Leaders who know how to win

reflect on their history of victory:

Our family has owned the team for 15 seasons and there’s only one player now on the team who has been here for all five Super Bowls, and of course that is Tedy Bruschi. He holds the franchise record for most appearances in post-season games with 22. Tedy embodies everything we want the Patriot brand to stand for: hard work, perseverance, overachievement, and selfless commitment to team first. He’s handled every stage of his career with great class.--Robert Kraft

He always captured it perfectly, so I guess, if you ask me to sum up how I feel about Tedy Bruschi in five seconds: he’s the perfect player, perfect player. He’s helped create a tradition here that we’re all proud of. The torch has been passed, and we’ll try to carry it on. It’s a high standard. It’s a high standard. I’m proud of everything he did and the payout that he’s paid for all of us going forward.--Bill Belichick

Yes, I knew how to play linebacker and I knew how to play. [Bill] Parcells came in, [Pete] Carroll came in, but I didn’t know how to win until Bill came in here. He taught me how to win. He taught everyone in that locker room how to win, not just go out there and play well. You can go out there and roll your helmet out there and even though it has a Patriot logo on it, do you think they’re going to lay down? They’re not. You still gotta play. You still gotta play and he taught us that.

Coach, thank you for…You talk about the 800 plays that you could have put up there for what my career encapsulated. There are 800 things that I could talk about to thank you for what you’ve taught me. Thank you so much for being who you are. I hope that people in New England realize who they have here – who they have in the head coach. I consider myself a football historian. I like to read. I like to see where this game came from. You are looking at something special. When I walk into this facility and that office is on the left, I know I better come ready to work and this guy is going to have this team ready to win because he’s up there. I hope you realize what you have, that’s all I have to say. He’s that great and I felt it a privilege to learn under him for all of these years.

I think people want to move, to change teams because they want to fix their problems an easy way. It’s either, ‘Man, I didn’t like this coach,’ ‘I didn’t like this situation,’ ‘I didn’t like the way they used me,’ or ‘I think it’s going to be better somewhere else, so I’m going to try this place.’ I learned that I’d rather stay in one place and fix the problems that were there myself; It would feel more gratifying. I’d rather right the ship that jump ship, and that’s something that I always tell myself: to stay the course and yes, there are problems and there are relationships that you might have to deal with with certain people that maybe you don’t get along with. Fix it. Fix it. Do something to make your situation in the place that you want to be in better, rather than running and going somewhere else.--Tedy Bruschi