Matt Patricia hilariously sheds light on how he became Patriots playcaller in 2022

There are few more prominent fans of the New England Patriots than Barstool Sports’ founder Dave Portnoy. His fandom of the Pats has been well known for the past two decades, and it’s helped to fuel the ascension of his website into what it’s become today. On Wednesday evening, he had an interview with Matt Patricia, and let’s just say Portnoy tried to get to the bottom of a very difficult question for him. He wanted to find out how exactly Patricia became the offensive coordinator for New England, when he’s been a defensive coach for nearly the entirety of his coaching career.

I love Matt Patricia. We’ve won so many Super Bowls together.

But I had to get to bottom of how he became the Pats offensive coordinator pic.twitter.com/RvUtzUgCwd

— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) February 5, 2025

“That was interesting, right? That was definitely interesting,” Patricia said. “But I do think, though — I’m just going to say this. I don’t think it was better the next year, right? So, maybe we can let me off the hook here a little bit?”

Saying that the Patriots offense in 2022 was “interesting”, sure is an interesting way of putting it. The New England offense was an unmitigated disaster with Patricia at the helm. Their offense sputtered, finishing dead last in the red zone and near the bottom in yards per game and third down conversions.

The decision to put Patricia in charge of the Patriots’ offensive attack will forever be one of the most questionable decisions of Bill Belichick’s career. Why did Belichick make that decision? We’ll forever want to know the answers. And it looks like we’ll never really get the full answer on that from Patricia. He essentially dodged the question on Wednesday night.

At the time of the decision, The Boston Globe’s Ben Volin reported that Patricia “didn’t really want to be offensive coordinator, but did it as a favor to Belichick, who needed someone he could trust.” Officially, the Patriots really didn’t have anyone titled as the offensive coordinator, but Patricia was the offensive line coach and senior football advisor. But, he basically ran the offense as the “designated play-caller”. And it wasn’t a pretty sight.