The NEW, BOLD, New England Patriots!

[VJCPatriot]

First of all I would like to give a round of applause to our Patriots front office for this year's off-season moves. Our Pats brain trust signed the gem of this year's free agent class - Adalius Thomas and filled a huge defensive need at the same time. Then they shored up a wide receiver corps that got exposed in the AFC Championship game by trading for Wes Welker and signing deep threat Donte Stallworth. They also got good backup players at the RB and TE position in Sammy Morris and Kyle Brady to replace the departing Dillon and Graham. For all of this I would like to shout out a hearty BRAVO!!

And now given all the bold moves the Patriots organization has made this season I propose a bold new plan that would be in character with what the Patriots have accomplished thus far. I hereby dub this the "Get Patrick Willis Plan." The objective is obvious - shore up the only remaining glaring weakness on the Pats, the MLB position, with imo the best middle linebacker in the draft and imo the only 1st round-worthy middle linebacker in this year's draft. I propose the following. We trade both our first round picks to get as high up as possible. That would put us at about the #8 overall pick according to the draft value chart. Then we evaluate the team needs around us, see who does NOT need a Patrick Willis. Then we trade back as far as we dare while picking up some extra picks in the process. I am guessing somewhere in the 10-15 range. We then draft Patrick Willis with that pick. We use the additional picks we pick up to get more depth and young players (including Zak DeOssie to double up on that MLB position). We then light up a victory cigar after the draft, having addressed all weaknesses on this team, and having gotten significantly stronger.

Thank you for considering my plan, and whether or not the Patriots adopt it, I will still toast the Patriots front office for the great job they have done thus far. Thank you Pats braintrust for your moves this offseason. You have given the fans of Patriot Nation plenty of hope and excitement for next season!

 

[IndyKen]

First of all I would like to give a round of applause to our Patriots front office for this year's off-season moves. Our Pats brain trust signed the gem of this year's free agent class - Adalius Thomas and filled a huge defensive need at the same time. Then they shored up a wide receiver corps that got exposed in the AFC Championship game by trading for Wes Welker and signing deep threat Donte Stallworth. They also got good backup players at the RB and TE position in Sammy Morris and Kyle Brady to replace the departing Dillon and Graham. For all of this I would like to shout out a hearty BRAVO!!

And now given all the bold moves the Patriots organization has made this season I propose a bold new plan that would be in character with what the Patriots have accomplished thus far. I hereby dub this the "Get Patrick Willis Plan." The objective is obvious - shore up the only remaining glaring weakness on the Pats, the MLB position, with imo the best middle linebacker in the draft and imo the only 1st round-worthy middle linebacker in this year's draft. I propose the following. We trade both our first round picks to get as high up as possible. That would put us at about the #8 overall pick according to the draft value chart. Then we evaluate the team needs around us, see who does NOT need a Patrick Willis. Then we trade back as far as we dare while picking up some extra picks in the process. I am guessing somewhere in the 10-15 range. We then draft Patrick Willis with that pick. We use the additional picks we pick up to get more depth and young players (including Zak DeOssie to double up on that MLB position). We then light up a victory cigar after the draft, having addressed all weaknesses on this team, and having gotten significantly stronger.

Thank you for considering my plan, and whether or not the Patriots adopt it, I will still toast the Patriots front office for the great job they have done thus far. Thank you Pats braintrust for your moves this offseason. You have given the fans of Patriot Nation plenty of hope and excitement for next season!

To quote Clint Eastwood in "For a Few Dollars More" - "Bravo"

Seriously, I'd love to see something on the order of what you propose. To know we would be entering the season with a bolstered ILB position with Willis would make smile - and sleep rather well at night....

 

[Patriot Missile]

Nice post. Congratulations are in order for the hard work put in. However I can't agree trading up to get Patrick Willis. Especially when he may fall to us.

This draft is deep with late 1st and early 2nd rd talent and I think there is more needs than you think than just LB on this team. Our secondary is also of concern with just "one?" player signed long term through 08? I realize we have players coming back from injury which will probably shore up the secondary quite a bit but imo this would be the year to add some talent to fill in the holes that are soon to be opening.

 

[VJCPatriot]

Nice post. Congratulations are in order for the hard work put in. However I can't agree trading up to get Patrick Willis. Especially when he may fall to us.

This draft is deep with late 1st and early 2nd rd talent and I think there is more needs than you think than just LB on this team. Our secondary is also of concern with just "one?" player signed long term through 08? I realize we have players coming back from injury which will probably shore up the secondary quite a bit but imo this would be the year to add some talent to fill in the holes that are soon to be opening.

Thanks. I agree that cornerback is another longterm concern to look at. But since we have Asante franchised I could see us putting off addressing that need this year. Whereas at MLB we have an aging Bruschi who showed worsening lack of range and mobility in last year's playoffs and then who else? Seau? That is why the proposal to get Willis. IMO, no offense to fans of PSU linebackers, Poz is too small to be adapted to play MLB in the Pats system and he also showed himself to be kind of slow and unathletic at the combine. So if the Pats don't address MLB early, I don't see the Pats going after one until well after the first round. It all depends on how the talent falls but I am certainly not counting on Willis to be falling to #24 after he ran a 4.5 40 at the combine.

 

[solman]

Trading up in the first round is a suckers move.

Top first round choices consistently fail to pan out.

In contrast, BB/SP have been ridiculously consistent with their bottom first round picks.

Besides, Willis may yet fall to 24. I don't think he should, but clearly many people in the scouting community (who have spent orders of magnitude more time watching Willis than I have) think he will.

 

[ClevTrev]

Trading up in the first round is a suckers move.

Top first round choices consistently fail to pan out.

In contrast, BB/SP have been ridiculously consistent with their bottom first round picks.

Besides, Willis may yet fall to 24. I don't think he should, but clearly many people in the scouting community (who have spent orders of magnitude more time watching Willis than I have) think he will.

Excellent point. Whether Willis falls or not, the value starts with the last 1/3 of the first round, from about choice 20 plus or minus a couple. Targeting an individual player is something the Pats don't typically do in a reach. It's mostly not beneficial. Why change a good thing?

 

[Fencer]

If you look at the 7 positions on defense, including nickel CB, that aren't DL or OLB, the Pats have:

Harrison -- excellent, aging, and injury prone
Samuel -- excellent, but likely to leave soon
Bruschi -- aging and injury prone, hurt last season; opinions differ as to how he played unhurt
Hobbs -- solid or better
Gay -- injury-prone and only locked up for one year
Wilson -- regressing and in his last season
The potential to have either Thomas or Vrabel play inside

+ a whole lot of projects and JAGs.

Yes, the JAG/project supply is CURRENTLY richer at DB than at ILB, but it doesn't follow from that ILB needs to be the top draft priority.

 

[VJCPatriot]

So anyone you'd rather go after than Willis? I dunno, I think one more quality player might just put this team over the top especially when they have already filled most of their needs via free agency. Most rookies we draft his year will not be making this team so why not go after quality over quantity? I just had the feeling that was the Pats philosophy this year especially since they plucked some rather choice free agents to address very specific needs and spent the $$$ to get it done too. That's just my feeling. Feel free to disagree if you can come up with a different explanation.

If you look at the 7 positions on defense, including nickel CB, that aren't DL or OLB, the Pats have:

Harrison -- excellent, aging, and injury prone
Samuel -- excellent, but likely to leave soon
Bruschi -- aging and injury prone, hurt last season; opinions differ as to how he played unhurt
Hobbs -- solid or better
Gay -- injury-prone and only locked up for one year
Wilson -- regressing and in his last season
The potential to have either Thomas or Vrabel play inside

+ a whole lot of projects and JAGs.

Yes, the JAG/project supply is CURRENTLY richer at DB than at ILB, but it doesn't follow from that ILB needs to be the top draft priority.

 

[patriotsdynasty12189]

Lets wait till the season until we congratulate our front office. You never know, Donte Stallworth can turn into Jerry Porter, Thomas and tear an achilles, Morris could get arrested for smoking pot, K.Brady could forget how to block, Wes Welker could return to bad form. Lets wait for a while.

BTW now that we have Kyle Brady will Tom Brady's jersey be T.Brady now?

 

[VJCPatriot]

Lets wait till the season until we congratulate our front office. You never know, Donte Stallworth can turn into Jerry Porter, Thomas and tear an achilles, Morris could get arrested for smoking pot, K.Brady could forget how to block, Wes Welker could return to bad form. Lets wait for a while.

BTW now that we have Kyle Brady will Tom Brady's jersey be T.Brady now?

Heard they changed that rule so Brady will not have to change his jersey. Same thing applies to Adalius Thomas and David Thomas. No jersey changes needed. I think that makes sense cos the refs always refer to the players by number rather than name anyways.