Josh McDaniels was gone. On Tuesday morning, he drove to the New England Patriots facility to clean out his office. His decision was made. Then, he ran into Bill Belichick, Robert Kraft, and Jonathan Kraft, and everything changed.

McDaniels deliberated staying with New England, reportedly struggling with his decision to part ways with the franchise to become the next head coach of the Indianapolis Colts. Still, before this final meeting, he was leaving.

As they began to talk, McDaniels simply couldn't turn down one part of their pitch: an all-encompassing, open mentorship from Belichick on matters beyond X's and O's.

From ESPN's Mike Reiss, transcribed by Ryan Hannable of WEEI:

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“Bill Belichick said to him, ‘I want you to be by my side. I am going to open my world to you. Show you how I view roster building, how I look at financials and the salary cap.' To McDaniels, who is 41 years old, the chance to be with Belichick, arguably the greatest coach of all-time, 65 years old, to have that opportunity was viewed as to be extremely valuable to him.”

If you watched the recent 30 for 30 episode The Two Bills, this sounds very similar to what Bill Parcells did for Belichick when he served as his defensive coordinator. Coordinators are so invested in doing their job and the task at hand, rather than taking a macro-view of the team's football operations as a whole. This experience and knowledge will be invaluable for McDaniels as he continues his coaching career, whether it be in New England or with another franchise down the road.

Additionally, Reiss said a second major factor that led to McDaniels staying in Foxborough is stability. The Krafts were willing to make a long-term commitment to McDaniels that is rare in the NFL coaching world, allowing him to keep his 3, 6, 10, and 12-year-old kids in the same school system for a significant amount of time.

Together, these two things were too appealing for McDaniels to keep his commitment to the Colts, and to be fair, until Tuesday, he didn't know they were on the table.