Bret Bielema happy to have new defined role with the Patriots

FOXBORO – The last time Bret Bielema was a position coach, the Patriots were still without a Super Bowl.

The 49-year-old coach will enter this season, however, on a new path after a decade of successful coaching in the college ranks. The former head coach at Wisconsin (2006-2012) and Arkansas (2013-2017) will coach the Patriots defensive linemen this year after spending last year in Foxboro as a consultant.

"Last year, I would do a lot of that kind of big-picture [...]

FOXBORO – The last time Bret Bielema was a position coach, the Patriots were still without a Super Bowl.

The 49-year-old coach will enter this season, however, on a new path after a decade of successful coaching in the college ranks. The former head coach at Wisconsin (2006-2012) and Arkansas (2013-2017) will coach the Patriots defensive linemen this year after spending last year in Foxboro as a consultant.

"Last year, I would do a lot of that kind of big-picture stuff and then got a little more specific,” Bielema said. “I think when you're a head coach, you never lose sight of how important every details is, and then that does carry over to your approach with a certain group. 

"So now's the opportunity to take all the things I learned as an assistant before I became a head (coach) and all the things I learned about as a head coach that I wanted for my assistants, to be able to be the best I can be and obviously help this program in any way I can."

Bielema’s relationship with Bill Belichick goes back years. It’s easy to see the respect Belichick has for his fellow coach when you factor in the number of players he drafted from Bielema’s programs. Bielema has coached Pats draft picks James White, Trey Flowers, A.J. Derby, Deatrich Wise and most recently, fourth-round pick Hjalte Froholdt.

The familiarity helps, but after his first season in Foxboro, Bielema is happy to have a defined role this season.

"I spent a lot of time in different rooms, but now to just to have that year as a work-in-progress transition to jump into where we're at now, it's been a lot of fun,” Bielema said. “And I knew a lot of those guys already, so even if they didn't play for me [at Arkansas], they were guys that I'd recruited, guys that we competed against, so there's a lot of familiarity and I think that part made it easier."