Ben Coates, in action during a 1997 game, was a deserving choice of the N.E. fans for the Patriots Hall of Fame.

The Journal / Bob Breidenbach

You’ve got to hand it to Patriots fans — Ben Coates was a great choice for the team's Hall of Fame.

The best tight end in team history, he averaged 73 receptions per season for six years, from 1993 through ’98. He was the team’s leading receiver in five of those seasons, setting an NFL record in 1994 for catches by a tight end, with 96, for 1,174 yards and 7 touchdowns.

Pretty impressive numbers for a guy who wasn’t drafted until the fifth round in 1991.

Not that Joe Mendes, who made Coates the first player ever drafted out of Livingstone College, is taking any bows for the selection.

“You don’t wait until the fifth round to pick a Pro Bowl tight end,” he said yesterday from his home in northern Virginia.

Mendes was the Patriots’ vice president for player development when they chose Coates with their seventh overall pick in ‘91, after Pat Harlow, Leonard Russell, Jerome Henderson, Calvin Stephens, Scott Zolak and Jon Vaughn.

“I honestly can’t tell you now what kind of grade we had on him,” Mendes said. “I don’t think it was a ‘make-it’ grade.”

At that time, it didn’t seem to matter to the Patriots whether Coates made the team. They had a Pro Bowl tight end in Marv Cook, a third-round choice out of Iowa in 1989 who led the Pats in receptions in Coates’ rookie year with 84. Cook made a second trip to Hawaii the following year. Then, in ’93, he went to the bench, losing his starting job to the bigger, more-talented Coates.

“Ben was a player who really benefited when we hired Bill Parcells in 1992,” said Mendes. “He fit in well with the way Parcells wanted to play the game. He was a big, tough guy who was good in all areas — blocking, passing, running after the catch. Just like Mark Bavaro had been for Parcells with the Giants.”

It was Coates’ size — he was 6-4, 245 pounds and, as Mendes noted, “played even bigger” — and speed that first caught the team’s eye.

“When we came back from the combine,” Mendes recalled, “we said: ‘We need to follow up on this guy.’ ”

So they sent Dante Scarnecchia, who then was tight ends coach for Dick MacPherson, to North Carolina to take a closer look at Coates.

“He’s as good an evaluator of talent as any coach I’ve ever known,” Mendes said of Scarnecchia, who this season will be entering his 25th year with the Patriots, having been on the staffs of six head coaches. “He has a real good eye. The big thing we wanted to know from Dante was: ‘Do you want to coach him?’ After he’d seen Ben, he said: ‘Hell, yes!’ ”

Coates was a quick learner. He’d gone to Livingstone because he’d played just one year of football in high school. But he caught 36 passes –– 9 of them for touchdowns –– in 1990, and proceeded to catch on quickly with the Patriots.

A powerful blocker, he did even more damage to opposing defenses as a receiver. Linebackers weren’t fast enough to run with him, and defensive backs weren’t strong enough to keep him from getting the ball. Even if they had him covered, Coates used his body to shield defenders from the ball or, more often, push them away without being called for offensive pass interference.

“He had a variety of ways to get separation,” Mendes said with a chuckle.

Once he had the ball in his hands, Coates was like an oversized running back, with a devastating combination of strength, speed and shiftiness.

“You know who he reminds me of as a runner?” the late Bucko Kilroy once said of Coates. “Mike Ditka.

“Ditka was a fullback playing tight end. When he got the ball, those little defensive backs couldn’t bring him down. Coates is like Ditka after the catch, but faster. He’s dangerous with the ball.”

The ball was all Coates ever wanted. He didn’t care about publicity.

“Most guys want attention,” he said. “But most guys aren’t me. I’m just here to do a job. I just play hard. That’s about it.”

Although Coates did his job as well as anyone in the league, he said it was “nothing special, just part of the job.”

Patriots quarterback Drew Bledsoe would beg to differ. He loved to get the ball to Coates, often referring to the big tight end as his “security blanket.”

“Any quarterback,” said Bledsoe, “would be stupid not to try and get the ball in his hands. He’s really a weapon. Every week, I think teams will have something to stop him. But, every week, he finds ways to get open. He’s a big-time player. He makes the big catch when you need it. As far as I’m concerned, he’s the best in the game.”

As far as those astute Patriots fans are concerned, Coates is the best tight end in team history.

jdonalds@projo.com