After returning home to New England early on Monday morning, Patriots players were off for the day. They'll have a couple days of light work before taking an extended break over their bye week before starting preparations to play the Philadelphia Eagles on November 17th.
Bill Belichick relayed that he thought everything and everyone needed to be better while speaking with the media on a conference call late on Monday morning.
"All the way across the board in all three phases of the game – offense, defense, special teams – certainly the coaching and the playing and fundamentals all could be and need to be better," said Belichick. "So, that goes for every position, every player, every coach. We've just got to do a better job."
Meanwhile, Tom Brady appeared on WEEI for his weekly radio spot, where he dove a little more into the loss to the Ravens and what the bye week will mean for the 8-1 Patriots.
"[The Ravens] played a good game," said Brady. "That was a good game by them. They played well offensively, they played well defensively. It's a tough team, it's a tough place to play and we didn't play our best. That's usually the outcome in these situations."
Brady was specifically asked about the Patriots showing signs of life offensively while running 11 personnel for the entire game, which includes one running back and one tight end, and a heavy dose of the no huddle. For a team used to cycling through personnel packages, it was a departure to focus solely on one grouping.
"That was a good mode for us," Brady told the Greg Hill Show on WEEI. "I thought we played well in it at times last night. It's really about good execution. We definitely had some good drives in there.
"The one thing I was happy about was we never quit, we kept fighting, we got back in it. They made some great plays there to kind of keep us pretty far from the lead there at the end."
Mohamed Sanu emerged in his second game with the team, grabbing 10 catches on 14 targets for 81 yards and a touchdown and quickly proving to be a reliable target after less than two weeks of practice. Brady was impressed by his newest weapon.
"He did a great job just finding little spots in the zones and [he] catches the ball well and runs hard," Brady said of Sanu. "It's a real credit to him two weeks in to come in here and have that type of contribution. We're gonna need a lot more as we go forward, really from everybody. Everybody at this point is going to have to take it to the next level. This is when football season gets tough. It's a lot of mental and physical toughness we're gonna need."
But before things get tough the Patriots will get a short reprieve with their bye week. It comes at an optimal time for the team, past the halfway point of the season and with the playoffs starting to come into focus.
"The bye week's about really getting healthy," said Brady. "Physically, mentally and getting a chance to evaluate where you're at so you can go forward and be better.
"It's really a good time to self scout and reflect where you're at and what you need to do . Teams who use this wisely usually do a good job."
Even after a disappointing loss to a conference rival, Brady had already begun to turn the page.
"Even though it didn't go our way we can learn from it and we can try to improve and be better," reflected Brady. "That was not our best. It's different if you think you played your best and lose. If you don't feel you played your best and lose, you feel like 'if we correct some things we'll be right in it.' That's a much better feeling."
