New England Patriots Thread Mod Warning Post #253

Seems like the Gesicki and Juju deals are pretty team friendly. I'm liking the moves so far... nothing too flashy, but solid improvements in depth, especially on offense.

From what I've read Board is a stud ST player, but not a complete non-entity at LB either - he'll see some snaps there.

From the visits and rumours they are still looking for a Safety in particular. We do seem particularly light on DBs, especially after the Mills release.

Anybody thinking that Bill would draft a RB in the first round shouldn't have a job. Not only do we have a great one in Rhamondre Stevenson but there's no chance Bill would ever draft a RB in the first. He's always look to find value later in the draft for that position.

He had one good season with the Raiders. He was pretty ordinary with the Eagles. 2021 with us, under 500 yards, was his fourth best season in the eight he's been in the league. He's never had 900 yards in a season.

I didn't like us signing him, he'll do nothing with the Ravens either.

We've been hit and miss on CBs named Jones', Cyrus Jones anyone? If we did take a Jones, they might just end up balancing our Jones quotient if Mike Florio is to be believed.

On that note, I hadn't given much head to the Lamar talk at the time, as I just thought it would be too much for the organisation to take on financially and pickwise. However, if we could move Mac for a 2nd (I don't think we'd get a first for him after last season), we could probably package that with our other 2nd to maybe get a mid-1st, so maybe we could pay that price. Kraft has publicly mentioned Lamar and said money would never be an issue in seperate statements, which makes me think he wouldn't be against moving Mac if it was to get Lamar. I think Bill would be well up for this, Lamar could definitely push the timetable on passing Shula's record to just 2 seasons, and Bill wouldn't have to deal with the fallout thereafter, plus if his relationship with Mac is as fractured as is being suggested, I just don't see any coming back from that. Swinging for the fences on Lamar could seal his legacy if it works out, hanging his legacy on repairing and succeeding with Mac seems much more tenuous (not saying he won't, but Lamar would seem like a much quicker solution).

Assuming the roster stays broadly the same if Lamar arrived, I would think that Lamar could instantly make us contenders. Personally, I'm not his greatest fan but even I can recognise the dual threat would be a significant upgrade. With his movement, he could make receivers open even if they can't make themselves open, so I don't think we'd need significant upgrades at receiver or TE (although an upgrade would be welcome). The only caveat to my "could" is the OL. In my limited understanding of OL play, my guess is that the pass protections and durations for a mobile quarterback are probably very different to the pocket passers we've had for the last 25+ years. Obviously, given the difficulty that the OL had last year installing the outside zone run concepts, I'd be a little worried that they might not adjust to this either. The new coaching will no doubt help, but I genuinely don't know if the OL personnel we have will fit to whatever scheme we would have to devise for a Lamar.

Anyway, I'm saying it now, let's go for Lamar!

With draft day only a few nights away, I thought I'd avoid my usual habit of going "i thought that was going to happen" after the fact and get my thoughts out in advance. I am not particularly fixed on names, I hardly watched any college football this year so don't have any sense of who we should really hang our hat on. With 11 picks, we should be able to pivot about the draft fairly handily, so purely from a positional perspective, I'd like to see one of 3 things happen:

(A) As we did in the 2012 draft, keep our first and then bundle a bunch of other picks to get a second go in the first round, with a view to selecting 2 day 1 starters addressing 2 out of the trio of WR, OT and CB. The only way I feel this year is different from 2012 is that overall I don't think we've as much talent on the roster, so 2 high end talents may not be enough. Additionally, I think the general feeling among analysts is that there's really only 15-20 talents with a true first round grade, so we may not be able to get up there. And before anyone gets pedantic, I know we traded our way into 2 first-rounders in 2012, I just mean the end goal should be 2 first rounders.

(B) As we did in the 2009 draft, trade back from the first and through a combination of other moves end up with 3/4 in the second. If we're not going to get the absolute top line talent, I think we're better to throw a bunch of picks at the next level and see who works out. Certainly worked out well in 2009 (Chung and Vollmer were stalwarts for us, Butler was a stalwart for anybody but us). We might also pick up some good players who aren't necessarily what we directly wanted as it seems there's a lot of depth at TE and the edge positions. I think this would be my preferred move.

(C) Go for the batshit crazy move I've already posited, namely taking an instant upgrade with Lamar (nothing against Mac, but Lamar would be an instant elevation for not just the position but also for the offence in general). The money would be crazy, the cost in picks would be crazy, the Ravens probably wouldn't deal with us, and like Eagle Eye said, we might not get a full season out of him healthwise. On the plus side, it's hard not to like the thought of Bill yet again sticking 2 fingers up to conventional wisdom.

What would you folks like to see out of this draft for NE?

I like Skoronski but I'm reading a lot about him being more suited to guard in the NFL which concerns me. He was brilliant as a tackle at Northwestern.

Tbh I don't see receiver as a huge need, not a first round need anyway. We've got Smith-Schuster, Parker and Thornton who I think will be very good.

We need a slot guy and we've had great success picking up players for that position cheaply, Edelman 7th round pick, Welker 5th round pick via trade and Jabar Gaffney as a very cheap free agent.

That offensive line has to hold up no matter who the starter is.

Personally I believe Mac Jones can be the man if he gets the time in the pocket. I don't see what the big deal is about him going outside the organisation for help last season given the pathetic offensive coaches he had. I'd personally look at that as a guy with a lot of self-belief looking to fix things.

Shouting at coaches when things are going wrong, who did you see do that in the past. Yes a certain no.12, the GOAT.

Anyway, I'd like to see us spend our first round pick on a tackle and maybe our second as well. If you get Paris Johnson and Dawand Jones is there in round 2 I'd grab him as well.

I'm not saying he is definitely overrated but CJ Stroud got so much time in the pocket that he might just not be as good as his numbers suggest. Johnson and Jones gave him incredible protection.

Reilly Reiff is not bad but there's no future there. He'd be a very good guy to help two young men to find their feet though.

I'd be cutting Brown, he's done nothing since he got here.

I'd nearly bet on us taking a Jones for the defensive backfield. 😁

You'd think we'd go OT, CB or maybe WR in Round 1. But as we saw last year with the Strange pick, pretty much anything is possible. Albert Breer said some teams have less than 15 players with first round grades - hopefully there is an early run on QB's that pushes one of the top CB's or OT's into our range.

They did a good job in FA of adding depth so I don't think we have screaming needs anywhere, but we could do with getting better and younger in most positions.

Gonzalez after a trade down to 17, absolute ace of a pick.

We still have 11 picks, including 4 x 4th rounders. Can't see us drafting 11 players so we could move up to get targets as the draft progresses.

Tackle is the obvious need now. WR and TE make sense too as we need more playmakers around Mac.

Not a Tackle, but finally some OL help with C/G Jake Andrews from Troy.

There's Jones at the senior bowl.

His basketball highlights they showed on the NFL network coverage were class.

And now we give a pick to the Jets and they take a tackle. I'm getting really pissed now.😡

Jones went to the Browns.

So at this stage we've taken a CB, 2 x LB, DE, C, 2 x OG, K, P, WR

Boutte the wide receiver played the slot at LSU.

Anyway, no tackle selected to this point. I just don't understand it.

We have Trent Brown the penalty machine, Riley Reiff at the end of his career and not much else.

Edit to add: We just took another slot receiver.