Patriots 2024 Offseason Thread

They said early on that was Field Yates's board, not Bill's. 

Bill is keeping his powder dry with this assessment. There's a non-zero chance that Buffalo starts slow, McDermott gets canned mid-season and they call on the GOAT to sort them out and get them over the hump. If/when that happens, it'll do him well to have had a massive paper trail of times he praised Josh Allen in the media.

Semi-hot take: I think Maye was actually the better fit for Kingsbury’s air raid. Kingsbury’s simple offense doesn’t make for easy reads with its lack of motion. Because of this, the quarterback must 1. Make full field progressions and 2. create their own throwing windows with mobility against NFL defenses. This is something Maye did with regularity in college, whereas Jayden was more of a one read or go guy who shied away from tight windows. Furthermore, Jayden seldom threw on the run, and I think his arm lacks juice to hit windows while off platform in the league.

Yeah, I was thinking of the 22 Trade where GB gave up 34 to Minny for 53 and 59.

While Buffalo, Green Bay, Houston and Washington also have 2 2nds, the first of each of their picks is probably too high to get the 2nd.

Philly does have 50 and 53 so that's close but there would have to be other exchanges of picks probably.

Patriots need to draft Kool-Aid McKinstry. Positional need be darned.

Wouldn’t cost as much in assets as Aiyuk I’d imagine

He's not just clay, that's not what the 2022 tape says. I'd draft him just off his 2023 tape, no question about it.  The thing is his 2022 tape is way better with more talent. Too many people only want to judge him off what he did recently. Think Zappe when he got a full week practice starting with talent versus Zappe down two OL guys and a bunch of weapons, no run game being asked to throw every pass at end of the year. It went from wow Zappe is way better to Jones to Zappe sucks also. That's what I see on tape with Maye losing his top two WR, multiple OL starters and OC. His new WR while talented was kinda a one trick pony who's play was very up and down. He missed a bunch of games. His WR drop tons of passes and his OL sucks.  He doesn't have time in the pocket and badly misses his great slot WR in Josh Downs.

I still want him to sit for a while, but I do fear he's going to push for a starting spot much earlier than people think.

I'd be interested in seeing what the value of that 2nd round pick is to teams. If you can get a 1st next year, would you consider it? I'd probably take a tackle because I think you can get a good WR in the 3rd. I don't want to trade for anyone who won't be apart of a core 3 years from now.

I would look to trade down and select Keon Coleman or Troy Franklin.

Pre-Draft I was firmly on Team Penix & Team JJ. But now the Patriots have chosen the Next Guy, so I'm on Team Maye.

Bill Simmons posted this Maye clip & I'm impressed with his athleticism & skill:

FWIW, none of the ESPN Guys, Brugler, PFF, ranked in that range. Only CBS had him at 67.

That being said, Jeremiah said team grades at this point are all over the map. Guys with 6th rd grades for some teams could be in play tonight for others. Thought teams generall agree on top 50 or so but then it varies drastically.

So who knows how long Baker will last.

Pats really need OT help, but the remaining OTs are either developmental or lower ceiling. I would consider Suamataia or Patrick Paul if they are still on the board at 68, but can the Pats wait? I like Christian Jones too, but he seems lower ceiling, is he a significant upgrade on what we already have? Day 3 they could consider Giovanni Manu, but he is super developmental.

I would strongly consider Jackson Powers-Johnson (assuming ok medicals) at 34. While the Pats really need OT hep, their IOL wasn't so great either.

For comparison (Sacks + Hits + Hurries) * (600 / Actual Passing Snaps) ... ie Pressures scaled up to 600 passing snaps, which is approximately 1 season

David Andrews 27, Sidy Sow 33, Cole Strange 39, Atonio Mafi 65

Compare to some of the best in the NFL: Chris Lindstrom 15, Tyler Linderbaum 17

Now compare to some of the best college IOL-men on the board
Jackson Powers-Johnson 1, Mason McCormick 5, Christian Mahogany 10, Cooper Beebe 12 (~ 13% of Beebe's snaps were at OT)

Obviously those numbers will go up moving from college to pros. How much?
For comparison here is where our guys were in their last year in college and where they were last year:
Sidy Sow 21 (college) -> 33 (pros), Cole Strange 10->39 concern around draft was his anchor, Atonio Mafi 22->65

Part of that crazy JPJ number can be attributed to Oregon's extreme short-passing offense and Bo Nix, but still, 1 is nuts. If they don't take JPJ at 34 then I would strongly consider Mahogany, Beebe, and McCormick at 68 if they are still on the board. They could definitely improve on what they had last year.

If you want to go WR:

At 34 AD Mitchell or Ladd McConkey ...or Aiyuk if you could get him for 34

No on Keon Coleman. 4.61 40. Did not test on the short area agility. Not a sharp route runner. Does not separate well. Good hands - only 3.8% drop rate. Supposedly a good contested catch guy. He did well on the jumping tests. But he was only 10 for 30 on contested catches last year. Even if you assume some of those contested catches were errant throws - there would have had to be 10 bad throws, or 1/3 of his attempts, excluded just to get him to 50% contested catch rate. That seems like a stretch.

I would go JPJ or Aiyuk if available at 34 and
At 68 WR or developmental OT if one is still on the board (or Mahogany)