Jason Licht on how the Patriots ranked Tom Brady before the draft in 2000

29 January 2021 | 15:10

When Jason Licht, general manager of Jason, organized the signing of Tom Brady as a free agency ahead of the 2020 season, it was not the first time he has been associated with the six-time Super Bowl winner.

Light (49) worked for the Patriots in one of his earlier NFL roles prior to the start of the Bill Belichick era.

“I got my first job with the Patriots in 1999,” Licht said at a news conference earlier this week. ‘It was my first full-time scouting career for a club. We went 8-8 that year. Pete Carroll was the coach. He was let go, and then Bill Belichick was hired and he immediately went to draft meetings as soon as he entered the building.

“I got to know him through those meetings,” Licht said. A little intimidating, but eventually he gave me a promotion afterwards. ‘

In the first few weeks of Belichick as coach of the Patriots – after the protracted ‘border wars’ that followed his retirement from the Jets and subsequent trade to New England – Licht helped put together the team’s plan for the draft in 2000. set.

Among the names considered in Foxborough was a Michigan quarterback Tom Brady.

“I did not personally examine Tom,” Licht recalls. ‘I was a Southeastern explorer at the time. I listened to the conversations about him and we watched tape together, but I can accept no credit that Tom was set up. ‘

Light nevertheless had interesting historical insight into what was the biggest value pick in NFL draft history (New England picked Brady with the 199th pick).

“I do know that Coach Belichick has had him for a long time,” said Licht. ‘We took him in the sixth. We did not need a quarter at that time. [Belichick ranked] him much higher than that – he and Scott Pioli had him much higher than those on the board. The conversation started with, if I remember correctly, the third round, and he’s still sitting there in the sixth and they take him. ‘