A couple of Idle thoughts on the offense
1. I don't give a F#ck about who is the "#1" WR. For the ENTIRE BB and Brady era we had a true #1 WR (Randy Moss) for 3 seasons and only 2 seasons with Brady. Did you all forget that we have been ENORMOUSLY successful for all this time WITHOUT a #1 WR? It begs the question why so many fans who purport to be Pats fans constantly demand one? To quote Andy Dufresne (shawshank redemption) "are you just being OBTUSE"
Last season with the WRs we had, We had 3857 passing yds which ranked 14th in the league and only 5 rankings less than the LA Rams who had a "superstar QB the best WR in the league plus OBJ etc. But the fact is NONE of that matters to me. Another thing Bill has preached to us for the last 20 odd years is that LAST year's team mean nothing. There is roughly a 33% turnover in teams every year. Sometimes it's a little more, sometimes it's bit less. He also preached to us that EVERY year the team has to reestablish their team chemistry and every year they have to establish a new identity. So what I look at is ARE they going to be better or worse in talent at each position and for that reason, I am optimistic that this offense is going to be more talented and should be better. The stuff about chemistry and identity will only begin at TC and cna take half a season to see if both develop and whether it will be good or bad.
Let me break it down by position
QB - EVERYBODY on the offense will be positively affected by the expected improvement of Mac Jones. I expect better command of the offense, slightly better velocity on his ball, a bit more mobility in the pocket, and just the gain a good one will get from having a few thousand reps under his belt. I wouldn't be surprised if they keep 3 QB's on the roster with Hoyer back as mentor and initial back up. I think they will hope to get Zappe to the PS, but if they don't think he'll make it keep on the 53 at least for the first part of the season. Hoyer did well in his few opportunities. - better
WR's. Bourne and Aghular, should ALL be incrementally better for their added experience in this system as well as their timing with the QB. Meyers has improved EVERY year he's been here. His role may diminish a bit, but he is great depth at multiple positions. THEN you add the 2 additions of Parker and Thornton we get the big WR we were hoping for when we drafted Harry plus some world class speed in Thornton with enough talent at WR to allow him to slowly be integrated into the offense as a situational guy rather than have him HAVE to be an impact player right away. - better
TE's Henry was clearly AS good as advertised and will slightly improve because the experience he had with the offense AND because his QB will be better. Smith we all HOPE will improve and should in his 2nd year.. I think we will see him as a TE, WB, and FB this season. This versatility will add to his value and open things up for him. Assasi gives us an experienced #3 as depth. - better
OL - I'm VERY excited in this area. This OL gives us an interesting combination, VERY athletic on the left side, and VERY powerful on the right.
I rewatched a bunch of Wynn film this off season. In those instances where he was beaten I thought it was more often caused by him being over extended at times which led to him being off balanced. This is VERY fixable and hopefully is what he and the coaching staff will be working on. What I didn't see was him being powered over. He's purported to be too small to play LT because of his size. The man IS still 300+ lbs and the primary rushers he is going to continue to see week to week are about 240-60. But they also are going to be freakishly athletic and fast. All the more reason to have a freakishly athletic LT. Injuries ARE a real issue, but they can continue or disappear. Who knows.
After watching that clip on Strange pointing out just what an athletic freak Strange actually is, I'm REALLY looking forward to seeing him at TC and in the initial PS games. I imagine there WILL be a period of time where he has to get used to playing against NFL calibre players. If I had my choice I would match him with Barmore every chance I got. But I'm confident that this kid will be be a big upgrade on Karras both as a starter and possible back up at C. Also looking forward to seeing what Dejardin has. I hoping he will be as an upgrade on Ferentz as a back up. Andrews has proven to be a Quality starting C in this league. A guy who can anchor the middle on pass rushes and athletic enough to get to the 2nd level in the run game.
The Left side will be likely manned by Owenu and Brown both big bruising brawlers that can bully DL's. The Pats had a top 10 rushing attack last season (8th) a majority of those runs came over the right side. Whether Owenu can be as good as Mason remains to be seen. We know that he's a decent OLman who can move out to OT when he has to. We also know that the Pats really like him, but time will tell. Brown has had limited injury issues as well. We'll just have to see. Part of any successful season depends on luck with injuries. We can only see how it goes as it goes.
Depth - You know I'm OK with what it is right now. I think there are enough decent guys between the rookies and vets to find 4 more guys to round out our OL depth out of the roughly 8-10 guys they have now. and of course vet FA's are always a possibility before TC. Bottom line, this line COULD be better than last year's edition. Just too many question marks right now -?
RB- I LOVE the combination of Harris and Stevenson - I'm really excited to see what Strong can do. He adds a skill set that our RB room doesn't have. All 3 of those guys are better than average receivers as well, which makes me wonder about James White. And while he's been a wonder as a 3rd down receiver for MANY years and critical to our success over the years, but he's never been a good RB in the ground game and after the catch. 2020 was a down year for him and 2021 ended with a very serious injury. I just wonder between the fact we have guys who can catch the ball, the injuries and age if this might be the year he might become a redundancy one we might not be able to afford to keep on. Of course James White has pretty much defied expectations for many years. So who knows. Bottom line our run game looks to be in great shape for this season - better
In the end I expect us to be better in talent all over the offense with the only question being how the OL gels together and that's more a question of experience and not some much the talent. At this point of the season I have MANY more questions about the defense than the O. But that's an Idle thought for another time.
