Forged in Foxborough: Episode 1 Review
The Patriots have created their own Hard Knocks-type show and I watched it
Every year we wonder if this will be the year that the Patriots finally get selected for HBO’s Hard Knocks and every year the answer is no. Now it appears that the Patriots have fired a preemptive strike and are making their own Hard Knocks. Which after the damage that the HBO franchise did to the Giants last year, having editorial control over an inside look at your franchise, seems like a very good thing.
That’s what the Patriots have seemingly done with their new series Forged in Foxborough, the first episode was released last month on Youtube. They’ve yet to follow up with a second episode, so I don’t know how frequent this will be or how many they’ll do but like all Patriots content, I’ve watched it and I have thoughts.
- The show opens up on April 7th, the first time the team gets together and Coach Vrabel goes through his rules. This was the clip that we saw all over social media this spring and we didn’t know why we were getting this morsel from inside the walls of 1 Patriot Place. It all makes sense now, I was surprised when that seemingly private speech was captured and released by the organization, but now we know its part of a show that clocks in at 1 hour, 13 minutes. I don’t know what we did to deserve this, if like Miss Elizabeth believes that this is a Robert Kraft make good to Patriots fans for the groan inducing Dynasty series, whatever its origin, we’ll take it! Best quote from this meeting “Why the F*** would I care what went wrong last year!?!” Mike Vrabel.
- A cool visual of construction, on what I believe is their new indoor facility, while Vrabes talks about building a foundation. We’re getting very art light house. (“Might enter it into some festivals, probably won’t. Not what this is about.” Michael Scott.) But a cooler one is Vrabel wearing a yellow jersey with number 51 on it during a practice in the rain. 2025 is a whole new ballgame!
- Interesting that after the opening credits, they flash back to January when Vrabel was announced as the head coach, and then flashes further back to when he was inducted into the Patriots’ Hall of Fame. I’ll go to my grave believing that the seeds of him becoming the Pats head coach were planted that weekend in 2023.
- The episode poses as a tribute and hype video for Mike Vrabel’s return to Foxborough and you will get no complaints from me. There is a great clip of Vrabel being mic’d up as a player and you hear him converse with Bill Belichick about trying to find a tell in an opposing player’s stance. It’s a practical application of everything people say about him being a coach when he was a player. The fact that we have this clip of the greatest coach of all-time, asking his outside linebacker if he was able to pick up any tendencies on an opponent like he’s one of his coaches is astounding. It’s like your babysitter cutting you into her pay for the evening, she’s not supposed to level with you like that.
- It’s still weird to me to see talking heads clips of Gronk and Edelman as media members. A quick side note, Edelman’s podcast Games With Names is generally very good, but I’ve found that the joint podcast of Edelman and Gronk, Dudes on Dudes, is a pretty tough listen. I was getting through it for a while, but a couple of weeks ago I finally pulled the Band-Aid (not a sponsor) off and stopped listening. I feel terrible because those are my guys, but I can only hear them fight their way through pronouncing 90% of names wrong and talking about subjects they may or may not have read the Wikipedia of before they cracked their mics.
- This show is 73 minutes, and at the 25 minute mark we are digging into the football, as we get a look at the scouts hitting the college scouting trail. It’s easy to see the balance in the front office now, with Eliot Wolf on one side of the head coach and VP of player personnel Ryan Cowden on the other side during Reese’s (not a sponsor) Senior Bowl practice. Wolf is the guy Vrabel inherited from previous regimes, Cowden is his guy from Tennessee.
- You see glimpse during Senior Bowl practices, of Washington St WR Kyle Williams and Florida DT Joshua Farmer impressing the Patriots contingent.
- Patriots national scout, Matt Evans, describes a Vrabel Type player as a “fast, physical, attacking player and more than anything a tough player.” This isn’t the scout’s interpretation of what the coach wants, the Coach TOLD him that that’s what he wants. Do you think Jerod Mayo had a type?
- After watching the clips of Milton Williams dominate this year’s Super Bowl, I think I need to lay down for a bit. Mercy sakes alive. Did we pay him enough?
- “I think Christian Gonzalez is going to be the best cornerback in the league this year.” Devin McCourty. Thank goodness I’m not writing my game by game preview this week, I’d have this team winning 12-13 games right now.
- I can’t get over Stefon Diggs outfit at his introductory press conference. He dressed like an accountant who got invited to your Memorial Day BBQ and you’re both a little surprised he showed up.
- It is fascinating to see how the process went for the team to actually select Will Campbell with the 4th pick in the draft. Though a little weird when Director of College Scouting Camren Williams calls Campbell and hands the phone to Wolf and the first thing Wolf says is “where did you eat last night?” Like this kid is hoping he’s about to hear that he’s being picked 4th in the NFL draft and he’s being asked if he went to that pizza place in Green Bay? (I wonder if it was Rocky Rococo? Not a sponsor.) I get it, Wolf grew up around Green Bay, the draft was in Green Bay, but come on man, the kid just wants to be drafted!
- “You have to love violence to play offensive and defensive line. It’s a dog eat dog world and I want it to be me every time.” I’m buying all the Will Campbell stock.
- It’s neat to see how genuinely excited director of college scouting Camren Williams is when Wolf tells him to “get (player x) on the phone.” Makes me feel even better about the TreVeyon Henderson and Kyle Williams’ picks.
- You can easily tell which round of the draft you’re seeing clips from, based off how the Patriots’ personnel department is dressed. By Saturday, I assume nobody is wearing shoes and Vrabes has challenged at least 4 staffers to a Greco-Roman match in the hallway.
I greatly enjoyed the first episode of Forged in Foxborough, but again I am the target audience for Pats porn like this. It’s not for the feint of hart, if you’re a Giants fan, you probably don’t care about it, and after the Draft portion you’ll probably huck a remote at the screen, yelling “WHY COULDN’T JOE SCHOEN HAVE DONE IT THIS WAY AND JUST SHUT THE HELL UP ABOUT SAQUON!?!?!”
During the Brady era, a show like this would have been entertaining, but would have revealed way less about the organization and showed less footage from inside the walls. It would have been lost in Super Bowl DVDs and social media highlight tapes. But now, when we haven’t had much to cheer from over the 4-5 seasons, this feels like the right time for something like this to come out. You’ll not that not many of the highlights used were of current Patriots, in fact I’m not sure they showed any besides practice reps and Vrabel highlights from the early 2000’s.
I’m interested to see where the show goes and how long it lasts. My guess is we’ll get another episode sometime this month covering OTA’s and mini-camps, maybe another episode or two during training camp and then cut it off once the regular season begins. Though I would definitely watch a weekly show like this during the season.
Though to be fair, I would also watch Vrabel in those hallway Greco-Roman wrestling matches too, so maybe I’m not the best judge of these things.