USA Today grades the Pats on the bottom tier of the Free Agency period

[Claremonster]

The only time I ever thought that was after SB 42, didn't think JetDell wanted us to go 19-0 and make his Spygate witch hunt into a mockery. What makes you think last years SB was rigged (Pats Giants)? The safety? I thought that one was BS.

Exactly (the safety)! The first one, the Giants oline was never called for holding (especially on the Tyree catch)...eh, all it does is bring back more But, it was blatant.

 

[MTM558]

The Patriots are only graded this low because the reporters want to (and should, to an extent) make a big deal about how the Patriots let Welker go to the Broncos, and have yet to adequately replace him in the offense or overhaul their defense.

In truth, the Patriots are already championship caliber (as evidenced by last 2 seasons) and only need complementary veterans to an already strong, youthful core.

The roster can be generalized as follows:

QB: Brady Mallett - Arguably greatest QB ever and a young, promising backup. (A+)

RB: Ridley, Vereen, Bolden, Washington - A dynamic 1-2 punch in Ridley-Vereen who are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more explosive than BJGE and Woodhead. Bolden and Washington are good ST contributors and solid backups. (B+)

WR: Amendola, Jones, Slater - Slater is Special Teams only, and both Jones and Amendola, while possessing tremendous upside, are very injury prone. This position needs to be filled out in a big way (C-)

TE: Gronkowski, Hernandez - Best TE combo in league by far. Durability is a question, but their injuries have been kind of freakish, so they can be given the benefit of the doubt (A+)

OL - Solder, Mankins, Wendell, Connolly, Cannon - A solid, young OL under Coach Scar. Just add depth and perfecto. (A)

DL - Jones, Ninkovich, Wilfork - A deep position, yet not many "game changers." This is where a draft pick or Abraham could help. (B)

LB - Mayo, Hightower, Spikes - Big, strong, imposing. But lacks in coverage ability and proven depth. (B)

CB - Talib, Dennard, Arrington - If Talib is healthy, Dennard is out of jail, and Arrington is in the slot, the team may be on to something. (B)

S: McCourty, Wilson, Wilson, Gregory - If A. Wilson can contribute and T. Wilson can develop, the Patriots now have a solid Safety group (B)


So outside of WR, CB, and DL to a lesser extent, the Patriots are very much ready to go.

 

[Brady6]

How does this team deserve a C+, if you're not grading on a curve?

It's really hard to determine a teams grade when no players has taken a snap yet.

1. If Armstead plays to his potential he'd easily be the best DT on the market this offseason. Look at his contract against Bryant's.
2. If Marcus Benard is 27 years old and has 11.5 sacks in 25 games Paul Kruger has 15.5 sacks in 52 games. Compare their contacts.
3. Amendola stays healthy and performs we got a younger more athletic slot receiver with less financial risk.
4. Donald Jones is an upgrade over Branch or Stallworth right away and could potentially be an upgrade over Lloyd.
5. Does this USA Today guy know anything about Vega? Because I certainly don't he could be Cameron Wake and then how is our grade?

These are just a few of the reasons why grading UFA now is down right dumb?

 

[mgteich]

The TEAM is not rated low, just our first 2 weeks of free agency. We're pats fans; we think the team has done great. But I can see how the mediots might be underwhelmed.

After all, how can the media know that the oft injured Amendola is better than Welker, and Jones will be better than Lloyd and his over 900 yards of production? How can they think that Belichick won't find a top receiver in the rest of the free agency and the draft, given belichick's history of being so successful in those areas?

For the outside world, we took one of the very past passing games in the nfl and lost all our receivers, our 3rd down receiving RB, our LT and our backup OG. In their place, we have brought in Amendola (with his injury history), Jones (who wasn't even worth a bonus) and a backup OT who didn't even play last year. To be blunt, none of our receivers could start for Denver or probably for a lot of the top passing teams.

For the outside world, our problem was our defense. As of now, we are bringing back the same defense and brought in Smith to replace Chung. For many outsiders that is sort of a wash. Plus, we brought in a couple of CFL's, not exactly a source of great linemen.

We have upgraded our kick returner and downgraded our punt returner (losing Edelman).
=============================================

BOTTOM LINE

Others have done much better than the patriots in this first phase of free agency. It is NOT quite true that this always happens. We don't always give up on all our own offensive players who are approaching free agency (plus not exercising an option). Yes, we always lose players, but usually we sign a lot more of our own. This is a very long list: Vollmer, Thomas, Welker, Lloyd, Edelman, Branch, and Woodhead.

Obviously, the patriots like to say we concentrate on signing our own instead of making a big splash in free agency. Well, we haven't done that very successfully. And as we know, cap room is NOT the issue. We have $15M or so plus $3.75M that we could get from a Mankins restructure plus $1M we could have (perhaps we have it) if Lloyd's dead money is spread over 2 years.

And yes, I would feel a lot better if we sign Lloyd, Vollmer, Edelman and pass-rusher in the next couple of weeks.

 

[Fencer]

Inc. is literally the only reasonable grade. Compared to most other teams, the Pats have "handed in" only a small fraction of what will be their total work.

I.e., until the cap dollars are mainly spent, it's ridiculous to evaluate the FA period.

 

[Brady6]

The TEAM is not rated low, just our first 2 weeks of free agency. We're pats fans; we think the team has done great. But I can see how the mediots might be underwhelmed.


We have upgraded our kick returner and downgraded our punt returner (losing Edelman).
.

Washington returns punts as well as kickoffs. We upgraded both areas.

 

[50-yard-line]

Well, I've seen a lot of stupid things "wasting ink," but this might be the stupidest.

Consider:

"Green Bay Packers (A-): Despite having roughly $20 million at his disposal, GM Ted Thompson hasn't opened the checkbook. It appears the money is earmarked for OLB Clay Matthews III, NT B.J. Raji and (perhaps) WR James Jones — all free agents in 2014 — and QB Aaron Rodgers, who's in line for a raise. No arguments here — including a tough divorce with WR Greg Jennings — especially if Thompson gets a good back in the draft."

vs.

"New England Patriots (D+): The jury is out on what amounts to a free agent swap of Welker for younger but less durable Danny Amendola, and no one will be watching more closely than QB Tom Brady with his new cap-friendly deal. CB Aqib Talib is back, and maybe S Adrian Wilson is the next coming of Rodney Harrison. And there appear to be several more irons currently in the fire, so this grade may soon require revision. But the receiving corps looks weaker without Welker and Brandon Lloyd, and you have to wonder what the Patriots see in Donald Jones that the Bills didn't. And whither RT Sebastian Voller?"

Did you catch that? Green Bay had 20 million and did nothing (and lost Jennings), but New England lost Welker, REPLACED him with Amendola, upgraded their secondary and have more irons in the fire. Green bay A-, New England D+.

Go ahead and mull that over for a while, and while you're at it, consider that one of the top 75 list had New England hitting 3 of the top 20 FA values in Talib, Wilson and Amendola. That list called Wilson a huge upgrade over Chung for less than half the price (while a top 75 DB list had Chung way ahead of Wilson, duh). This article is a "click-hitter," looking to spark fights on message boards.

 

[Jimke]

The Patriots are only graded this low because the reporters want to (and should, to an extent) make a big deal about how the Patriots let Welker go to the Broncos, and have yet to adequately replace him in the offense or overhaul their defense.

In truth, the Patriots are already championship caliber (as evidenced by last 2 seasons) and only need complementary veterans to an already strong, youthful core.

The roster can be generalized as follows:

QB: Brady Mallett - Arguably greatest QB ever and a young, promising backup. (A+)

RB: Ridley, Vereen, Bolden, Washington - A dynamic 1-2 punch in Ridley-Vereen who are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more explosive than BJGE and Woodhead. Bolden and Washington are good ST contributors and solid backups. (B+)

WR: Amendola, Jones, Slater - Slater is Special Teams only, and both Jones and Amendola, while possessing tremendous upside, are very injury prone. This position needs to be filled out in a big way (C-)

TE: Gronkowski, Hernandez - Best TE combo in league by far. Durability is a question, but their injuries have been kind of freakish, so they can be given the benefit of the doubt (A+)

OL - Solder, Mankins, Wendell, Connolly, Cannon - A solid, young OL under Coach Scar. Just add depth and perfecto. (A)

DL - Jones, Ninkovich, Wilfork - A deep position, yet not many "game changers." This is where a draft pick or Abraham could help. (B)

LB - Mayo, Hightower, Spikes - Big, strong, imposing. But lacks in coverage ability and proven depth. (B)

CB - Talib, Dennard, Arrington - If Talib is healthy, Dennard is out of jail, and Arrington is in the slot, the team may be on to something. (B)

S: McCourty, Wilson, Wilson, Gregory - If A. Wilson can contribute and T. Wilson can develop, the Patriots now have a solid Safety group (B)


So outside of WR, CB, and DL to a lesser extent, the Patriots are very much ready to go.

I would add offensive line to your list. They lost their top backup guard
(Thomas) and I hope they come up with a better offensive tackle than
Cannon to replace Vollmer (if needed). Cannon was awful in the preseason
when he got a chance to play.

 

[Ring 6]

Are you saying that right here in the game threads after just the 1st couple series people make judgements about the outcome of the entire game and not only that, often the entire season? I'm shocked, simply shocked.

Actually he's not saying it, he's defending it......

 

[The Boston Patriot]

Excellent! I hope every nitwit grades us at the bottom of their list.

 

[Ring 6]

Well, I've seen a lot of stupid things "wasting ink," but this might be the stupidest.

Consider:

"Green Bay Packers (A-): Despite having roughly $20 million at his disposal, GM Ted Thompson hasn't opened the checkbook. It appears the money is earmarked for OLB Clay Matthews III, NT B.J. Raji and (perhaps) WR James Jones — all free agents in 2014 — and QB Aaron Rodgers, who's in line for a raise. No arguments here — including a tough divorce with WR Greg Jennings — especially if Thompson gets a good back in the draft."

vs.

"New England Patriots (D+): The jury is out on what amounts to a free agent swap of Welker for younger but less durable Danny Amendola, and no one will be watching more closely than QB Tom Brady with his new cap-friendly deal. CB Aqib Talib is back, and maybe S Adrian Wilson is the next coming of Rodney Harrison. And there appear to be several more irons currently in the fire, so this grade may soon require revision. But the receiving corps looks weaker without Welker and Brandon Lloyd, and you have to wonder what the Patriots see in Donald Jones that the Bills didn't. And whither RT Sebastian Voller?"

Did you catch that? Green Bay had 20 million and did nothing (and lost Jennings), but New England lost Welker, REPLACED him with Amendola, upgraded their secondary and have more irons in the fire. Green bay A-, New England D+.

Go ahead and mull that over for a while, and while you're at it, consider that one of the top 75 list had New England hitting 3 of the top 20 FA values in Talib, Wilson and Amendola. That list called Wilson a huge upgrade over Chung for less than half the price (while a top 75 DB list had Chung way ahead of Wilson, duh). This article is a "click-hitter," looking to spark fights on message boards.

Read the Raiders as well. They get a A-(IIRC) for doing nothing and evidently saving money for some point in the future

 

[Deus Irae]

Are you saying that right here in the game threads after just the 1st couple series people make judgements about the outcome of the entire game and not only that, often the entire season? I'm shocked, simply shocked.

Sure, although that's not the only form in which in-game analysis and discussion takes place. I was actually referring to the more nuanced discussions as opposed to the "It's over, they lost!" or "That other team sucks. We're going to kill them!" stuff.