WelshPat

Disagree, there's lots of guys that come into the nfl and play well from the start. D-Jackson, Crabtree, Greg Jennings, Calvin Johnson, Eddie Royal, Maclin, Steve Smith... i could go on and on.

Someone like Damien Wiiliams can come in and run every route in the book pretty much straight away. Now, someone like the guy from Georgia Tech, Thomas, he's going to take a while because he's only run 2 routes in his life.

Remember, Tate was a first round prospect and was rated higher than his team mate Hakeem Nicks, who played pretty well pretty quickly. But i think it's tough to rely on someone coming off a pretty much a year injured.

PATSYLICIOUS

Yes, but how many have done it in our system? In the BB era the most successful rookie WR is probably Bethel Johnson and that's not really saying much most of it was from his KR. Tate is virtually a rookie, hope for the best with him but you can't enter the season expecting him to line up across from Moss. We need a vet IMO

__________________
Organized madness
The young Gott-stra
Young Frank Sinatra

DW Toys

Sounds like whistling while walking through the cemetery to me. You can't really be sitting there behind a desk saying "Let's wait for cuts"? What? It is not comforting to me to know that is the main strategy. Kraft doesn't micro-manage so if we made an obvious mistake like Boldin, I am sure BB really has a plan "B'.

The Draft?...Cousins, 18% chance of success from 1-8(plus comps) only. I hope that is not the plan. I also hope they aren't banking on a stupid stoner to be the savior at WR. Stupid as in "let me toke my blunt before the NFL Physical" stupid and he was not that big of a deal at WR at NC. His return abilities made him more attractive. We cut a 14 year vet because he could not get the Patriots WR system. Now you have "Cheech" Tate being fitted for a yellow blazer? Perhaps he can smoke that. What was Tates' Wunderlic?

Cousins we need to at least get one WR with a better long term outlook than Patten....Please.
DW Toys

ausbacker

The Colts seemed to go OK with Wayne, Clark and the youth brigade at receiver.

KontradictioN

Tate showed an ability to get behind coverage last year and that was about it. If he works on his route running and gets the offense down, he'll be a dangerous player with us. That has yet to be determined though. All we know about Brandon Tate is that he has had some knee issues for the past couple of years. We shouldn't rely on him and Edelman and a receiver should/should have been definitely looked at. It basically boils down to this: if the FO is right about Tate then we might have a viable WR3. If they are wrong and we don't do anything about the receiver position, there is a bigger hole there than there was in 2009. Seems like a dangerous gamble to me, but we'll see.

Heh. To be honest, I forgot that there was any interest in Reed.

__________________

To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.


CREDIT - Sicilian

patsinthesnow

Great Point. However, I wonder if having a stud WR along with a stud TE helped.

EDIT: Nevermind, I'd rather have Wes Welker than Dallas Clark.

The_Riddler

Until McNabb joins the Raiders and we watch the top of the 2011 draft go back down into the 20's.

It's time for Brandon Marshall or TO

Gator Mike

Bingo.

I think the Pats honestly believe that Branch will be made available at some point.

jmt57

Teams are playing under a whole different set of rules this year. For starters there was the increase in the number of service years for a player to become a free agent this season. As a result there are fare fewer unrestricted free agents available for teams to sign. So at this point in the offseason, when about 30 of the 32 fan bases are screaming 'why hasn't my team done more' every year, the screaming is even louder because those fans were expecting more rather than less in an uncapped year.

Secondly the uncapped year has changed another dynamic in how teams shape their roster. Typically teams are cutting players at the start of free agency in order to clear cap space. However in an uncapped year they no longer need to do that. Now the only incentive is to avoid paying roster bonuses on certain dates. End result is that more veterans will be cut later in this offseason than they would have been in previous years, which will in turn make more free agency additions happen later this offseason.

Yes, the Pats have an issue at WR; there is no denying that. But aside from the annual 'why haven't we done anything yet' mentality, it may be worth considering that this offeseason roster changes in free agency are going to be far different than in the past.

captain stone

Why does Kraft believe that more vets will be released after the draft this year than in past years? Without a salary cap, there's less of a reason to do that. Besides, because this offense is so damn complicated, it behooves the FO to bring a new WR to Foxborough sooner rather than later.

I still think that Bill should've signed Dante Stallworth & Matt Jones weeks ago; they would've already started learning the playbook and becoming acclimated to the task at hand.

__________________
Question Authority.