A few thoughts,
1) Most grudgingly accepted that healthy Amendola was a adequate replacement for Welker. However, keeping an injury-prone Amendola instead of Welker (if that turns out to be the case), certainly made a difference yesterday.
2) We have no #2 TE. What this means is that front office failed to find the 3rd and 4th tight ends to be available when a top TE was injured. There is no excuse for not being able to have an adequate blocking TE on the squad.
3) We've needed a solid downfield receiver since Moss left. That is not the issue. The team simply failed in bringing in even an adequate veteran receiver. We need a #3/#4 who could be a #2/#3. The parade of players was there, but with no success. The patriots used a 2nd, 4th and signed some free agents. They did fine with their choices. And yes, we need one to step up by mid-season or certainly for the playoff run. We knew that before Game One.
4) The rookies are as about what would expect from rookies. As was seen from last week's rookie stats, there weren't any doing great.
5) Gronkowski is arguably the 2nd most unimportant player on the team, given our lack of backup tight ends that can block.
6) My BOTTOM LINE is that we are a very weak offense with Amendola and Gronkowski out.
So the immediate cause of the situation is injury. However, the more serious cause is the lack of quality backup personnel at both TE and WR. The Brady offense may be able to run behind Gronkowski, Amendola and Edelman. However, there should be more. After all, expecting them all to stay healthy is unreasonable. Besides, the offense should have more than 3 WR/TE's we can count on. It is NOT unreasonable for a top passing team to have 3 reasonable receivers, and 2 reasonable TE's (at least one of which can receive and one than can block). We don't need a lot of superstars. One is plenty; we have one.
The slot receiver has been the only productive and consistent position on the offense; Edelman and Amendola have combined for 30 receptions, 261 receiving yards and 2 touchdowns in 2 games. All those who have referred to the team letting Welker walk as this huge screw up; the reality is that the slot position is just fine. The issue is the 1 reception for 5 yards out of the tight end position, and are rookie wide receivers catching just 9 of 33 targets so far this season. I do not believe Welker changes any of that, so if there is a gripe it has more to do with not addressing the tight end position, or the draft selections.