Trent Brown plays his best football in New England.
The offensive tackle spent three seasons with the San Francisco 49ers before joining the Patriots, experiencing a breakout year, and winning the Super Bowl in 2018. According to Brown, that emergence had a lot to do with the way Dante Scarnecchia challenged him, despite only spending a season together.
The longtime assistant retired in 2019 after 34 seasons with the Patriots, but a few years later, still is considered to be one of the best offensive line coaches in NFL history. Or, the best -- as Brown insisted to the hosts of "Pardon My Take" in an interview snippet he posted to Instagram on Monday.
"When I first got there [to New England], it was just the drill work. All his drill work translates over to the game, and then you do so much, and repetitively, and it's just second nature," Brown said, going on to tell a story about his first year with the Patriots.
"I remember in Jacksonville, my first time I was with the Patriots, and he just cursed my [expletive] out on the sideline one time. That wasn't a good game for me because I was still kind of trying to grow into a left tackle at that point. And then the next we got practice he cursed me out again. And I mean, some people would get down about it but I was just like, challenge accepted. From that point on, that's probably the best football I ever played. And then we just kind of grew to love each other from there."
Brown went on to have his strongest season of football before leaving for the Oakland Raiders and moving with the team to Las Vegas the following year. Scarnecchia spent the 2019 season as the longest-tenured coach in the NFL before a second try at retirement.
The 28-year-old tackle returned to New England as a free agent in 2021 and re-signed Wednesday on a reported two-year deal through the 2023 season.
Though he's no longer working in football, Brown feels Scarnecchia's coaching will carry him through the rest of his career.
"I think it was the attention to detail, the love he had for the game, and the love he has for the guys in his room. I think the things he's willing to do for the guys in his room," Brown said on what separated Scarnecchia.
"I think that's the best kind of coaching there is. The tough love, but has your back."
