Law: Secondary needs primary approach

The Patriots have their problems in the secondary; that's patently obvious. But ex-Pats Ty Law and Troy Brown agree there's someone on their coaching staff who, if he could devote the time to it, could solve the problem.

And that person is Bill Belichick.

"He is just as good a position coach as he is as a head coach," Law, the former All-Pro cornerback, told Michael Felger on 'Sports Sunday'. "I mean, I understand, as a head coach, you have to micromanage everybody. You have to oversee things.

"But at this point in the season, Belichick has to go back out there -- kind of like he did when I was playing for the Patriots -- come back and say, 'This is what we're going to do as a secondary.' He would be in our meetings . . . and he would be actually coaching us from a position standpoint. He was no longer the head coach. He was the defensive backs coach when we weren't playing right.

"So I think he needs to do that right now, go back and show these guys some of the basic fundamentals. Because they don't have a true, veteran leader back there. They don't even have a veteran leader as a coach."

Brown -- who also played the secondary in addition to his duties at wide receiver -- concurred with Law.

"In 2004, Belichick would call fellow DB Earthwind Moreland and myself into his office -- we had to cut our lunch 20 minutes short -- and we'd sit there and we'd watch receivers," said Brown. "We'd watch the coverages that teams were playing against them and he would tell us things that I had no idea to look for. You know, 'This guy doesn't catch the ball going well to his left', 'That guy doesn't catch the ball going well to his right', 'When he's lined up here, he's going to do this', 'When he's lined up there, he's going to do that'. That's the kind of secondary coach he was.