Pats Pulpit Reacts: Fans generally pleased with Patriots’ latest coaching hires

After the New England Patriots hired Bill O’Brien as their new offensive coordinator, we asked fans to grade the move. The results came as no surprise: a majority of participants in the SB Nation Reacts survey gave the move either an A (55%) or a B (37%) grade.

Naming O’Brien as the new OC was not the only move made by the club, however. Since bringing him aboard, two more assistant coaches were added to the mix on offense.

While it remains to be seen what titles Adrian Klemm and Will Lawing will eventually hold — the belief is they will work with the offensive line and tight ends, respectively — fans are similarly pleased with the moves. The latest SB Nation Reacts results are proof of that:

Adrian Klemm is joining the Patriots after a one-year stint as the University of Oregon’s offensive line coach, run game coordinator and associate head coach. He will add experience to a position group that lacked just that from the coaching department in 2022; Matt Patricia, who filled in as O-line coach before basically being replaced by assistant Billy Yates, had only one year of working a similar job on his résumé.

It is no stretch of the imagination if “Anybody but Matt Patricia” would have earned positive grades. Klemm’s résumé between UCLA, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Oregon is a strong one, however. A majority off Patriots fans seem to agree.

As for Will Lawing, he is a bit obscure compared to Klemm. Nonetheless, his experience working with Bill O’Brien at Penn State, with the Houston Texans, and most recently at Alabama is a positive. While this particular hire did not generate the same hype as the other two, it is still seen as an improvement.

As always, we also asked the community to share its thoughts. Here are some of the comments:

Beantown Resident:

Loved the process this time much more than last year.Looking back at last season, I think MP made a mistake of also being the OL coach. He should have pushed back and asked to recruit an OL coach to take more things off his hands.I’m also thrilled that at this point if MJ can’t deliver, we’ll know that we need to upgrade the QB. He’ll get an average OL, a top 10 rushing attack, a top 5 defense and hopefully a top 10 ST. And he’ll get real offensive coaches. If he can play like a top 10 QB, we’re making a deep run into the playoffs.

And we’re 4th in cap space and the rest of the AFC East is 19, 22 and 27. Looking forward to this next season.

Old New England Patriot:

A for Klemm, delighted.

Jury out on Lawing, but feel like Caley was replaceable.

And if I could have both teams lose, I would. I’m going Eagles because KC and their “dynasty” arrogance still irritates the hell out of me.

AlecinBerlin:

Both get an ‘A’ from me.

Taking away possible coaching roles for MP is a top priority for this team.

coolbeanz:

Billy O---A, experienced coach, clearly an upgrade at the position; Belichick can give the offense to O’Brien and worry about other things; hopefully the Pats can find a position for Matty P. that he can excel in

Klemm---A, they apparently got the man that they wanted and usually Belichick makes good decisions at the coaching level; remains to be seen how he will do at the NFL level, but should be an upgrade at the position

Lawing---A, it’s good to see the Pats bring in new young talent; looks like he might be replacing Caley as the coach of an underachieving tight end group; can’t be worse; would like to see the Pats bring in more youth to bolster the coaching pipeline which is smaller than most NFL teams

sriram12078:

Klemm gets a “B” from me, simply because I know nothing about the field. It’s not like they signed Mike Munchak, Bill Callahan or brought Scar out of retirement - OL coaches with a proven track record of adding value. But Klemm has experience in the role and “experience in the gig” was sorely lacking last season.

Lawing is an “A” for me for what it represents - he is one of O’Brien’s key people. This means that O’Brien is being given some latitude to shape his staff.

zionlion02:

B+ For Klemm, excited to see what he can do. B for the other guy as I don’t know much about him, but I like that they are bring in people that might be successful in the role and have worked with BOB before - that grade is more for the decision. BOB is a B+ as well.

Figure an A is mostly a hindsight grade, so we’ll see how this shakes out.

Lurker von Troll:

A for Klemm because he’s not just an OL coach, he’s also been a run game coordinator.

B for Lawing because I don’t know much about him, but he’s BOB’s guy and he has been a TE coach. Maybe he can actually get something out of our TE’s

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