14thDragon
Third String But Playing on Special Teams
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I have been thinking a lot about the draft recently and though most people are expecting the Pats to take an OLB with their first round pick and consider safety a need because of the loss of Rodney.
First to state the obvious no one except BB knows what BB thinks and the rest of us are just guessing.
I will give you all of that.
Based on what we read and hear about BB’s appreciation for James Sanders and the fact that the Pats signed Sanders to a contract extension I think it is unlikely that BB is looking to replace Sanders with an early pick.
That maybe so but the secondary was routinely torched to cinders last year, and I cannot shake the 3rd-15 reception by Keller from my mind. The coverage over the middle must get better or the defense will continue to decline.
Also I think Rodney’s short term replacement is already on the team and his name is Tank Williams or, if you like, Gary Guyton, serves that role as the coverage linebacker/safety.
Williams is a massive question mark and Guyton is good in coverage, for linebacker and is an order of magnitude below Rodney in coverage abilty.
I don’t think BB would have traded Vrabel if he didn't think that players on the roster could replace him. Redd, Crable and Woods are the players that I think will serve as Vrabel’s replacement. Plus a lot was made last year of Guyton’s ability to play all 4 LB spots.
Maybe his does, but even if Bill came out tommorow and made that statement, I would say he was wrong. Furthermore replacing Vrable is not the point, I want to improve over Vrable in the next couple of years. The defense has been trending down since 2004, I attribute that to the erosion of talent in the secondary and at linebacker. Cornerback has gotten a make-over, and Mayo infused a lot of new talent at the ILB position, but the job is far from complete. It showed on the feild last year, the defense was a liabilty, it needs more talent to compete.
Because of these guesses on my part about BB’s thinking I find it more likely that BB will pick up OL or DL help early to eventually replace Kazcur, Neal, or Seymour.
It is possible, and if it comes to pass, I think it is a mistake. Unless one of the top tier tackles (Top 4/5) or top tier 5-technique (Jackson), and the top 4OLB are already gone and 3/4 of the next tier are still available and the top Cornerbacks are also gone. Put simply, unless an OLB or CB is a real reach at the 23 spot, then it would be a bad mistake to go anywhere else.