Friday Patriots Notebook 8/15: Defense Struggles in Second Joint Practice, Diggs Comments Cause Questions
Follow us
Follow Us
🕑 Read Time: 9 minutes
Posted Under: Patriots News
HOME > Patriots Blog > Patriots News
Some Patriots news and notes on this Friday:
1) The Patriots wrapped up their second of two joint practices on Thursday, with most of the work focusing on the red zone for the offense as both clubs got some final work in ahead of Saturday’s preseason game.
By all accounts, Drake Maye and New England’s offense performed pretty well, with Maye connecting on a couple of touchdowns as the unit made some plays against the Vikings’ defense.
It wasn’t all perfect. The Vikings got pressure on him and there were several sacks, but Maye managed to make some throws and more importantly, the offense didn’t turn the ball over. Considering they were facing a pretty good scheme with Brian Flores trying to challenge him, that’s probably the biggest positive to take away following two days of competitive practices between the two teams.
That was an area where Maye garnered some praise from New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel yesterday, with Vrabel noting that even with the pressure Maye faced during these sessions, the second-year quarterback did a good job of dealing with it.
“I thought he did well,” said Vrabel before practice. “I thought it’s easy to go into blender when you’re seeing a bunch of this stuff and kind of scrambling and turning one less than favorable play into a real sh** storm. So I didn’t see that.”
“I thought he was able to process, and we didn’t execute all the time, but I didn’t see any panic from him. I thought he was able to communicate and get the things that he wanted, and then hit some plays because of it. When we blocked them, we were able to make some plays, and then we’ll just have to try to see what happens today and continue to go from there.”
Still, blocking the Vikings, at times, was a challenge. Rookie Will Campbell struggled at various points against Vikings defensive end Jonathan Greenard, who got the best of him multiple times throughout these two days. Thursday was another where Campbell gave up a couple of sacks and also allowed penetration that forced Maye to scramble, with the rookie left tackle continuing to face the learning curve of life in the NFL.
“He had some good plays and had some plays where he got beat inside,” said Vrabel. “These are going to happen to young offensive linemen. We’re not going to sit and evaluate every practice. I’ll let you guys do that, and we’ll go from there. Just keep trying to improve.”
Maye also had some musical chairs going on at left guard. With Jared Wilson sidelined, Ben Brown was the surprise name to step in at that spot in his absence. That certainly didn’t help the situation, with Brown being tested as the club continues evaluating its depth chart along the offensive line.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the football, it sounds like second-year quarterback J.J. McCarthy had some success against New England’s defense, throwing several touchdowns while hitting his final nine throws of the afternoon.
That’s not ideal. Although it sounds like safety Jabrill Peppers didn’t see a lot of action on Thursday, with DJ James, who has had a good preseason, also missing time. How much that factored into their struggles isn’t known, but it would be a surprise if that didn’t play a role.
Vrabel added some perspective coming off of Wednesday’s session, but it was likely a theme following what transpired yesterday.
“These practices are like a game,” said Vrabel. “We’ve said that. There’s ups and downs. We hit some plays. They hit some plays. There’s an intermission, and again, there’s a break with special teams, and then usually a two-minute situation at the end. So we were able to make a play at the two-minute situation. And kind of the same thing defensively. They hit some plays. We were able to have some good plays and again, just looking for some consistency.”
2) Campbell’s struggles on Thursday remained something that was certainly talked about, with the rookie going up against another talented player as he continues his indoctrination at a difficult position protecting Maye’s blindside.
He had a false start on Thursday and allowed multiple sacks and pressures as he battled against Greenard, with the Vikings defensive end being a big challenge for the former LSU standout.
With just a few weeks to go ahead of the opener against the Raiders, Phil Perry of NBC Sports Boston said during an episode of Quick Slants Thursday that it was arguably one of the most difficult days we’ve seen from the rookie thus far.
“I had seven sacks on Drake May in that top offensive line unit, three of them coming off the left tackle,” said Perry. “You could argue this was Will Campbell’s worst practice of the summer because it wasn’t just in the 11 on 11 periods. He had a heck of a time with Jonathan Greenard, top edge rusher for Minnesota, in the one on one period as well. It feels like things might be moving a little quickly for the number 4 overall pick, Tom [Curran]. They need him to be solid on that left edge, and today his head was swimming.”
Taylor Kyles of CLNS said Thursday that it’s hard not to be a little concerned heading into the season.
“There’s a lot of room for him to grow,” said Kyles, who was there along with Brian Hines of PatsPulpit Thursday. “Maybe it’s just a rookie wall he’s got to hit before he starts to turn things around. But at the same time, if we’re talking about week one, he’s going up against Maxx Crosby, one of the scariest human beings in the game of football, a relentless motor. He is not going to go easy on the rookie. And you do have to think, I don’t think there’s going to be a whole lot of game plans, especially early, where you trust Drake Maye to, you know, five-step drop, seven-step drop, and have Will Campbell be able to protect the blindside.”
“You’re going to need chip help from running backs, maybe some max protect schemes, or at least just keeping a tight end or some other body in there to help Will Campbell out on the edge. And besides that, I think it’s going to be a lot of quick throws, a lot of screens. And that scares me because we’ve seen what happens when this offense has to rely on the quick game or has to work around a glaring hole on the offensive line. They become predictable, and then defenses kind of hone in on that, and it makes life a lot harder on the quarterback.”
“So I’m not hitting the panic button on Will Campbell. Again, this is a rookie. Even if he struggles for the entire season, I’m not necessarily saying, ‘Hey, they have a massive problem here.’ You’re hoping to see some level of growth, but right now, it is not good for Will Campbell. He is struggling. It’s just not as much back and forth today as I would have liked, and that’s really the biggest thing.”
3) Stefon Diggs was another topic of discussion on Thursday, with a comment he made on a recent interview with Dianna Russini standing out.
During the interview, when asked if he was overdoing it as he continues working his way back from his knee injury, Diggs told Russini that he’s been ‘pushing the needle’ and he wasn’t 100% sure about his status for week one.
“I feel great. I’m pushing the needle always. I’m always on doing more than less,” said Diggs. “We’ll see about week one. I don’t know how I feel about it. We’ll see. Coaches aren’t too excited. I’m not too excited. I’m just trying to take it day by day. So we’ll see, man. It looks like we just don’t know where it’s going to go.”
Vrabel was asked about those comments by Perry, and the head coach fired back a response where he clearly wasn’t thrilled about the question.
“Did you really believe that, Phil [Perry]?” said Vrabel. “I mean, you’re a smart guy. I don’t know where you went to school. It wasn’t Ohio State. But do you really believe that? Do you really believe that, Phil? Or are you just trying to bait me into something?”
Perry said he wasn’t baiting him and that those were just Diggs’ comments, and then followed that up with asking him if there was any doubts in his mind whether he believed the wideout would be out there to begin the 2025 season.
“I don’t know the context in which he said it, but you’d have to help me,” said Vrabel. “I mean, he’s been out here almost every day. I’m excited of where he’s at, and we’ll see when week one comes. But he’s going to practice today. Hopefully, he helps us in the red zone, but we can’t predict the future about week one. I just know he’s going to be out there today. He works hard, and he cares, which are two important things.”
4) Another topic of discussion was a comment from wide receivers coach Todd Downing earlier in the week, which hinted that Diggs is still figuring things out and that he’s clearly still learning the system.
But one part of what Downing said had to do with Diggs possibly not being in the right place, which was something that ended up being discussed on Thursday.
“I think where he’s at in his process right now is where we want him to be,” said Downing back on Monday. “He’s working hard when he’s out there with his reps, and you see him making some plays. The big thing with him is understanding that we can’t confuse results with the process. If there’s a day that he doesn’t have a whole bunch of production, that doesn’t mean he didn’t do his job and get open. The process for him is going to have to be learning this system and learning exactly what the quarterback and what Josh [McDaniels] are looking for. Making sure that he’s in the right spot at the right time. As he continues to refine that, I think he’ll stay on the trajectory he expected.”
Vrabel was asked about Downing’s comment, albeit the snippet that was quoted to Vrabel in the question was, “The big thing with him is understanding that we can’t confuse results with the process. So if there’s a day he doesn’t have a whole bunch of production, that doesn’t mean he didn’t do his job and get open.”
Vrabel questioned the context of the comment and then went on to say that just because a player isn’t seeing the ball doesn’t mean they’re not doing their job.
“Again, there’s days where the ball doesn’t find you,” said Vrabel. “There’s one football, there’s five eligible receivers. The quarterback decides where he wants to go with the ball. No different than Kyle Williams. Kyle Williams is working extremely hard. The ball hasn’t really found him. He’s been open. There’s been separation. I’m not sure which day Todd said that, but the other day in the red zone, I thought that Stefon factored and looked good and keep getting better. So I don’t think that that’s going to be always the case, right?”
“As far as there’s a… Terrell [Williams] mentioned this. Terrell Williams said this one time when ‘You can make the play without making a tackle.’ And that was something that you have to teach defensive linemen is when they start trying to make a bunch of tackles, maybe they start hurting some of the people behind them and the fits and everything else because they’re trying to make a tackle, where there’s ways to do their job and really contribute to the defense without ever getting a stat.”
“And those plays will come. Just make the ones that you’re supposed to make. And I really equate that to really every position. But you asked about receiver, and then again, everybody wants to catch the ball and everybody wants to score touchdowns. And those will come, and that’ll happen. And maybe on that particular day, in which Todd said that there wasn’t a ton of production from that practice day. I’m not really sure when he said that, but there’s other ways to be successful and do your job and help us win. That’s the most important thing.”
One other thing that was interesting was that Vrabel was asked if Kyle Dugger, who has slipped down the safety depth chart, could possibly be considered a candidate, like Marte Mapu, to move to linebacker. “We would consider anything to try to help the football team and help the player,” said Vrabel. “That’s everything we want to try to do is help every player earn a role and build a football team.” … When asked about rookie safety Craig Woodson, Vrabel had positive words for the rookie. “He keeps, I think, getting better,” said Vrabel. “I think he keeps learning each day some of the different techniques that maybe he didn’t use as much in Cal. I’ve seen him tackle. I think the special team stuff was good. Throwing himself in there into the fire on some of the special team stuff was good to see. So continue to see where he’s at just from his physicality and go from there.”… Getting back to the receivers, Perry added that the biggest concern at this point is the fact no one has emerged consistently at the top of the receiver depth chart. “As healthy as Stefon Diggs has looked at times, to me, he’s just not that effective, especially when they go into the 11 on 11 periods of practice,” said Perry. “He did have one target and one catch in 11 on 11s today. He had two targets and two catches in 11 on 11s yesterday, but he is just not impacting defenses on a regular basis, even when he’s going against his own. And so they’re without a true number one. Maybe Diggs is a two, maybe Pop Douglas is a two. But those guys have shown some inconsistencies, two drops from Pop Douglas today that make it really, really difficult for Drake, especially if he’s not getting time in the pocket.” … Terrell Williams spent last week’s preseason game up in the booth and after being asked about it Thursday, Vrabel said that may end up being the case again as they continue evaluating things. “There’s a lot of positives to being upstairs,” said Vrabel. “To being able to see things and being able to call the game from there. Just trying to get a gauge on what’s best. Some coaches, some play callers, like to do it from the field. Some really like it from upstairs. So Terrell is going to probably stay upstairs this week and see how that goes and continue to work. And again, that was a good operation that we were able to go against with Washington and the no-huddle stuff. And that was a good first test in preseason.” … The Patriots are off today ahead of tomorrow’s preseason game against Minnesota.
From our archive - this week all-time:
April 7 - April 22 (Through 26yrs)
Join 2,000+ fans getting exclusive stats, analysis, and insights delivered straight to their inbox every week. Never miss a play.
To much drama for summer camp. Media generated. So what if there’s no distinct #1 WR? If you’ve got four #2’s your better than most NFL teams. As for Diggs, you need him to show #1 skills during in summer camp while he’s rehabbing? C’mon. At this point in Diggs carreer, it was debatable he is a #1 class guy even if healthy. The offensive line should be expected to struggle when you have 5 guys that never played together, and only one (Onwenu) ever played on a McDaniels offense. Plus, two are rookies, where you expect some struggle year… Read more »