Monday Morning Draft Thoughts

[bucky]

jimmyjames and bucky, i (think) i follow your arguments, but IMO AzPatsFan is closer to the schemes i see out there.
1. patriots don't do the whole SS/FS thing, it's more of a 'split safety' philosophy.
2. certainly ty law played LCB all his time here. but i don't think it was because there was a LCB/RCB approach. IMO it waas because ty felt more comfortable on that side of the field. but as you may remember ty and rodney started playing CB-safety games late in ty's last season.
3. the patriots playbook doesn't seem to have safeties rotate toward one or another side of the field in an organized way. it's more like forward/back. it's much harder for opposing QBs to read complete a progression before big sey or willie ray close the pocket.
4. IMO BB doesn't see that backfield in the context of 4 starters, a nickel back, and a dime DB. it looks like to me that his basic unit is 6 DBs, using backs in a rotation where their roles change from play to play. the QB can't figure out the coverage by watching the safeties, they move every which way.
5. QBs also can't figure out who's covering the #1 WR, it's often more like a zone thing. in one sector and man-to-man somewhere else. if there is assignment of a CB to single coverage for an entire game, it's surely disguised to try & confuse the QB.
6. i like seeing samuel in the middle of the field, he impresses me as a ballhawk. hobbs seems good at man coverage, that could be on either WR or on the TE. gay & several others look really good to me when they're floating back there in some kinda disguised zone, with help from a LB or a safety.
7. geno wilson is a more confident player when rodney is next to him. the whole DB needs a leader, e.g. willie clay, lawyer, RH. then the 1-2 hitters, like t-buck, wilson, and others. samuel got in some heavy hits last season.
8. IMO that back 7 sets up in a way that the safeties have to come up and make first hits if the triangle in the middle (MLB-DT-DT, or ILB-ILB-NT) breaks up. guss scott, sanders, wilson, ventrone, all got hurt coming up to take on the likes of ron brown, mcgahee, the bus, tomlinson, running untouched into the backfield. even RH isn't enough if opposing teams can get their RBs into the backfield like that say, 10 times a game.

You can't really say that the Patriots' system has a "standard" anything because they're a game-planning team. They do have a base D for the front 7 and their base coverage is probably cover 2. But you can't deny that when they need to blitz or play 8 in the box, Rodney gets that assignment while Wilson gets the CF or man-coverage assignment. That in effect would make Rodney the SS and Wilson the FS.

But all of this is irrelevant to the CB discussion. If you look throughout the NFL, almost every team has their best CB listed as the LCB. Look it up - Bailey, Woodson, Tillman, McAllister, Woodson, Madison, Newman, Law, etc. Obviously, the reason is that most NFL teams are "right-handed" and so are their QBs. Samuel played RCB initially, but has been playing LCB for the last 2 years. I know a lot of people on this board are down on him and I'm in the minority. But I'm just trying to point out that as far as the coaching staff was concerned, he was the #1 CB all of last year. Whether he stays that way or not is open for debate.

 

[Julius]

Don't forget Gay. Gay is actually better than Hobbs, although everyone on this board continually forgets it.

Uhhh I disagree with this Gay is a smart player who keeps the play in front of him and doesn't allow his man to get deep on him by taking chances. Hobbs plays closer to the receiver and seems to bat more balls away. I really think Hobbs has better ball skills and will be a much more dangerous player. Gay was starting by default more than anything he did a admirable job but his upside is limited.

 

[Warren=underrated]

Thanks for the additional thoughts Clevtrev. You make a good point in #4 about how some of our picks will help Watson.....I hadn't thought of it that way. I think you also might be onto something w/ #6.....CBSsportsline also thinks O'Callaghan might play some guard. I tend to think both will stay outside, but it's certainly something to keep an eye on.

The only place I strongly disagree is #1. I think the Pats take needs into account less than most teams, but they definitely still have an eye on the roster when drafting, and aren't just doing "best available." Otherwise, it'd be quite a coincidence we never took a kicker while Vinny was around, but the second he's gone, we draft one. I also haven't seen us use a high pick on a QB in quite awhile. If we really use a pure best available method, we must be the luckiest team in the NFL, because in the early rounds the best available guy always seems to play a position where we could use an upgrade.