Insider shares where Jerod Mayo was 'tougher' than Bill Belichick

Different reports and stories shared throughout the offseason touched upon how first-year New England Patriots head coach Jerod Mayo embraced a "warmth before confidence" approach to the job while serving as the replacement for living legend Bill Belichick.

In a mailbag published on Thursday, Patriots insider Chris Mason of MassLive revealed that Mayo didn't completely abandon Belichick's tactics while preparing his team for the grueling season.

"Mayo ran a tougher training camp than the Patriots have seen in the past few years," Mason explained. "The players were in pads constantly, Mayo made starters play a lot in preseason games, and practices regularly concluded with runs up the conditioning hill that Belichick constructed behind the backfields."

The Patriots missed the playoffs three times across the previous four seasons before team owner Robert Kraft showed Belichick the door in January. A plethora of analysts sugge sted that the Patriots simply needed a new voice and a different type of leader.

With that said, it shouldn't be forgotten that Mayo played under Belichick from 2008-15. The 38-year-old joined Belichick's coaching staff in 2019 and learned plenty from the six-time Super Bowl champion head coach about what to do and not do in the main role.

As ESPN's Mike Reiss mentioned, New England safety Jabrill Peppers said shortly after the club's season-opening 16-10 win at the Cincinnati Bengals this past Sunday that Mayo is "a players' coach" and "a guy you want to play for." Interestingly, Mason believes one reason the Patriots earned that surprising victory is that Mayo "didn’t take it easy on his guys this summer" amid numerous predictions forecasting that New England would end the ongoing season near or at the bottom of the overall league standings.

Former Patriots players often made featuring for Belichick during the franchise's dynastic run sound downright miserable. Mayo said on Wednesday he's a fan of "artificially creating adversity during practice ," but he ultimately may have to learn when to ease up on players assuming New England eventually comes back down to earth this fall.

The Patriots first will look to once again silence doubters when they host the 1-0 Seattle Seahawks this Sunday. As of Thursday afternoon, DraftKings Sportsbook listed New England as a 3.5-point home underdog for that contest.