rookBoston

I'm sure it struck many of you as much as it did me, that BB decided on a very deep PUP list coming into TC. A lot of those players could probably practice with the team at 80 or 90%, but BB chose to take a conservative approach.

Started me thinking: What does stacking the PUP list with a lot of players do for the team?

Well, for one, it locks players up on the team without costing us any roster spots. Granted, if they dont come off the list before the season starts, we cant activate them until Week 6... but that's not such a bad thing, really:

1) a 16 game season is more of a marathon than a sprint. Any player who joins the roster in Week 7, will still play a full 10 game schedule, and come into the playoffs in peak form without the same number of bruises and flesh wounds than his teammates.
2) our first six games are pretty soft, with a heavy dose of Jets and Bills.
3) we always lose players to IR during the season. Having a PUP filled with players who know the scheme and can step right in is a real luxury.
4) there's always that "spark off the bench" factor that Bruschi brought to the D last year

So, giving players like Harrison and Koppen the opportunity to get 100% healthy and 110% ready to play may actually be a brilliant strategic move, over a 16-game season, plus playoffs.

Stashing them on the PUP gives players like Sanders and Scott, Hochstein and Tucker more snaps and experience with the team, fire-proofing those players for the long haul, exposing their weaknesses for development.

The flip side of the PUP is our use of the IR. Over the course of the season, BB has shown a willingness, even a propensity, to throw players onto the IR-- which ends the player's season, but saves him for the franchise coming into the next season, again without costing a roster spot.

PUP and IR are just a couple of useful loopholes in the limitations on the number of roster spots a team has available in the course of a season. BB has always kept a shadow roster, but the risk of releasing players to recall them in a situation of need (ex: Hank Poteat, Gene Mruczkowski) is that we may lose them to other teams-- Dexter Reid (now with the Colts) comes to mind. If BB could have put him on PUP or IR, I think he would have.

By "using" players early in the season and sending them to the IR, to be replaced with fresh and healthy veterans off the PUP, effectively increases the size of the roster from 53 to something closer to 60.

Having a guy like Bam Childress on the PUP is just about ideal. He's shown just enough potential, that another team would bring him into camp if we left him unprotected. And, if we have an injury at WR, bringing him onto the roster from the PUP list would he a great way to backfill with a player who knows the system.

Sullivan on the PUP is convenient, too, in case four weeks into the season we realize that LeKevin Smith just cant cut the mustard (ie. he "tightens" up, gets sent to the IR, and we buy another year to work him into the right shape.)

Kaczur on PUP helps thin the density of talent we have at OT, with Light, Gorin, Britt, O'Callaghan all legitimate players. And if history is any experience, the chances of losing us an OT to the IR is pretty high. Bringing Kaczur off the PUP, is a huge shot in the arm.

For a coach who values team depth, physical smashmouth play and is planning for a 19 game season, these are the types of creative tools you need to keep the team fresh and productive.

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pats1

The chances of any more than 1 or 2 of thse players actually staying on the PUP come September are miniscule.

Guys like Seymour, Sullivan, Jackson, Childress, or Paxton just need a few extra days of rest and/or need to pass the conditioning test before they get going.

Training camp time is extremely valuable, especially to get players back in season form, so he wouldn't just waste it for an early season roster spot.

We'll see most of the PUP guys back very soon.

Poll

Must be the FCC.

AzPatsFan

One of the changes that I was hoping to see other than reinvigorating trades was the return to eleigibility of IR players fro the playoffs.

As the rule presently stands the IR'ed injured palyer is lost to all teams for the balance of the "season". But this is an extra penalty to the playoff clubs since their playofff games are extra games that the teams not good enough to get to the playoffs don't.

Yet come next season, all have the eligibility returned. Is this fair? In effect the Superbowl teams get penalized for as many as four games with "suspensions" for players that they cannot use. Wouldn't it be reasonable to impose the same suspension on non playoff teams the following season? The non pplayoff teasm could not use their last season IR'ed palyers for four games?

If you think that is ridiculous, then so it the penalty imposed on a team by making a now healthy player ineligeble should his team make the palyoffs?

Look at the Cleveland Browns. Their prized FA pickup tore his patella on the first play of training camp and is "gone for the year", He may be healthy if the Browns get into the plkayoffs after 20 weeks of rehab, why can't he be activated and play?

The penalty of plalcing a player on IR for the season should be equal for all and serves it does discourage the good clubs from stockpiling players, but a regualr season limit on IR would still serve that purpose.

Let teams have the option of returning their IR'ed palyers for the palyoffs. Only the healthy ones who were probably hurt early like the Clevelnd Center could be utilized but they ought to have the chance.

patchick

Rook, this whole argument assumes that there's a relationship between the number of players on training camp PUP and in-season PUP. I can't see any reason at all to assume that. I'd put a player on TC-PUP if I don't expect them to practice much for the first day or two--for any reason. Minor injury, poor conditioning, "veteran benefits," whatever. That way if the guy isn't ready, or just falls down the stairs the next day, PUP is an option. There is absolutely no downside. (Similarly, I can't see any reason to put any PUP-eligible player on the IR.) But "stashing" a player on PUP to keep him fresh? I'm mighty skeptical. We'll see what happens as the season approaches.

fgssand

I think the point Rook brings out is an excellent one. Seems to me "PUP stashing" of players would be nice opportunity and a great insurance policy to be able to keep a few players around. Then, they can be brought back for the stretch run, if needed, due to IR's suffered in the first part of the season. I would think a group of 2 or three players in addition to any legitimate injured players makes sense. I suppose it could not be carried too far, due to cap limitations.

shakadave

I like the Rook Theory of PUP, too, but with a few changes.

If PUP players cannot practice with the team, wouldn't it be better to let them go through training camp and then PUP a few at the end of August? Coming in cold in Week 7 might not leave that much time to warm up and resume the season. Plus, those players are necessarily behind in the gelling of the team throughout the season.

In the cases of Rodney and Koppen, I don't think either of them will be ready to play before Thanksgiving, so PUPing them for now makes sense.

And shouldn't Kaczur, another case Rook mentions, be in camp trying to maximize that Year 2 Bounce?

__________________
Please, God, don't let us ever suck as bad as the 2011 Cowboys did in the Jets opener.
* * * * *
"I got a little shine on and showed you guys a little taste of my speed."

----Vince Wilfork, Jan. 7, 2007

pats1

Exactly. It's all about practice.

The problem with your theory is that once players practice in training camp, they can't go on the PUP until the next season. There's your catch.

patchick

Ok, I guess that in this year without cap pressure it might be a rare temptation to "stash for freshness." But who would actually be a valuable mid-season addition under these circumstances? The player can't practice in camp or during the first six weeks, so it would have to be a veteran who's familiar enough with the Pats' system to need almost no reps. And, of course, one whose absence won't be sorely missed -- basically a borderline guy at a relatively deep position. Let's take a look at the TC PUP list:

Bam Childress
Chad Jackson
Not vets, WR is a thin position.

Nick Kaczur
Dan Koppen
Richard Seymour
Rodney Harrison
All project to start; too valuable to let sit if they're close to healthy.

Lonie Paxton
Has anybody ever worried about a long snapper's "freshness"?

Johnathan Sullivan
Hasn't played in the Patriots' system, needs reps. Perhaps a scenario where he's drastically out of shape but somehow persuades the team that he's really, really ready to get serious and spend the next couple of months working out? Stretches credulity a bit.

Which leaves:

Randall Gay
Patrick Pass

As the candidates for a PUP shadow roster. Personally, I'm not buying it.

Mike the Brit

Hey, Patchick: using logic. No fair!

__________________
My prized possessions: Our family pictures; my dad and me getting doused by Bruschi in Super Bowl XXXIX [Shalize Manza Young Up Close with ... Bill Belichick]


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