Good morning. Here are your Patriots news 4-13 and notes for this week. Before we begin, tomorrow, our Patriots 4th & 2 podcast will feature Mailbag Monday, with Derek Havens, Mike D’Abate, and me. If you have any draft or team-related questions, send them in, and we’ll get to them.
The NFL Draft is right around the corner, and it is a big one for the Patriots’ rebuild. They have some major chips to play.
Derek Carr’s Injury May Benefit New England:
News of Derek Carr’s injury may have the Saints looking to move up in the draft to get a quarterback, possibly drafting Shadeur Sanders. The Patriots may be a perfect trade partner for New Orleans, while looking to slide back a bit if specific scenarios play out.
Carr has a shoulder injury that could cause him to miss the entire season. Carr missed seven games last season with oblique and non-throwing hand injuries. He sprained the AC joint in his shoulder in 2023; it is unknown if this latest shoulder injury is related to that. Carr is reportedly weighing his options on whether to have surgery or not.
If Carr is forced to miss the season, the Saints have two choices. One is to sign a free agent like Aaron Rodgers. Or they can trade up in the draft from their #9 position to secure Sanders. The Patriots are sitting at #4 and face their own scenarios in the upcoming draft.
If Abdul Carter and Travis Hunter are both gone, do they stand pat at #4, select LT Will Campbell, and fill their most significant need on the roster? Or do they take someone else with the #4 pick?
Or do they trade back, amass more draft capital, and still fulfill their needs, albeit a bit later? That may cause them to lose a shot at Campbell. But if they do trade back with the Saints, it could net them the #9 pick and New Orleans’ #40 pick. This would give ammo to trade back into the first round if they want a shot at a left tackle or another position; Ohio State RB TreVeyon Henderson maybe?
Lately, many mock drafts have had the Patriots taking Georgia linebacker Jalon Walker. He is versatile and could play a huge role for the Patriots’ defense.
Walker is only 21 and plays inside and outside. He’s very strong despite his weight of 245. The team could move him around, play inside on early downs, and on the edge in passing situations. The Georgia staff loved Walker as a leader on and off the field. He seems to be a Vrabel-type of guy. He’s a playmaker, and no doubt the coaching staff would find very creative ways to use him.
The upcoming draft gets more intriguing by the minute.
Quick Hitters For the Patriots and NFL News:
Adam Schefter: Jimmy Traina this week had a couple of really good pieces that are not Patriots related but are interesting none the less. The first was on Adam Schefter who sounds like he’s suffering from burnout on the ESPN Beat.
Schefter has been on ESPN since 2009, and is the go-to guy in Bristol. “I’m blessed and privileged. It’s beyond anything I would’ve imagined. But what do I do in the future? What do you want to do? What can you do? Do you want to walk away from something you spent 35 years building? Is that worth it to you? These are all mental machinations that I guess that I’m going through.”
Schefter added, “I guess I’ll keep doing this as long as I possibly can, but you do wonder what else is out there for a job that does have you in handcuffs, that does take over your life, that you are beholden to at all times. It’s just the way the job works. It’s relentless in nature. Again, I don’t want to complain about it. There are far more challenging ways to make a living.”
Mel Kiper: Traina did an interview with Mel Kiper and it showed a side of the ESPN’s Draft guru that we don’t normally see. Kiper spoke about the first draft on ESPN in 1984, with him, Bob Ley, and Chris Berman. He said they covered the first two rounds only and then they broke away for a tractor pull.
My how times and the draft coverage have changed. To listen to the entire interesting interview click here.
Bill Belichick: Great nugget from the coach this week in his book, The Art of Winning, where he said “The Patriot Way” didn’t exist.
“Someone came up with the phrase, ‘The Patriot Way,'” Belichick wrote. “I think they made some money off it. Good for them. Here’s something you should know: The Patriot Way does not exist.“
Belichick’s remark definitely appeared to be a shot at owner Robert Kraft, and who can blame him after much of the documentary that came out last year was critical of the guy who coached the team to nine Super Bowls in 18 years.
Patriots 4th & 2 Podcast: Derek, Mike D’Abate, and I discussed the secondary prospects in the draft. On Friday, Derek and I did a quick interview with Matt Chatham. Please check us out and listen to us on YouTube, Apple, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Russ Francis/Chuck Fairbanks: The former Patriot tight end and head coach should be in the Patriots team Hall of Fame, and the fact that Francis isn’t is an absolute travesty. Francis and the Raiders’ Dave Casper changed how teams used the tight end position. This will be displayed in our Sunday posts until it happens. Casper is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Francis’ numbers stand up well against Casper’s, yet he isn’t even in the team’s HOF.
How Mike Vrabel Addressed the Team This Week:
Last week, the Patriots players came in for the first voluntary workouts of the year and Coach Vrabel addressed them as to the rules he wants the team to follow.
Respect was a word that was used several times throughout the portion of what was an almost four-minute video, with Vrabel laying the groundwork and expressing his expectations as they begin preparing for the upcoming season.
“There are some things that I have that I would ask us to try to abide by,” said Vrabel. “One is to respect the team, respect the football team and the people that are here. The second one is, I’d like you to have when we’re in a meeting, I know what the style may be, just pull your hood down in a meeting. That’s all I ask. I just ask that when we’re in a meeting, that we just pull our hood down and we go from there.”
“Be on time. We just talked about time. Be on time. If I can’t be on time, Christian (it’s not known if it was Christian Gonzalez, Barmore, or Ellis he was addressing), what’s the easiest thing to do? You would just call. That’s called communicate. All you got to do is say, ‘Hey, something came up. I’m going to be a little bit late.’ Now, after about four or five times, that starts wearing off. This is just a once in a while. All it is is a respect thing.”
“Be on time. We just talked about time. Be on time. If I can’t be on time, Christian (it’s not known if it was Christian Gonzalez, Barmore, or Ellis he was addressing), what’s the easiest thing to do? You would just call. That’s called communicate. All you got to do is say, ‘Hey, something came up. I’m going to be a little bit late.’ Now, after about four or five times, that starts wearing off. This is just a once in a while. All it is is a respect thing.”
“And the cell phones. We all got cell phones. Most of you have more than one, as a matter of fact. Just leave the cell phone in your bag, but just put the phone away. If it rings, don’t start start coughing. I’ve been in this league for 25 years. We all know when a cell phone goes off, we don’t need to start coughing and doing that s**t. We’ll just turn it on and put it on silent, and we’ll move on. Leave it in your bag.”
“The cell phones in the weight room. Leave it on the counter or leave it in your locker. You don’t need to do a set and then check your cell phone. Do a set and check your cell phone. Just leave the cell phones out in the locker room.”
Vrable is building a team and culture in his image and so far, everything seems to be moving along nicely. That’s why four of the captains from 2024 are no longer here. It wasn’t because they were bad guys or bad players. Vrabel tore it down to the studs and is rebuilding the team a piece at a time.
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“What my goal was that I told everybody in the building, and I told Mr. Kraft, I told the coaches, it was to build a program that you guys and the coaches and the staff wanted to be a part of, that they wanted to protect,” said Vrabel. “When you care about something, do you protect it?”
“Yes,” the players responded.
“And that you were proud of it. That I’m proud to be a New England Patriot. I’m proud of the way that we do things. I’m proud of the way we prepare. I’m proud of the way we practice. And I’m proud of my teammates for the effort in which they play. So that was my goal, to get started. And then that you’re going to eventually believe in that and then start to trust it.”
“The goals for our program, the overriding goals for that program that we’re going to build, is going to be one to win the division,” said Vrabel. “When was the last time the New England Patriots won the division? Does anybody know? 2019. And we have one player, Joe Cardona. That’s one person. So we’re building our own identity. We’re building our own team. We’re building our own program.”
“There’s going to be things within that that are different. There’s going to be things within that that are the same. And it’s all going to be based on, how do we make you guys as good as you possibly can be as an individual, as a player, and then as a teammate? That’s going to be our whole goal. And you have to start understanding that of why we’re doing what we’re doing.”
Head Coach Mike Vrabel discussed the expectations and goals for the team.
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“Somebody asked me what success looks like, and I said, ‘Yeah, you can judge it by wins and losses during the season, but success for me in the offseason is going to be that the players believe in what we’re doing, and they believe in the message, they believe in the teaching, and they believe in the connections that we’re making.’” — Mike Vrabel
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A former US Army Special Forces NCO and Officer, Steve has been following the Patriots since their days at Fenway Park. Steve has worked in the film industry and wrote as an Military Editor at SpecialOperations.com, 1945.com as a reporter for the Millbury Daily Voice, Millbury-Sutton Chronicle, and the Grafton News. He's also a member of the Pro Football Writers of America (PFWA)
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I felt the captains the pats let go this off-season were not part of a culture rebuild but just individual scenarios and or fit in the new team. David Andrews career is seemingly medically done. Jon Jones is over 30 and has been hurt a lot in recent seasons. I believe he makes some decent money too. Do the math there. Likely those are the key factors with him. Bentley is a big thumper of a LB and not fast. Bentley is not a fit relative to what’s being built with smaller/quicker guys. Dietrich Wise…. he’s been OK on holding… Read more »
Regards to the draft, given Will Campbell should be available at #4, the Pats have no hard need to trade up/back etc. They could move if a better scenario presents itself. But they don’t have an issue if Hunter/Carter are gone. Will Campbell would be a worthy pick at #4, and secondly, it’s at the most needy position they have on he team. And that is likely what is going to happen – picking Campbell. Boring to some, but all good.
Taking Campbell at #4 takes a lot of pressure off of the rest of the Pats draft.