While I was never a fan of Gaffney's and I thought he was pretty weak for the Patriots (and I often critiqued how he was killing us because he had no ball skills when Brady would make a perfect pass to him) I do agree that, with 20/20 hindsight, we sure could use him right now. Greg Lewis, Joey Galloway, Brandon Tate, were his replacements. Going back to last August, I thought the move to bring in the new guys and get rid of Gaffney (who I never liked) was a great idea. In hindsight, of course I'd rather have Gaffney.
But at the time, I remember that even Reche Caldwell played more and was more of a target than Gaffney.
Gaffney did improve and played better with Cassel in the game, but with Brady, he had practically no rapport. He made one HUGE catch with Brady that was a sight to behold in the end zone, but I mostly remember the drops on perfectly thrown balls 25 yards downfield. He couldn't get separation, mistimed the ball.
I certainly hope the Patriots do a LOT more to address that position this year in the draft, and they should stop looking for athletic specimens at WR and instead draft guys that produced on the college level. This year we saw Mike Wallace, Austin Collie, Johnny Knox and several others show that you can grab guys in the lower rounds, so I suggest the Patriots keep their draft picks and use a scattershot approach. Really we could have done it last year, and I wouldn't care if only 33% of those picks made the team. Even one of Wallace, Collie or Knox would look good right now. There are always Bobby Engram types out there, guys who don't have top end speed, but they can catch the ball.
The Eagles have a kid on their practice squad, Jordan Norwood, who can snag the ball and runs great routes. He was a walk-on at PSU and does not have great athleticism, but he can run a curl, a comeback, and you throw the ball anywhere near him or drill it into the ground, and he'll catch it.
Can we still sign guys off of practice squads?
