particular players or elements of the team. The few pages on Steve Neal take most Pats fans through untrodden ground that goes a little deeper than "oh, and he was a college wrestler." But, the Neal moment is one of the few that feels like a Moneyball moment. Still better, for a behind-the-scenes peek for fans, I would compare the book very unfavorably to Seth Mnookin's "Feeding the Monster." Price clearly lacked Mnookin's access, and it shows.

There isn't a lot of Price's promised "how they did it" subtitle; and, like Moneyball, where Michael Lewis focuses on the successful quirks of the A's system (they draft guys in the first round that no one else had on their board, and the guys become real good major leaguers -- BTW, the great failure in Lewis' logic is that the A's waste 1st rounders on guys they could have had in the 10th or 15th -- the antithesis of "getting value.") Price fails to explain how the drafting and player evaluation are really any different than what is done elsewhere in the league.

An area where Price does explore that question is in a lot of time spent evaluating the Belichick/Pioli tactic of bringing in "system" guys like Bryan Cox, Roman Phifer, Mike Vrabel, etc to fill out the 02-05 rosters. That analysis looks a little silly though when the 2007 roster is taken into consideration -- i.e., Adalius Thomas and Randy Moss. It remains to be seen whether the team will continue to pursue the same kind of strategy with the upward salary cap adjustment that is expected in 08 and beyond thanks to the league's exploding revenues.

The same is true for Price's evaluation of the Pats' philosophy on guys like Bruce Armstrong, Ty Law, Lawyer Milloy, Deion Branch, Adam Vinatieri and Ben Coates. This isn't Price's folly, everyone had this one wrong, and only time (and the Asante Samuel negotiations) will tell if the Pats return to the pre-07 philosophy.

Don't get me wrong, I think this is a good pre-Super Bowl read -- that's what the extra week is for -- but, I would say that where Michael Holley's "Patriot Reign" suffered (in spite of his best efforts to subsequently rescue it - because of the team's 8-8 campaign while he had his best access), this book suffers for its timing (reaching a conclusion about the "Patriot Way" right before the record breaking season) and in what it asks us to believe about "The Blueprint."