Tuesday Patriots Notebook 4/9: News and Notes
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Some Patriots news for this morning:
One of the biggest losses heading into the 2023 season on the offensive side of the football was the departure of Jakobi Meyers last offseason.
With Meyers joining the Raiders in Las Vegas, the club lost a key playmaker on offense who was a valuable asset on third down.
No one expected any problems at the time after the club added JuJu Smith-Schuster, but the results ended up being challenging. Nobody ever filled Meyers’ shoes and stepped into that role, causing both Mac Jones and Bailey Zappe to struggle all season as they battled to move the chains on offense.
Fast-forward to 2024, and the club has endured some similar losses on the other side of the football.
Kyle Dugger led the club on third down as a key playmaker last season, so the news that he’ll be in the fold for the next four seasons is certainly a relief. However, while the New England Patriots have kept their defense mostly intact, they’ve lost some guys who had a surprising impact on third down in 2023.
Myles Bryant, Jalen Mills, and Mack Wilson each departed in free agency this offseason. However, they were among the five most productive players for New England on third down last season.
2023 Defensive Third Down Totals
(From our 2023 Defensive Stats Database)
Bryant’s numbers were probably the most surprising. The defensive back finished second in this category, racking up 20 tackles along with a sack and three passes defended, along with two tackles for a loss. He departed for Houston as a free agent this offseason.
Wilson also was surprisingly productive, contributing 11 tackles along with 4 QB hits, which included 3.5 sacks. He also added one pass defended and a forced fumble. He’s now in Arizona after joining the Cardinals.
Meanwhile, Bentley was a beast for them on third down last season, with the veteran totaling 3.5 sacks but his team-leading 11 QB hits is staggering, especially in relation to his peers.
Mills finished right behind Bentley with 14 tackles. He signed with the Giants this offseason.
While the argument can be made that the club will get back Matthew Judon, Christian Gonzalez, and Marcus Jones in 2024, these numbers are a reminder of how important it’s going to be that someone does, in fact, pick up the slack. Gonzalez was already off to a decent start in this area before he got injured, so his return should certainly help.
Bringing back Jennings was also big, as he was a key factor in this group. It’s also possible we’ll potentially see a bigger role for Keion White and Josh Uche this season.
For now, looking at these totals, it’s funny how guys who were considered role players ended up contributing so much in this area. Again, this is just food for thought, but let’s hope some of the other guys still here from this group have just as big of an impact in 2024.
Tom Curran of NBC Sports Boston continues beating the drum that if another team wants to move up to #3 overall and make a trade with New England, it’s going to cost them.
A lot.
In fact, it would be an amount that Curran reports will have to be “historic”, which he believes will be a minimum of four first-round selections.
According to what he’s hearing, it’s going to take a package larger than what Miami received when San Francisco made its deal in 2021 to move up to the same spot when the 49ers ultimately selected Trey Lance.
As part of that deal, which allowed San Francisco to move up from # 12 to #3, the 49ers sent their #12 overall selection, their first-round picks in 2022 and 2023, along with a 2022 third-round selection.
That haul played a huge role in Miami’s turnaround, which put them back in contention both in the AFC East and within the Conference. That’s likely the outcome the Patriots would be hoping for if another team hopes to sway them out of their spot.
There is a fair amount of desperation, both in Minnesota and in Denver. The Vikings are already feeling the heat internally, and it’s coming from the best wideout they’ve had since Randy Moss.
Following the departure of Kirk Cousins, Justin Jefferson has already made it clear he’s got one foot out the door and that his days as a Viking may be numbered.
Minnesota has seemingly done all it could this offseason to extend him, but nothing has come to fruition. It feels like he’s not thrilled with going from a contender in the NFC to a team that is now pinning its hopes on Sam Darnold.
That may be why if the Vikings take a swing at moving up, it would solve two issues. It would give them their quarterback of the future, as well as see them end up with the most important position on the roster be there on a rookie deal.
This would give them enough money to hopefully keep Jefferson in-house while still having plenty of money next offseason to build around whoever they take.
Out in Denver, Sean Payton is another factor in this. Payton’s trying to get his team back in contention and may not be concerned with the backlash, given the reward that could go with it. He could very well be thinking that if mortgaging the Broncos’ future doesn’t yield a star QB for them to move forward with, he’ll go back to working at Fox and it will be someone else’s problem.
He sort of hinted as much last month when he told reporters, “I would rather the angst be now than September and October.” That may be why he might be willing to take a stab at outmaneuvering Minnesota to make it happen.
Brian Daboll of the Giants is also in need of help. The Giants sit at #6 overall, and unless he solves his own QB problems, he’s someone else who could be feeling the heat. Giants GM Joe Schoen has played both sides of the coin, with some believing they’ll trade back and add picks, rather than possibly move up. But he’s expressed a need to upgrade from Daniel Jones, albeit he’s also pointed out that their issues along the offensive line didn’t do him any favors last season.
They also saw one of their best players, Saquan Barkley, move on to Philadelphia this offseason. So if they’re going to stick with Jones, they need to further build around him.
The team that could benefit the most from this is Arizona, which sits at #4. They’re the ones least in need of a quarterback and would likely jump at the chance to grab a massive package to inject more talent. They’re also potentially the reason why unless another team is coveting the player New England is after, the Patriots may not be the ones who ultimately get the offer to move back.
For now, the message is clear. If a team wants #3, they better come with everything they’ve got. Otherwise, Eliot Wolf and company will draft whichever quarterback convinces them they can be the future this team needs moving forward.
Out in Washington, just like in New England, they’re trying to poke holes into Jayden Daniels’ game as the Commanders have seemingly shown the most interest in the LSU quarterback.
The number one stat that keeps coming up is the fact Daniels never had a pressure-to-sack rate of less than 20% in a single season in his career, with his combined pressure-to-sack rate finishing at 24%.
Commanders reporter Mitch Tischler of NBC Sports Washington spoke with 106.7 on Monday and talked a little bit about his thoughts on the analytics focused on Daniels’ sack rate. To Tischler, he believes when it comes to Daniels, the LSU standout has the physical tools, which he believes might be tougher to correct with North Carolina’s Drake Maye.
“I like Jayden, but I certainly won’t be upset if Drake Maye ends up being the guy,” said Tischler. “There are baselines in college for these stats that, for years, it’s been a moving goalpost about, ‘if a guy can’t complete more than 60% of his passes in college, he’ll never do it in the pros.’ And you have a guy like Josh Allen who, coming out of Wyoming, completed in the mid-50s percentage of his passes, and lots of folks said, ‘Oh, he can’t be successful, he’s not accurate enough, he doesn’t have a high enough completion percentage.’ You look at kind of what he’s doing in the league now, and you can see there are different ways to be successful.”
“Obviously, the pressure-to-sack ratio isn’t a fantastic stat for Jayden Daniels, but I think his completion percentage and his yards per attempt, and his ability to use legs can kind of counteract those things. At the end of the day, you look at it, and Drake Maye’s pressure-to-sack ratio is percentage is a percentage point and a half lower than what Jayden Daniels’ is. It’s not like it’s a massive upgrade when you start looking at Drake Maye. So, listen, there are positive and negative stats you can throw out there for all of these guys at quarterback. At the end of the day, you have to, as a team, sit down and look at where the player needs improvement and if that can happen within your organization.”
“It’s kind of the same thing I’ve been saying for a long time. For me, I think Jayden Daniels needs to learn how to use the whole field and read the middle of the field a little bit more, maybe be quicker going through his progressions. And I think that’s something that you can teach a young quarterback.”
“With Drake Maye, my worry is his footwork, and his quick pass completion percentage where he can get a little hairy with the football. To me, that feels a lot tougher to fix something physical than something mental when you get to the NFL level. And in the meantime, with Jayden Daniels, you have his elite athleticism that you can use to move him around the pocket.”
Tischler also noted that he understands why there is concern when it comes to that pressure-to-sack statistic after what happened with Sam Howell last year, with Howell going down a staggering 65 times in 2023.
For now, they’re going through a lot of similar discussions we’re hearing locally, so it was interesting to hear that perspective.
It sounds like Troy Brown could be another coach headed to the college ranks. According to Noah Furtado of 24/7 Sports, Brown is reportedly a candidate to replace Ra’Shaad Samples at Arizona State. Brown’s role had shifted here, with Jerod Mayo saying recently Brown would work in ‘skill development,’ but it sounds like he may instead pursue his coaching career outside New England. … Michael Holley said on NBC Sports Tonight that he’s hearing that for both Washington and New England, J.J. McCarthy is the player who is at the top of both teams’ draft boards. “I’m hearing more and more chatter that J.J. McCarthy is high, if not first, on the boards of the Washington Commanders and the New England Patriots,” said Holley. “He may be QB1 for both of those teams.” Holley had admitted he was skeptical on McCarthy, but he believes it’s now a real possibility he’ll be among the top QBs off the board in just over two weeks. … Count former Patriot Vince Wilfork among those who didn’t like the way Bill Belichick was portrayed in The Dynasty docuseries. “I didn’t like the comments of how it went. I think Bill deserves a lot more credit than what was portrayed in there,” Wilfork told Jordy McElroy of USA TODAY. “So I just stay away from it. I’m going to tell you like I tell everybody else. Bill Belichick is the best head coach that ever coached the game of football.”
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