“Nobody in the game of football should be called a genius. A genius is somebody like Norman Einstein.” — Joe Theismann

If I thought Bill Belichick was a coaching genius, I wouldn’t dare presume to write this column. Geniuses don’t take advice from ordinary, garden-variety yahoos like me. No great football mind that ever lived would take pointers from an aging, under-employed problem drinker who can barely teach the D-lineman on his team of 9-year-olds how to shed a block, just because said guy writes Internet columns. Any real football genius finding this article in his inbox would delete it unread faster than Stephenie Meyer tossing out some piece of “Twilight” fan fiction sent to her by a teenage Goth nerdette.

But like I said, Bill Belichick is no coaching genius. He’s much more than that. I consider him a super-genius. One with the brains and wisdom to see things on a different plane of existence than the rest of us. Like Dumbledore. Or Yoda. Or Velma from "Scooby-Doo!" Which is why, even though you could say there’s a million-to-one chance he’d take some of what I’m about to say to heart. In the words of Lloyd Christmas, “So you're telling me there's a chance …”

Look, the whole history of the NFL is lousy with so-called geniuses. Lombardis, Browns, Shulas, Landrys and Walshes. And one thing they all had in common is they didn’t waste a second of their valuable time listening to nimrods who aren’t from their coaching fraternity.

But that’s where The Hooded One has always separated himself from the mere geniuses. Over his unparalleled career he’s shown the willingness to tread the path others dare not. He’s proven there is no length to which he will not go to find the answers.

One of my favorite Belichick stories ever (and believe me, I've got a million of 'em), came from, of all damn places, the economics department at the University of California. Back in 2006, a professor there wrote a paper about the advantages of football teams going for it on fourth down. The paper was probably read by fewer people than the Romer family’s “Here’s what we did this past year” Christmas letter. When one NFL coach was asked if he’d heard about Romer’s analysis, he basically told the reporter where he can cram his "supply and demand."

But when Belichick was asked the same question, he said he’d read the paper, and had a long and thoughtful response about Romer’s conclusions, the theory behind them and their practical applications in a game. Bear in mind that the paper had never been published. But it was a stone His Hoodedness was willing to turn over in search of pigskin wisdom. The fact that it probably cost us the Indy game last year is beside the point.

Here’s another example. One of the peculiar figures in football history was Joel Buchsbaum. A strange, hermity little man who looked like a frailer Stephen Hawking and spent his whole life huddled in his Brooklyn apartment doing for the NFL draft what Hawking does for quantum physics. Belichick went to great lengths to glean scouting wisdom from the freakishly insightful little oddball, even visiting his cramped, filthy Flatbush Ave headquarters to talk personnel evaluations. And when Buchsbaum died in 2002, it was the coach of your New England Patriots who gave the eulogy.

My point is that since Belichick has shown he’s willing to listen to other geeky, football obsessed social misfits, what’s one more? So, I’m presenting here my five-point plan to immediately restore the Patriots to their former glory and make a championship run in 2010:

1. Release the hounds. Over the last several years, the Pats have spent an enormous amount of time, resources and draft picks trying to come up with solutions in the defensive backfield. But the last two years have been nothing but a blur of DBs playing three yards behind receivers and getting slowly picked to pieces by some of the worst quarterbacks in the NFL, quickly ripped to shreds by the good ones and disintegrated by the great ones. This obsession with taking away the deep threat, laying back seven yards off the line and dropping into soft zones while leaving the underneath routes wide open is torture to watch. Seriously, Amnesty International should sue on our behalf. And more importantly, it doesn’t stop anyone. In Brandon Meriweather, Patrick Chung, Darius Butler and Devin McCourty, they seem to have found strong, tough athletic guys with good football IQs. Let them play up, press, be physical, force receivers off their routes.  And create turnovers. Forget the risk; let them go for the reward. Those picks by the Jets weren’t mistakes by Tom Brady, they were forced by aggressive coverage. I’m tired of the Patriots secondary winning the Mediocre QB Association’s Good Guy Award.

2. Let Brady call his own plays. I think 10 years is enough time for him to have earned the trust. I can’t shake the feeling that he doesn’t care for what he’s hearing out of the voice in his helmet. I’m sure Bill O’Brien is a great guy and knows what he wants to do with a game plan. And I have no doubt that short of him going on a killing rampage, the Cleveland Browns will make him their next head coach. But if Belichick doesn’t think enough of him after two years to give the coordinator title, then it’s no big deal to unplug his Motorolas. Peyton Manning calls his own plays. Enough said.

3. Find a featured running back. I’m all for having a stable of running backs. I get that this is a tandem-running league now. I don’t need to go on a diatribe about how Sam Cunningham was a three-down back any more than I need to tell my kids about how I walked to school. I’ve seen the numbers on 300-plus carries backs and they fade faster than your average boy band. What I don’t get is this business of automatically bringing in a different RB to start the second quarter. They’ve been doing it through the O’Brien era. You can count on it. No matter how many carries the starter has or how well he’s running, he’s on the bench to start the second. And there’s no logic behind it. This isn’t Pop Warner. Your backup’s parents aren’t going to be mad if he doesn’t get to play.

4. Blitz more. I know it’s not central to the Pats' defensive scheme. And that Belichick has said the sack is the most overrated stat in the book. But it’s maddening for a Pats fan to watch Baltimore, the Jets, or Pittsburgh drive offenses insane with the pressure, then try to comfort yourself with the fact that Rob Ninkovich is really good at setting the edge. It speaks volumes that Dick LeBeau has been running the same damn zone pressure scheme for 30 years and still no one has figured it out. Give us some of that, please.

5. Let them go nuts. I appreciate that Patriots players don’t act like mouthy, chest-pounding, SportsCenter whores all the time. But at some point, you’ve got to turn them loose. On the field. It’s been years since we’ve seen an opponent seem intimidated by the Pats, and maybe a little over-the-top, insane blood lust is what they’re lacking. Nothing vicious and cheap, but I wouldn’t hate it to see a little of what Meriweather did at the U. of Miami or Brandon Spikes brought to the field at Florida. Pads popping, bodies flying, and more eye pokes than a box set of "The Three Stooges." To quote Shakespeare, “In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man's modest stillness and humility. But when the blast of war blows in our ears, then imitate the action of the tiger: Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.” That’s what we need more of. Stiff sinews.   

For a couple of years now, Kerry J. Byrne of 'EEI and Cold, Hard Football Facts has been making the case that Belichick is not as “geniusy” as he once was. By way of full disclosure, Kerry is a friend of mine. I’ve seen his research, read his dispassionate, logical analysis. But I refuse to accept that he’s right on this one. I will not believe the game has passed Belichick by any more than I’d let some data convince me there is no Santa or that all women don’t secretly want to sleep with me. Some things you just have to take on faith. And as long as I’m believing in ridiculous things, I’m going to believe that he’s going to take my advice and make something out of this season before it’s too late.