Through many of Bill Belichick's 300 wins, he's had with him a note card. During games, right there on the sidelines, he'll pull out the note card and jot down a few notes. There's only so much that can be kept on one of those cards so he has to be efficient, but that's typically how he operates anyway.
Belichick prepares and over-prepares weekly. That's why even an 11-year veteran like Julian Edelman — someone who worked his way from being a seventh-round pick to being one of the most productive postseason receivers in the Super Bowl era -- calls him "a machine."
But part of what has made Belichick as successful as he's been is that he takes all the information he's gathered and he condenses it into digestible morsels for his players and coaches.
On WEEI's Greg Hill Show, Tom Brady described that reduction — going from massive quantities of information into bite-sized pieces — as part of what makes the Patriots head coach great.
"I would always say, sometimes coaches give you so much information that you can't retain any of it because it's so much," he said. "I think what he does is he trims the fat. He gets you the meat of what they're trying to do. He doesn't confuse you. He doesn't tell you things that may never come up. It's not information overload."
Belichick's less-is-more teaching style has long been part of his approach. Whether it's in making halftime adjustments or meeting with his team to tell players what it'll take to win in a given week, Belichick's bullet points have become part of his legend.
"Coach comes in and says, 'These are the things we need to do to win,' and he's right damn near 100 percent of the time," Brady told ESPN in 2011. "It's, 'This is what we need to do, and this is how you're going to do it, and if we don't do it, we're going to lose.' "
New England Patriots
Brady and Belichick have won over 100 games since then.
"He does a great job," Brady said of Belichick. "His preparation is so on point, he boils the game down so you can actually take the things [he tells you], go out on the field and try to apply them. He's taught me a lot about football over the years and it's really been a blessing to play for him in my life."
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