June 5th, 2007
Practice wrap
Posted by
Albert Breer at 3:47 pm
Here’s some things we’ve got from today’s practice, a non-contact workout held on the upper practice fields at Gillette Stadium:
– The linebacker situation continues to work itself out. For practical purposes, we’re gonna refer to the strong-side inside position here as the “Mike” and the weak-side inside as the “Jack” (In some systems, the WILB is the “Mike” and the SILB is the “Ted”, as we explained last week.) Anyway, newcomer
Adalius Thomas spent just about all of today’s practice at the Mike, after working at the Jack during media access last week. This is significant because for the first time since
Ted Johnson’s retirement,
Tedy Bruschi looks like he could be playing the Jack, his more natural position and where he played for the team during its Super Bowl seasons. That would probably maximize his production, since he struggled some with the physical demands of the Mike over the last couple years, playing alongside
Mike Vrabel and
Junior Seau. The downside is that by turning Thomas into the Mike — he’s certainly got the size at 270 to play it — you may limit his playmaking ability, which happened to Bruschi over the last couple years. But someone’s gotta play there and, from a physical standpoint, Thomas is probably the best suited to play there. Thomas also took a few snaps on the edge — Bruschi at the Jack and Seau (last year’s Jack) at the Mike — and moved around in the nickel.
Mike Vrabel was slotted primarily on the left, and
Rosevelt Colvin was on the right (more often the open side), where he played before Seau’s injury last year.
– In the secondary, with
Asante Samuel AWOL, the Patriots plugged in
Chad Scott with the first team. But what’s real interesting is that
Ellis Hobbs remained on the right side, with Scott manning the left, where Samuel has started the last couple years. Generally, your stronger corner plays the left, since most offenses play right-handed and, as such, put the best receiver at the Z (flanker) position. The guess here is that if Samuel drifts further and further away, you’ll probably see Hobbs over there. But for most of today, it was Scott. And when it wasn’t,
Tory James was there. The safeties used with those two, most often, were
Rodney Harrison on the strong side and
Eugene Wilson on the weak-side.
– The receiver situation is very much fluid. While
Wes Welker was primarily in the slot, the other three newcomers were playing all over the place.
Randy Moss and
Donte’ Stallworth both took reps at the X and Z, and at inside positions. Most of the team’s passing work today came in red-zone work, and that’s where you’ll try to exploit matchups most, so all the movement makes sense. Holdovers
Reche Caldwell and
Jabar Gaffney also played both the X and the Z. What seemed like the combination used most often had Moss as the Z, Gaffney as the X, and Welker in the slot. Also, you can see
Garrett Mills, who really does move well, carving out a role as an H-back with the team, and
Benjamin Watson playing more of the traditional tight-end role that
Daniel Graham had here.
– Welker also was used as a kick returner, which was little surprise. What was interesting was that
Le Kevin Smith and Thomas were both back on the kickoff return team. Last year, Mike Wright was used on this team, and it signaled a sign of strong athleticism for a defensive lineman. This, it would seem, says the same about Smith. And if Smith and Thomas have the feet to do it, those would be two devastating blockers to set the wedge up.
– Here’s your list of absences for today: WR
Chad Jackson, Samuel, DB
Mel Mitchell, DB
Eddie Jackson, DB
Antwain Spann, S
James Sanders, DB
Brandon Meriweather, RB
Laurence Maroney, LB
Eric Alexander, TE
David Thomas and DE
Richard Seymour. Also, Ps
Tom Malone and
Danny Baugher, and G
Brian Barthelmes remain over in NFL Europa, while RB
Sammy Morris wore a red non-contact jersey.
– As for the non-roster report, QB
Vinny Testaverde was there, running the third-team offense, while WR
Troy Brown — who was at yesterday’s golf tournament — was not.
– One last, funny thing. LB
Larry Izzo, a southpaw, ran the scout-team offense for the defense, and actually showed arm strength, if not a ton of accuracy. And Izzo didn’t look all that bad, aside from a couple picks.
