Cunningham and Zappe cleared waivers, I see. I thought somebody would snag Malik, but thankfully I was wrong. Now they can allow his development to advance at its best pace. The receiver experiment appears to have been a bust, so his way forward is as a qb. Running the scout team will provide a look at what he can do and will help the starters to prepare, and he'll get a steady diet of NFL coaching to some degree. Glad I was wrong about his getting back to us. Nice to see some good news.
As for Zappe, I wonder if they'll keep him or drop him in favor of some oldster w/ more NFL experience. It depends on how they see his upside. If he can't in time adapt to a complex NFL offense, or if Malik can in time pass him by as #1 backup, as well as being a change-of-pace option, out he goes, I suppose. As of now, based at least on this preseason, he's a pretty mediocre backup, and this seems like the sort of year the Pats' backup qb is likely to get some work, so that's a little worrisome.
Now hopefully some useful players will emerge from the annual NFL swap meet and rummage sale. We seem to do better with that than we do with the draft: more known quantities, I suppose. Maybe we can score a full-size TE, or go for an even dozen offensive linemen (Is the Flying Wedge play still legal?) .