The way I see it, this team could either be significantly better or significantly worse than last year. Here are a couple of things that this team would depend on in order to come out significantly better than 2009...
1. Improve play at the quarterback position.
Brady started off the year badly erratic, seemed to have corrected it through the middle of the season, then began slipping again at the end of the season. I believe that this is due to three things in particular. The first is that Brady was coming off of the first serious injury of his career. That much is obvious and he had to deal with the physical and mental aspects of this. The second is the absolute drop off in weapons after Welker and Moss. Aiken sucked... badly. I actually laughed out loud as people defended him last year, then laughed so hard that I sharted when BB shot those defendants of the guy down with the heavy drafted in pass catching options and the signing of Torry Holt. He was terrible, Stanback wasn't much better, Edelman was serviceable and showed promise in his rookie year but was injured, Chris Baker was unbelievably slow, and both he and Watson had to stay back to block the majority of snaps due to injuries and inconsistencies on the offensive line. The third reason was injuries done unto Brady himself. The shoulder that Haynesworth re-injured in the preseason, the broken ribs, and the finger. All of those had an impact on his spotty play at the end of the season. Hopefully we can keep Brady upright and healthy this season.
2. The emergence of our young guys in the passing game.
As has been mentioned, the options in the passing game outside of Moss and Welker were not exactly stellar last season. We let Watson and Baker walk off into the sunset and have replaced them with three bodies: Crumpler, Gronk, and Hernandez. While I expect Hernandez to spend whatever time he sees on the field in the slot this year, we need to hope from something more from Gronk in the passing game. Can he contribute and be the threat down the seam and over the middle that we need from the TE position? Can he block on running downs? On top of that, can Edelman show improvement over 2009? Can Tate get on the field and make any contributions? What about Taylor Price? Will he show us anything this year? Torry Holt alone is not going to be enough, I don't think. We're going to need a few of these guys to step up if this offense and this team is going to make any significant improvements over 2009.
3. Can the O-Line, as it is, stay healthy and keep Brady upright?
This was as detrimental to the offense as anything last season. Light, Neal, and Vollmer all had significant injuries last year and the depth that came in behind them was not about to get the job done on anything approaching an admirable level. Because of this, Brady suffered multiple injuries and was often hurried to make a throw to a sub-par receiving corps by better pass rushing defenses. On top of that, the TE's were taken out of the passing game to help protect the edges against edge rushers from opposing defenses. The health and consistency of the offensive line is absolutely critical this year if we are to see any improvement. Admittedly, the (what looks like) loss of Mankins does not help that. Can Kaczur come in and do an admirable job of replacing his production? We'll see. But, for now, I'm liking the way the starting O-Line is looking. Light-Kaczur-Koppen-Neal-Vollmer sounds about right to me. But their health is absolutely key. I'm not high at all on Connolly. LeVoir is decent, we have no clue what we have in Bussey or Ohrnberger, and Larsen is a rookie. Here's to hoping...
4. Can Gerard Warren or Damione Lewis do better than Green and Wright?
The loss of Seymour at RDE hurt us on so many levels last year. When it first happened, I said that I was cool with it just as long as we had someone coming in behind him that showed promise at the position. Turns out we didn't. Teams gashed the right side of our defense all season long in the run and Jarvis Green was not the presence in the passing game that he once was. The floodgates finally flew open in the Baltimore playoff game. Can Warren or Lewis come in and show themselves to be effective run stuffers and can they also get a push in the passing game? If they aren't the ones, can Deaderick, Brace, or anybody else step up to do a great job of making us forget about the issues of 2009? Someone stepping up there will not only help the D-Line, but it will also help the OLB position extensively as well.
5. The ability of our younger guys to step up in the LB corps.
Those of us with our doubts about Gary Guyton kept having to try to sell his believers on the fact that he was more than just a third down ILB. Turns out the team sided with us with the drafting of Brandon Spikes to go with Tyrone McKenzie. But can one of them step up to effectively put Guyton on the sidelines during first and second down? This will be imperative to our interior run defense as well as our interior pass rush (which would make the defense much more effective against the likes of the Mannings and the Brees' of the league). At OLB, can Jermaine Cunningham show anything this year? It appears that he's going to be counted on much more now with the release of Crable. Can Cunningham show enough to supplant Ninkovich (a JAG, IMO) in the starting line-up? Can TBC give us even half of what he gave us last year? In order for the defense to show improvement, the D-Line has to improve first followed very closely by the LB corps.
