draft hindsight

https://www.boston.com/sports/new-england-patriots/2020/12/31/patriots-dynasty-collapse-draft-busts

They added Roberto Aguayo, Per Reiss/Field Yates: He was a solid kicker at FSU Florida State and was the 59th overall pick by the Buccaneers in 2016. He had a rough season, finishing 22-of-31 (70.97), including just 4/10 from 40-49 yards and 0/1 from 50+ 2016 Stats 20/29 - 5/5 30/39 - 13/15...

He knew they needed to throw away a year in return for financial flexibility moving forward. After the opt outs he knew for sure. If you consider all of the bizarre non moves on the roster for this year, there is no other conclusion other than...he knew no matter what they could not compete for...

Per Howe and Reiss:

They will be doing an article on N’keal Harry any day now......;) https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/30330511/dk-metcalf-chasing-glory

We need to rebuild through draft next couple years as we lack talent almost everywhere with a lot of aging vets. We will also have much better draft capital than previous years if we keep losing at this rate. Howver, given our draft record over the last few years, I have zero confidence in this...

Bill Belichick to Sirius XM NFL Radio: "This is kind of the year that we've taken to, I would say, adjust our cap from the spending that we've had in accumulation of prior years. We just haven't been able to have the kind of depth on our roster that we've had in some other years."...

The biggest reason we are beginning a rebuild is the first picks we drafted from 2014 to now. 2014 - Dominic Easley (1st round): bust 2015 - Malcom Brown (1st round): below average 2016 - Cyrus Jones (2nd round): bust 2017 - Derek Rivers (3rd round): bust 2018 - Isiah Wynn (1st round): average...

It all makes sense now.

Boo ESPN. Not going to open it. They lie. Harry is ready to break out. Cams fault. https://www.espn.com/blog/new-england-patriots/post/_/id/4821353/patriots-wrs-not-getting-separation-according-to-nfl-next-gen-stats

https://slantroute.substack.com/p/how-new-england-slowed-down-patrick Excellent stuff

Passer Rating when targeted: 2019: 75.5 2020: 61.8 Reception %: 2019: 50.0% 2020: 55.8% Yards per reception: 2019: 8.8 2020: 8.9 Yards per route run: 2019: 0.83 2020: 1.04 EDIT: Week 12 update

Going to be a tough game. I think we all see how good we are tonight. Looking forward to seeing how our defense plays against Wilson and how Cam plays again this week. Also, no injuries!!! Let's go Patriots. Let's discuss!!!!!!

Cam is being set up to fail without credible WR and TE threats. It will be easy for defenses to stack the box and give minimal attention to passing games. No double teams on WRS. I understand that until outputs, BB thought he had no cap to work with. But now there is 35 million available...

He is getting better and better as a passer, sure they beat the lowly Browns but I think the Ravens are the real deal, I can see things coming down between the Chiefs and Ravens for the afc this year. I can’t stand either teams...but damn they look ways better than any other teams. We shall see...

Rationale: 1. Before 2011, first round picks were massive contracts that could ruin a team's cap on unproven rookie players 2. After the new CBA in 2011, rookies are tied to a rookie wage scale making significantly less. Control of 4 years plus a fifth-year team option for first-rounders. 3...

For the handful of people that seem to be interested in this discussion, I figured we could attempt to put these posts in one thread going forward (at least until discussion careens off the rails). March birthdays and events: Happy Birthday, Don Blackmon 3/14: Don Blackmon Happy Birthday...

First round picks get 5 year deals (yeah, year 5 can be skipped). Beyond that, we're looking at a 4 year window. So here are the Patriots picks within that window. 2015 first round pick, and then 2016-2019 picks: Malcom Brown Cyrus Jones Joe Thuney Jacoby Brissett Vincent Valentine Malcolm...

The part of young WRs is spot on. The part about AB is spot on too. NFL Notebook: Tom Brady's views on young WRs fits with his late-career Brady-centric arc, will it factor into his end with NE? | Boston Sports Journal

It is shocking and sad -- at least from a fan of the game perspective -- that Andrew Luck is retiring. My question is whether it is time to try to pick the bones of that franchise while the getting is good. Hear me out. I'm sure the Colts front office is as shocked as the rest of us. With their...