We could have had Tevin Coleman instead of Jordan Richards. I just can’t let it go
I hear ya on that one.
Gurley was my #1 RB binky that 2015 draft (even though the Pats had no shot at him). I thought Coleman would fit okay, but I liked David Johnson and Jeremy Langford a bit better (more or less correct about Johnson; way off about Langford) - did not like Abdullah at all. Turned out to be a fairly shallow RB draft class. After (Johnson #86, ARZ), only Ajayi (#149) has really distinguished himself. That totals 6 decent > very good players out of 23 RBs drafted that year - and that's including Abdullah (#54, DET) and Yeldon (#36, JAX) as having been decent.
Anyway, the Pats had already signed Lewis and Cadet in 2015 FA to go with Blount and White, so RB maybe didn't seem like a pressing need at the time. They didn't even sign any UDFA RBs immediately after the draft that year.
Also, in the past couple-three years, BB has increasingly expressed a preference for players with at least some NFL experience who've already successfully navigated the college-to-pro transition, because there's less work to do to get them ready to contribute within the Pats' systems. That preference certainly contributed to the acquisitions of Burkhead, Gillislee and Cooks (and several others on the current team). However, I think that approach generally works better, fiscally (cap-wise), for some positions (relatively cheap RBs) than for others (expensive pass-rushing DEs).
Anyway, the 2015 Safety class was also fairly shallow (they most often are). After Richards (#64), the next SS taken was James Sample at #104 (JAX), just after the Pats double-dipped at DE (Grissom, #97 comp pick, and Flowers 4 picks later at #101). Sample has done nothing, and the two other 4th-round safeties, Clayton Geathers (#109, Colts) and Ibraheim Campbell (#115, Browns) have contributed marginally more than Richards, albeit on poor defenses. Free Safety Adrian Amos (#142) has done fairly well for the Bears, but none of the seven Safeties drafted after him have done anything, and five were out of the league after a year (or less).
That's actually another parallel between the Richards and Wilson picks. There were a dozen Safeties drafted after Wilson, the next one in the 4th round by San Diego (who had the pick right after the Pats took Wilson in the 2nd). Of that 12, only 2 have ended up being as successful as Wilson has been (at least with the Lions), although there were a couple of CB>Safety conversions who've done okay. Again though, IIRC 7 of those 12 safeties drafted after Wilson were out of the league within a year or two.
While BB taking a safety in the mid-2nd has become a running gag, the fact is that it's fairly rare that a safety taken after that point ever does much in the NFL (Harmon's draft class was unusually deep at safety). Furthermore, the Pats coverage systems, as they've evolved over the past decade, have often demanded more versatility from all the safeties on the field than many other schemes do, so those players who seem likely to fit are that much more difficult to find in the draft, and are likely to take fairly significant time to develop (if ever). Safety, for the Pats, is getting to be kinda like the defensive counterpart to WRs in the offensive system. Aside from Harmon, who's come on very strong this season (his 5th), the Pats' only successful drafted safeties over the past decade have been Chung (#34, 2009) and McCourty (#27, 2010) - and McCourty was converted from CB.
So, perhaps the point to the Richards, Wilson and Harmon picks was to try to get a safety prospect into the "grooming" process a couple-three seasons before he'd be needed.
With both Chung and McCourty turning 31 during Camp next August, it seems like it's maybe getting a little late to be drafting and grooming replacements (and Richards doesn't appear to be a viable one), so it's going to be interesting to see how BB approaches that situation (and the RB situation) this off-season.
