ctpatsfan77

A tidbit from Reiss:

Not sure if it's just against injury, or against skill and injury, but that's rather interesting.

FWIW, the new CBA limits what teams can do with UDFAs in two ways: the UDFA rookie contract must be exactly three years long, and each team is limited to an aggregate of $75,000 in signing bonuses for UDFAs.

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"Momentum was quickly snatched away by New England, who once again proved that any Patriot, at any moment, can make a play." —Inside the NFL, Packers v. Patriots

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jmt57

In the past few years I got the distinct impression that the Patriots paid their UDFA and Practice Squad players a bit more than most other NFL teams; part of Belichick's roster-building philosophy of our now #20 player being better than your #20 player; our #40 > your #40, our #53 > your #53, etc.

At first I thought the new rule of a maximum of $75k to UDFAs may be an impediment, but that doesn't appear to be the case at this point in time. I really don't understand what the rationale was in implementing that rule, especially when you consider what a relatively small amount of money that is relative to an NFL team's entire operating budget.

MrNathanDrake

Dane Fletcher
Gary Guyton
Kyle Arrington
BJGE

There's 4 UDFA's that should have a significant role on our team this year.

so yeah, I'd say we're ahead of the curve in recruiting UDFA.

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Bring on the 2012 Season

doesntmatter1

I feel that we are ahead of the curve when it comes to finding special teams players. For the most part I feel that great special team players correlate to great players overall.

Special teams is an underated part of the game(ask Chargers,Steelers, Dolphins) but it is the easiest way to see if a player is disciplined in doing their job with lane assignments and their physical abilities are shown because you have to use proper blocking techniques or its going to get flagged etc and all of this is happening at full speed.

If a rookie or free agent can do this at a high level then most of the time they can be used in some other capacity. The perfect example is kyle arrington. He made the squad by his st ability alone. His solid ST play translated to the defense and now he is seeing time as a db and occasional rusher.

Urgent

While Arrington is a good example of special teams players making the jump to offense or defense, there have probably been more Larry Izzo, Matthew Slater, JeRod Cherry, Tracy White, Eric Alexander types. Often the Patriots find players who can play ST at a high level, but cannot succeed in some other capacity. And value them.

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"Your father was a truck driver, Ray?"
- Trombley

BlitzFritz

and mike wright.

-- FRITZ

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"If you counted out the Patriots, you just don't get it." Adam Schein, September 2008

“We are building a big, strong, fast, smart, tough and disciplined football team that. consistently competes for championships.” Guess who.

ctpatsfan77

In years past, they have gone so far as to pay full salary to players on the PS (Billy Yates comes to mind).

I think it was to prevent ridiculous bidding wars for UDFAs; to be honest, I can't see a good reason for it, either.

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"Momentum was quickly snatched away by New England, who once again proved that any Patriot, at any moment, can make a play." —Inside the NFL, Packers v. Patriots

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nnmnmmnn

How does that compare to other teams? I honestly do not know... How do we compare?

Bill B.

And Brian Hoyer.

ctpatsfan77

With all due respect to Mr. Hoyer, I think pretty much all of us on this board hope he doesn't play a significant role on the 2011 Patriots.

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"Momentum was quickly snatched away by New England, who once again proved that any Patriot, at any moment, can make a play." —Inside the NFL, Packers v. Patriots

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