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http://news.bostonherald.com/blogs/patriots/
July 29th, 2007
Hot stuff
Posted by Albert Breer at 12:06 pm
The Patriots just finished up a two-hour session in the blistering heat, in full pads, with some hitting, and anyone whoever played football knows how that, well … just isn’t real cool when you’re in it.
Here’s some things we picked up along the way:
– A tone was set early in middle drills (tackle-to-tackle running game work without receivers or DBs), when new LB Adalius Thomas came hard into the ‘A’ gap, right in the thick of the offensive front, and flat out decked rookie RB Quinton Smith. Smith went from this — I — to this — __ — in a hurry, if you get my drift. Thomas continues to look like he has the size to fill the old Ted Johnson role at the Mike (SILB), while also having the versatility to cover, rush off the edge, etc., etc. In short, he looks like everything he’s been advertised to be. And even better, you can tell the way he’s involving himself with his new teammates. He and Tedy Bruschi spent a time over on the sideline during special-teams work going over things.
– Ellis Hobbs may be too important to the defense to return kicks anymore. And that’d be a shame. Because he’s real good at it. In kickoff work, Hobbs was joined deep by Laurence Maroney, Bam Childress and Wes Welker, and shone brighter than any of them, even if the drill was stop-at-first-contact. He reaches top speed faster, gets to the wedge quicker, and seems to think on his feet better and act with more decisiveness than the others.
– The other starting corner, for now, is Randall Gay, and he had a couple problems this morning. On one play, WR Randy Moss put a double move on him at about 10 yards, Gay bit and Moss easily glided upfield and underneath a rainbow from Matt Cassel. Gay seems to still be feeling his way back into playing, and getting his legs under him after missing most of the last two years. So doing it against a guy like Moss probably isn’t going to make you look real good.
– We said it on Friday, and we’ll say it again, in the race for roster spots, Jabar Gaffney looks like he’s ahead of Reche Caldwell and Kelley Washington. Not only does Gaffney seem to have a solid rapport with Tom Brady, his command of the offense, where he’s supposed to be, and his ability to find openings in coverage make him a valuable piece. Where he might run into trouble is in that he’s not a standout on special teams, and you’d look for that further down the depth chart at receiver. Washington’s better there, but seems to still be struggling with the offense. There were two occasions on timing routes in passing skeleton where the former Bengal seemed to run the wrong route and make the wrong adjustment, with Cassel throws fluttering to the ground, and that usually a result of someone making a bad sight adjustment.
– Chad Brown’s another guy who brings the inside-outside versatility to linebacker, but it was clear that two years ago he wasn’t real comfortable playing inside. Watch him play on the line, and you see a player who seems to time things out better, and can easier adapt his skills to the system. At this point, he’s clearly a backup. The question is how good a backup he can be. And it’s clear that his best chance is as an OLB on early downs and a down rusher in the nickel.
– Tory James might have something left in the tank. On a deep post to Gaffney during team work, James tracked the ball, well overthrown by Matt Cassel, and ran it down over his shoulder 60 yards deep. He also showed good instincts in breaking from the curl zone he was covering on another play to reach over Kelvin Kight and register a pass breakup.
