Everybody sees Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski as a harmless meathead, but his teammates see a different side.
He is, they say, “brilliant.”
No, really.
“If you meet Rob for 10 or 15 minutes, you might get an impression that may or may not be what it’s like to have him in your office, in a classroom and on the field for six, seven hours a day,” Patriots coach Bill Belichick said, via Phil Perry of CSNNE.com. “It might be a little bit different . . . Potentially.”
Gronkowski has to be smart to handle the multiple roles the Patriots demand of him, and they say he handles it easily.
“Rob’s a very bright guy,” offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels said. “We ask a lot of him. And he won’t let us down. He refuses to let us down with what we ask of him.
“He’s obviously very intricately involved in the running game. He’s involved in the passing game. We move him all over the formation. We put him outside, we put him inside, we motion him. He’s involved in third down, red zone. He’s involved in everything. I kind of relate it to the quarterback position. . . .
“When you talk about his demeanor in the meeting room, he’s like Tom Brady. When you talk about the way he prepares and practices, same thing.”
While that might not be consistent with some of his frat-boy antics, the results on the field indicate that there’s something to it.
