Hey Mr. Phil,
Your right as far as sometimes even I get stuck within certain riffs as we call them here. I've caught myself in that "rutt" at times and changed rudiments around in combination's to get out of it.
In free style jazz, it's easy to change and switch from one stance to another in a split second. I call it playing with your drums and not playing the drums. I've played stuff like this for my son, and he didn't get it. Till I showed him some real heavy duty jazz like this but with a five count.