Positions that are more or less clear

[Fencer]

K Crystal clear.
P Crystal clear.
LS As clear as a still and shallow ocean. The only uncertainties are how well the rookie will do -- duh -- and whether the Navy will permit him to keep doing it in future seasons.

QB Oh, never mind.

FB Crystal clear. Develin is the man.

RB (Power-oriented) Quite clear. Blount and Gray, with Bolden serving as a backup.
RB (Shotgun-oriented) Unclear. Nobody is seizing the opportunity. Health aside, White, Cadet, Lewis and Bolden are all in play. Roster spots are probably Bolden plus one other guy.

WR Clearing up. Edelman, Lafell, Amendola and Dobson seem locked in, subject to health, which in two cases is only semi-clear. Gibson, Harper and Boyce are competing for a spot. Tyms was too, but is injured. And Slater is emergency depth.

TE Semi-clear. Gronk and Chandler are obvious. Then there are 1 (my prediction) or 2 others, with Hooman being the default but not locked-in choice for one slot.

OT Pretty clear. We have 4 guys counting Fleming. One starter seems to be fighting injury every year. The other recently had cancer, probably concussions, and by most accounts a down year. So 4 it is.

Interior OL Quite unclear.

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Safety Murky.

• Wilson/Ebner/both is a considerable uncertainty.
  
• A 3-safety nickel seems like a strong possibility, which could mean McCourty got more snaps at CB than Safety.
  
• There's even a chance of a 3-safety base, with McCourty again in the role of a CB.
• If we assume a base of McCourty, another safety, Butler and another CB, when is the other safety Chung and when is it Harmon?

Starting left CB. Clear. It's Butler.

Other CBs. Beyond murky.

Pure LBs. The top 3 are crystal clear. The rest, including their number, seems fairly murky.

Edge rusher. Fairly clear -- Jones, Ninkovich, Sheard and the 2 top rookies. Tough to keep a 6th, except on the PS. If surprisingly few LBs are kept, so that Ninkovich should be viewed as a backup there, I guess there's room for another edge guy, but that's about it.

DT. A lot like LB. Easley, Brown and Siliga are fairly clearly at the top, except that Branch may be higher than 4th. But after the first 3 (by my count) things are pretty murky.

 

[mgteich]

I suppose the other way of saying this is that that 47 of the rosters spots are pretty clear.

K Crystal clear.
P Crystal clear.
LS As clear as a still and shallow ocean. The only uncertainties are how well the rookie will do -- duh -- and whether the Navy will permit him to keep doing it in future seasons.

QB Oh, never mind.

FB Crystal clear. Develin is the man.

RB (Power-oriented) Quite clear. Blount and Gray, with Bolden serving as a backup.
RB (Shotgun-oriented) Unclear. Nobody is seizing the opportunity. Health aside, White, Cadet, Lewis and Bolden are all in play. Roster spots are probably Bolden plus one other guy.

WR Clearing up. Edelman, Lafell, Amendola and Dobson seem locked in, subject to health, which in two cases is only semi-clear. Gibson, Harper and Boyce are competing for a spot. Tyms was too, but is injured. And Slater is emergency depth.

TE Semi-clear. Gronk and Chandler are obvious. Then there are 1 (my prediction) or 2 others, with Hooman being the default but not locked-in choice for one slot.

OT Pretty clear. We have 4 guys counting Fleming. One starter seems to be fighting injury every year. The other recently had cancer, probably concussions, and by most accounts a down year. So 4 it is.

Interior OL Quite unclear.

------------------------------------------------------

Safety Murky.

• Wilson/Ebner/both is a considerable uncertainty.
  
• A 3-safety nickel seems like a strong possibility, which could mean McCourty got more snaps at CB than Safety.
  
• There's even a chance of a 3-safety base, with McCourty again in the role of a CB.
• If we assume a base of McCourty, another safety, Butler and another CB, when is the other safety Chung and when is it Harmon?

Starting left CB. Clear. It's Butler.

Other CBs. Beyond murky.

Pure LBs. The top 3 are crystal clear. The rest, including their number, seems fairly murky.

Edge rusher. Fairly clear -- Jones, Ninkovich, Sheard and the 2 top rookies. Tough to keep a 6th, except on the PS. If surprisingly few LBs are kept, so that Ninkovich should be viewed as a backup there, I guess there's room for another edge guy, but that's about it.

DT. A lot like LB. Easley, Brown and Siliga are fairly clearly at the top, except that Branch may be higher than 4th. But after the first 3 (by my count) things are pretty murky.

 

[fnordcircle]

IMO Gibson is a lock due to the way this team prioritizes production so he's probably cut tomorrow.

 

[Fencer]

I suppose the other way of saying this is that that 47 of the rosters spots are pretty clear.

Yes, but that's only part of it. I'm also considering the question of who will actually play. There are guys who are locks to make the roster at OG, for example, who could plausibly get anywhere from 100% to 0% of the offensive snaps depending on how things turn out. DB has similar confusion -- only McCourty and Butler are locks to get a starter's or even a nickel-starter's snap count, and the position(s) at which McCourty will get his are still a bit uncertain.

At some positions we do know the exact pecking order, although on offense we can't know which packages will be emphasized, and hence there are a number of players whose snap counts are in doubt for that reason. (E.g. Develin, Chandler, Amendola.) But at CB, for example, Logan Ryan could still wind up as a starter (to the horror of most folks here), or he could wind up at deep pine.

 

[strngplyr]

Semi OT for the thread but man I do hope we ROTATE THE DL for a change. No need for several guys playing 90+% of the snaps, not this year.

It seems like we have a solid-ish 3rd guy quite often (Mark Anderson, Akeem Ayers, Sheard + rookies this year) and that third guy only ever gets used in injury situations. That needs to change unless one player is flat out dominating in a game.

From what we've seen and heard (though camp is always overhyped) we should be a top 10 pass rush defense this year if it all holds together.

 

[varjao]

I think we are thin at WR, Edelman and Lafell are missing valuable tc reps and if one of them miss a few initial games the offense may start struggling like last year, you add that to the question marks at guard and that can pretty much happen again, the Patriots is a team that shines in the second half of the season but I would like to see the offense to start intact from a year to another, or definitely improved, at least once, it does not look like it will be the case this year.

Amendola looks good and I think we will see him in his best at the start of the season with much better stats, confidence and experience in the system. His first game against the Bills he was a beast, then the groin injury affected him for the rest of the 2013 season.

 

[BTTA]

Did something happen to Stork that leads to the interior OL being completely unclear?

And isn't it becoming somewhat clear that Jackson will get significant playing time, if not start?

 

[patriot1136]

So who is our 3rd TE? Is it Hooman, Mundine or the guy from SF we traded Devey for?

 

[patsinthesnow]

CB looks simplified IMO. The Pats waited for Brown to be healthy, signed him late, and it appears he's already seized the #2 CB job.

@jeffphowe: Tarell Brown is clearly the No. 2 CB after this week. 2 INTs Monday, 2 end-zone PBUs Wednesday. Brees was 0 of 3 targeting Brown this week.


Butler LCB
Brown RCB

(Barring BB not messing with McCourty)

The question now is, which CB of these four get the axe?

Ryan
Roberts
McClain
Fletcher

 

[mgteich]

It depends on who Belichick wants in the game when 5 DB's are playing. It could be 3 safeties. It could be one of the four below. We could keep six corners and drop a safety. Or we could drop one of each.

CB looks simplified IMO. The Pats waited for Brown to be healthy, signed him late, and it appears he's already seized the #2 CB job.

@jeffphowe: Tarell Brown is clearly the No. 2 CB after this week. 2 INTs Monday, 2 end-zone PBUs Wednesday. Brees was 0 of 3 targeting Brown this week.


Butler LCB
Brown RCB

(Barring BB not messing with McCourty)

The question now is, which CB of these four get the axe?

Ryan
Roberts
McClain
Fletcher