This is the Patriots Catch twenty two podcasts with Evan Lazar and Alex bar Bazar Blazar from Blazarre. Hello, everybody nailed it, joined us.
Always buy our bark.
Here is Evan Lazar and Alex bars Thanksgiving and be nice to Thanksgiving off also selfish? Well yeah, no, it is totally selfish. It is on my bucket list to go to the Iron Bowl Alabama auverge. This is what is like the only way I'll ever be able.
To do it for the Patriots in terms of the competitive Look asked, what I when you're just talking about how you want to go to the Iron Ball, So you hope that the bye week is the week of the Iron Bolt. Well, we're gonna do some schedule today and we have the actual schedule. Now we're not just going off of rumors like we were last week. And Alex, do you get to go to the Iron Bowl?
You gotta go to the Iron Bowl? You don't? No, look at his face, you get to go? You get do you get to go to I won't say yeah.
We had the discussion off the so we I mean, the schedule's out like we Patriots tweeted out the preseason schedule. So I have tickets just and I have tickets to Zach Brown Band on August nineteenth, which we just found out. I will be in Green Bay for Patriots Packers preseason week number two. So guess who is not going to Zach Wild.
I bought tickets for Bruce Springsteen here at Chillette that Saturday because I said, oh, they always played preseason on Thursday. I'll get the Saturday tickets. You looked out games on Friday, I get to do both. You looked out man, So Iron Bowl have to wait, but I get to see Bruce.
God, I'm in trouble. Anyways, We're gonna be with you for the next hour, so you know, we sometimes it's an hour and a half, sometimes it's hour ten. You know, we don't really have a set time here, so I just kind of say hour or so that's the best I can do. But we're gonna do some schedule because we were on the show last Thursday while the rumors were trickling out about the Patriots schedule, but we weren't on the show and we had the actual schedule in hand.
So I have some thoughts, Alex, I'm sure you have some thoughts. On the Patriots schedule and then we'll do better worse, same the defense we did offense last week. And then we can take your calls made five to five Pats five hundred, or your emails at web radio at Patriots dot com for any and all other Patriots inquiries or if you have a take on what we're talking about. It's all on the table for you. So just give us a call and we'll discuss.
We're taking Taylor Swift calls.
We are taking Taylor Swift calls, and we're gonna do We're gonna do it Taylor Swift. Maybe a Celtics minute too, if you can sneak it in. But because I have takes about my Celtics and I have, Yeah, I'll wear this one. It's my Celtics, and I'll uh, we have some Taylor thoughts. You know, I like Taylor. You know I enjoy her music, not enough to buy a ticket
to the Concert of the Millennium. I'm not gonna lie, but I've been known to turn on some Swift every once in a while, especially like it's really good music. And I said, I think I said this the other day. I don't know if were air, but when we're coming back from road games and uh, and my writing's done everything. The behay is in the barn, as they say. And we have a little bit of a plane ride and I just need something to just tune out windows.
Yeah, just stare out the playoff across the country. Yeah.
Watching myself fly above the clouds while listening to some some Taylor Swift is not a.
Horrible It's called main character syndrome. I don't know what that means. It's people will get that joke. You're not alone in that, You're not alone.
No, it's just it's like it's like good soothing background music. It's poppy, it's light, it's not anything serious. It's not you know, I'm a rap fan, as you know, but sometimes you turn on some rap at that point in your time and you're like, I'm not looking to get pumped up right now. I'm looking to wind down. So I like some Taylor Swift. We'll give some thoughts on that maybe here in a little bit, but let's start with the schedule.
Yep.
So I think my two biggest takeaways from the schedule. One, this team is going to sink or swim with the first month of the season, either this team is going to be take us all by surprise coming out of the gate in those first four weeks with it's Philly, Miami Jets Cowboys, and that's either that's gonna be make or break the season in September, which I don't love, to be honest with you, because as as people that cover the team and try to drum up at least
a little bit of interest and excitement in the team, if they're own four out of the gate, and there goes your football season, right. But at the same time, we are going to learn a lot about this team, and I think in general the two things that are good about it are one what I'm maybe more looking forward to is learning about the defense, Like can this
defense take that next step? With Christian Gonzales now in the cornerback room with I'll even give Kean White and Marty Mapu to them, right, Like, with some of these pieces that they've added to an already pretty good defense, can this defense take that next step from being elite against bad competition, okay against good competition.
To elade against everybody?
And I think that that's really what I'm hoping to see out of that defense, especially that week one matchup against Philadelphia, because on paper, that's the type of team that roasts Bill Belichick's defense, right, a mobile quarterback option style offense, had those college gimmicky type things with RPOs in motion and things like that, couple good receivers to throw the football to, great offensive line. On paper, the Eagles hang forty on the Patriots on Opening Night. Can
the Patriots stem that tide? Can they come out and stop and shut down an elite offense and a good quarterback who's a dual threat, all.
Those types of things.
The other thing I think out of that is Mac Jones, Like, can Mac Jones win a couple of games that we don't think he should win or we don't think they should win. And the way that you do that is by winning a game against Jalen Hurts thirty eight thirty five in Week one, or winning a game against Aaron Rodgers right in the Jets and going toe to toe with Rogers and that offense and putting up more points
than the opponent. I'm not talking about winning seventeen fourteen, actually outscoring an opponent to a W. That's not necessarily something that we have seen in the Mac Jones Zra. So you're gonna learn a lot about them, but you're also in jeopardy of falling too far underwater, right, Like we're thinking too much in the first month of the year. They to me, to have a real chance at a postseason birth need to go two and two in the first month of the season, and that's gonna be a tall task.
Yeah, it absolutely is. My you know, general takeaway, I've got a couple of them, the big picture one. In a lot of ways, this is structured similarly to their schedule the last few years. Starts tough, you've got kind of a softer landing spot in the middle, and then you close with a gauntlet once again. And that's what it was in twenty twenty one. That's what it was in twenty twenty two. The difference being, I think that's
off spot in the middle. The last two years was about a month and a half, right, was like six seven games. This year it's what three four games, and that includes a game in Germany, which I think by default isn't easy, even if maybe the Colts aren't the best team. So the soft stretch of this schedule is not it's you blink and you'll miss it. The other thing, I you know, this is kind of a glass half full, glass half efty thing. I've heard people put it both ways.
They did, Kansas City is gonna be their toughest game no matter what they do get outside of having a bye week before, which we've seen with this team's been after the bye the last couple years. So maybe it's good they don't have an immediate bye week before it as much time as they could possibly have to prepare for that game because they play Kansas City on Thursday night or sorry, they played Pittsburgh on Thursday night on the road, but then it's Kansas City Monday night at home,
so no travel day. There's essentially four extra days baked into that preparation. How much of a difference will that make. I don't know. Will it be enough? Probably not, but that's something you have. But then I've had people come back and say, well, then you have a short week going to Denver on Christmas, even a spot where they've struggled, I'll take the extra time to prepare for Kansas City because that if they can steal that game, they're in
great shape. But you know, to start with Philly, to have Kansas City in the spot where they are based on some of the rumors we were hearing leading up that end up being false leading up to the schedule release. Yeah, I almost feel like I feel good about the schedule because some of the stuff we heard was so much significantly worse than what it ended up being. But this is as tough as schedule, not just the opponents, but the way it's structured as they've had in a while.
Yeah, So I did this. I did a little exercise thought exercise. I shared this on PU already, but we'll do it here too quickly. I broke it up into it projected wins, projected losses, and then what I call coin flip games toss could go either way right, projected wins. And this year it feels to me, and you can say this probably every year, but it really feels to me this year that when I say projected, these have
to be w's. Like, if you don't come out with wins from these games, you can get then getting to ten wins to get into the playoffs, it's almost impossible.
Saints Commander's Colts, Saints Commanders Colts. We'll see about the Saints.
Yeah, they do have Derek Carr now, so they have an okay quarterback situation and say they have a great quarterback situation, but they're okay at quarterback. Now, we'll see about their team as the season progresses. But if you can't beat Sam Howell and rookie Anthony Richardson, then you're not playoff team.
Yeah. I mean those are two teams that could be I don't know about the Saints. Saints should be in position for a top five pick. The Commanders could have shot at the number one p yeah. Yeah. Losses ye, Philly, yep, Dallas yeah, Buffalo, Buffalo, Kansas City. Yes, so I think so right now? What three and five, three and six?
Yes, that is what I'm getting at, right is we're even just if we give them wins where we think there should be wins, and even if we split the coin flips, which I'll get to in a second, it's not looking so hot. The last thing I'll say about the losses Buffalo, I'm gonna make a college football reference for you. Oh okay, you know how sometimes they say that, you know, for Auburn, like beating Alabama is like kind of the super Bowl, right, like the.
If you're having a bad season but you beat your rival. It gives you something. There are coaches who there have been coaches who maybe not as much the Alabama Auburn series, but there's other rivalry series where I'm trying to think of an example off the top of my head. Oh, I State, Michigan. No, because neither of those schools ever
fire coaches. The South Carolina Clemson rivalry, Yeah, a couple of years ago, South Carolina is I can't remember the year of the coach, but a couple years ago South Carolina's coach was like done, had a really bad year. Everybody's like he's gonna lose his job, and then they beat Clemson and he got another year, right, So like, yeah,
that kind of thing. So not to say that Bill's gonna keep his job just if they beat Buffalo, but I'm saying no, that one win can change the way you look at a season.
If they beat Buffalo straight up, like no wind, no injury to Josh Allen, like just straight up beat Buffalo and they finished with the record that I'm about to project that they finish with, then I do think you feel a little bit.
Better, right you do?
It changes the way you look at because you look at next year twenty twenty four now being a year where you really take that step forward, like you're competing now and you might not have the wins to show for it, but then in twenty twenty four, that's when it really starts to take off.
Although so a couple things to that.
One.
That's where you're supposed to be like year two with a rookie quarterback, and we're kind of ready.
But we're kind of in here too with a rookie, we're kind of going backwards.
But you know what I mean. Yeah, the other thing i'd say about that is what we're getting waiting in semantics, what if Buffalo just isn't good this year?
What if you beat Buffalo but then they go like you've been waiting for Buffalo to not be good for three years.
I've been saying they're gonna regress for the last two years, and they've regressed the last two years.
There's a chance there's I'm not saying that they're not They're a playoff team, hyeah, no matter what. But is there a chance that they're not as good as they've been. Certainly they've started to lose some pieces as they've.
Gotten get ready for them to go seven, eleven, and six, and everybody be like, oh, Buffalo win, doesn't matter, it's not the same Bills. Get ready for that.
Okay, coin flips Dolphins and Jets times to right, you know those four games, Yeah, I think are coin flips. Raiders, Giants, Chargers, Broncos, Steelers. Now the Giants, I think that they should win that game.
It's in New.
York, but it's not a travel you know, it's it's a thirty minute flight. But I disrespectable a lot, so I think that that's a tough game to win.
I do too. I think there's two kinds of coin flip games, right, the Jets games, the Miami games. I'd even say a game against a team like Vegas against a team like Pittsburgh. Those are legitimately, like, these are two very even teams, right, They're gonna get on the field and we'll see what happens. The other kind of coin flip game, and this would be a team like Denver or a team like New York. It's a coin flip because we have no idea what this team is.
Right by the time we get to that Denver game, it's not gonna be a coin flip. Yeah, because either they're terrible or they're good again. Right, Either the whole problem last year was Nathaniel Hackett and Sean Payton's fixed it and now they're the wagon everybody expected them to be. Or and by the way, I subscribe to this school theory, Russell Wilson might be Washington, and I don't think it's necessarily gonna be as ugly as it was last year because Hackett did play a big role in that thing
falling apart, and Peyton's a better coach. But yeah, I don't think Sean Payton can fix everything, every single thing. Russell Wilson just physically can't play at the level that he used to that he can't fix that. So like, I like, that's a coin flip right now, but there's a chance that that's a very winnable game. Yeah, right, I would say saying about the Giants, was Daniel Jones a flash in the pan? And I respect the hell out of day Ball, do I really do? But was
Daniel Jones a flash in the pan? Or is this Brian day Ball doing for him what he did for Josh Allen.
Yeah, the other game that I put on the coin flip category and I'm gonna get to my Denver taking a second.
Because I have a bone to pick. Pittsburgh. Yeah, I need to see Mac Jones be Kenny Pickett. There's similar teams. I need to see Mac Jones b Kenny Pickett. Yah, if he can't.
It's Thursday night game, it's primetime Island game all on its own, and the discourse around the Patriots, who would probably be hovering around five hundred at that point of the season, right, you know, a team looking at eight and nine. Again, the discourse around this team. If Mac Jones gets outduoled by Kenny Pickett in a primetime game, I can't.
I can't. But whichever quarterback loses that game is going to be viewed as on the hot seat for the offseason. Right.
So that is I think it's nine coin flip games the Dolphins and Jets. You know those four games, Raiders, Giants, Chargers, Broncos, Steelers.
I'll say this about the Chargers to the Chargers game. Yeah, it's tough.
One is it's a it is a home game.
It's a one game.
Like so that's a that's a ten am body clock game for the Chargers, which is something I do subscribe to.
And even in the two games there, Belichick has owned Justin HRB. Yeah, I mean like it's not even like, oh, it's just kind of close. I agree that it's coin flip game. They have a better quarterback, so you can't just chalk it up to a win. Yes, but Herbert has not been who he like he is.
But I hope this doesn't happen. But eventually Josh Allen solved Bill too. Sure, right, and when you're that physically talented, there's always that chance that this is the game that Justin Herbert.
Finally, the difference is Josh Allen had Brian Daball, who we know is a great coach. Justin Herbert has probably the worst coach in the league. You just don't and he's a bad coach. He's a numbers guy. He willingly took his team out of a playoffs.
Okay, we're not gonna do a bad coach. He can do this when they play the Chargers can if he's so. I have three penciledon wins and I have nine coin flip games. So if we split the coin flip games in half because they are a coin flip game, it's four and a half wins plus three.
I'm looking at it if you give them the benefit of them looking at it nine, I think even if you give them the the benefit of the coin flip games at five and four, they're eight nine.
Right, So let's let's call him nine for a second out of Philly Dallas Buffalo times two in Kansas City, they gotta they gotta figure out a way to pull out one of the or two of those games to stem the tip. Which ones do you give them the best chance to do?
So you're gonna say that I'm saying this because they hate Buffalo. Divisional football is always weird. You know him well.
But they just smoked it, I know. But in fair you know, no win tunnel game.
To slip back on what you just said, eventually, Josh Allen figured out Bill Belichick.
Right, So you think that Bill Belichick's eventually going to refigure out Josh Allen.
Yeah. And they've gotten I think closer than it looks they've the last two years they've dropped. They've just had a key interception would have flipped the game dropped. It was in the exact same spot on the field.
The second game in twenty one was closer than it looked. Offensively, they were bad in that game as well, but the game, the score was closer than and the two games last year.
I don't know how play the game here last year was as close as that game of twenty. But it's the same thing they had. I don't remember who it was who dropped it. The offense was just so so terrible. And that's that game here. So here comes phil Obrian. Yeah. The other one is Dallas.
Yeah, because I just remember Max Rock a year again.
Yeah, they couldn't stop. They had I think Dallas had six hundred yards in that game. They did, but Dallas is super hot and cold. Yeah, Like, you're not gonna catch the Chiefs on it off week. You're just it's not gonna happen. Their off weeks are like what the Brady or a Patriots are, right exactly. The off week is, Oh maybe you end up getting within two touchdowns. Right, you catch Dallas on and off week, Yeah, you can very much beat him because they'll get sloppy with the
football and Trayvon dig starts getting too aggressive. Right, it can happen. So at like of your like lock I lost games. Yeah, I would say Dallas is the easiest game on that because me too. It's just a very inconsistent.
Yeah, I would say Dallas is as well. And they're changing offensive coordinators. It sounds like Mike McCarthy my call plays.
Yeah, cars gonna call plays. It's early in the year.
It's slammed flat one hundred and fifty times because that's what he does. I think that there's a possibility that you could steal Dallas.
I do.
Yeah, So I'll give them that. It's tough though, it's a tough schedule, and I think we knew that, Mike Gripe. Yeah, and this is personal, This is totally selfish, Okay, But I got yelled at for doing this last week.
You did, and I'm gonna do it this week. And it's not.
The Patriots on Christmas Eve at primetime on the road a year after putting the Patriots on Thanksgiving at primetime on the road is malpractice. This is outrageous. And this is coming from a Jew that I'm this outraged by it, but I still am.
There were it, by the ways, gonna be New Year's next year.
This is outrageous. Not only not only are they on Christmas Eve, it's primetime in Denver, which is a four and a half hour flight. I will quite quite literally be flying across the country back for Christmas Day with Santa to make it in this listening to Taylor Swift, and I am displeased they took away my Thanksgiving last year.
I was really I was really upset by that. I'm not as upset about Christmas Eve because, as I just mentioned, I am Jewish, so it's not as big of a deal to me as obviously a big deal to my other half. But it's not as big a deal to me. But you know, last year Thanksgiving, I was bumped. Yeah, I was bumped. Like that's that's such a perfect day for you to just you don't have to work, you don't have to watch the Patriots. You just sit back, you eat a bunch of food, you watch football all day.
It's a great day to have. And now Christmas Eve this year and then they play on New Year's the following week.
I don't care about it.
I don't care about New Year's that much time. I just the Christmas and Thanksgiving back to back primetime year Like that's horrible.
That's terrible.
To come on, do you not care about our families? And I'm talking on behalf of the players and coaches right now too. I do not care about any of our families. That is that what this is.
I don't disagree with you. Somebody's got to do it. They went like twelve years without a game on a holiday, so we are kind of down here. They don't care about our families, Alex I, I, it's annoying. It's absolutely not well. I mean, we had heard whispers, and can I talk about the thing we'd heard? I don't know, I don't know which one it is. Oh you know what. It had been discussed openly on other stations, So it
was gonna be Thanksgiving? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, we had heard like that would have been I would have lost it.
Yeah, no, not Thanksgiving again. They obviously played Dallas in Dallas, so that right when.
You looked at it was like looking at who Dallas was playing. As the schedule started to leak, it came down to a point where there was like only three teams left downs to play on Thanksgiving, the Patriots or one of them. So it was like, oh, here we go.
But yeah, nope, Christmas Eve in Denver, it's on prime time and you know it's gonna stop terrible, you know, it's terrible. Lastly, I do like the schedule, the fact that we are basically our season is pre Germany post Germany, right like that's you know, because the bye week is in there. It's not exactly right in the middle of Germany.
It's week ten. It's not like week nine or week eight.
But it's close enough to the middle that that's how the season is gonna feel to me at least. Yeah, it's going to be let's get to Germany, let's play in Germany, and then reset after the bye and then that that's when, as Bill Belichick would say, real football starts in November into.
Well, I remember last year because people always say, like, when do you want bye week? When you want the bye week? In the schedule release video, last year was probably way the one This year was outstanding. Credit to everybody worked on that. Do you remember the one last year was just like which was also great, Like it is a very different kind of thing. But and people say,
when's the ideal bye week? I never quite knew its answer. Yeah, Ernie said the ideal the last year, Week ten was the ideal bye week because you want as in the middle of the season as possible, with slightly later preferable to slightly earlier. Right, So ten would be the ideal, I guess, or nine would be the ideal in an eighteen week season. Yeah, I feel like eleven is perfect pretty close. Like you can't complain about that.
And that's my last point is I'm I'm glad that they did take the bye after Germany because I think we're the whole team's gonna be wiping.
Not everybody got that. I know people think that that's a guarantee. Buffalo's playing in London. I forget when it is, but Buffalo's playing in London and then they play the next week. Their bye week isn't for like a month and a half. Yeah, that's until after international game. That seems brutal. So I'm glad that that buy is coming right after Germany. I think that really it's a blessing in disguise that there's no other setup for a week long trip someplace else, right, So we got one of those.
Last year they had too, They had the Miami trip, and they had the West Coast Vegas or Arizona Vegas back to back trip. This year is just going to be Germany. They do have the joint practices in the summer, but that's a little bit. It's kind of its own thing. So I think that this the schedule from that aspect, from a travel aspect to when Germany is to the bye week after Germany sets up. Okay, we knew the
opponents coming in. We knew it was going to be a tough gauntlet of opponents coming in, and we'll see what this team is made of.
One other interesting thing. I don't know if this means anything, just the way football's played and it being you know, once a week kind of game, but it feels like the last couple of years the schedule is very much home road home road home road, and you'd get like maybe one double home in one double road. Yeah, this year it's all over the place home home road, road home, road home road home home by and then it road home road home road road home. So it evens out
a little bit, I guess on the second half. But yeah, I you normally don't see it that that many combined, right right, you know, home and road as staggered as it is, you normally see it pretty evenly distributed. Again, because you're only playing once a week and you're preparing a home and all that. It's not the same as like when you look at a baseball schedule, you see like a ten game road trip. It's not quite like that. I don't know that stood out to me. It's not how I feel like it usually is.
Alex andrew wants you to come to the Cocktail sat cocktail party this Saturday before the road game at Miami, Miami, Florida. I think, is there Miami, George.
Oh, he's so.
We have a condo in state in Augustine. You can tillgate and watch the Dogs and the Gators. David Andrews would appreciate this.
So what he's talking about is the Florida Georgia Rivalry, which is one of the biggest in the SEC. David Andrews knows a lot about this. Yes, it's played in Jacksonville every year neutral Site. The nickname for the rivalry is it's what is it the world's largest outdoor cocktail party? The world's largest Maybe outdoor isn't any but that is another bucket list. I have a group of friends that we do college football stuff with, Like we just already talked about and we want to do a yearly trip.
The cocktail party. Absolutely on the list. I'm assuming the emailer is a Dogs fan based off what he said. There doesn't it doesn't specify. Oh okay, I'd like to go see it. Nothing against you.
He does say the road game at Miami, so I'd assume that means he's a Georgia fan.
Right. Well, no, he's saying when the Patriots are in Miami. It must be that weekend. It must be that weekend. You're right, I would like I don't I'm not a fan or against either team. I just kind of appreciate the sec Yeah, I would kind of like to see Florida get back to standing and see it as like a ranked game because George is just whooping Florida right now in that series. Shout out to David Andrews. But that is up there on the bucket list. The cocktail party.
Okay, all right, well there's your college football thirty seconds and.
Before yeah, it is the world's largest outdoor call.
Before we get to better word same on the defense, I do want to address one one thing. Yeah, and last week we talked a little bit about Malie Cunningham, and I rolled my eyes at the Malie Cuttingham buzz I think I might have compared it to Jeff Thomas or something of the ilk of that, like, and I rode the UDFA thing that we all right, you know, nineteen straight years, who's the guy that's gonna make it twenty Yeah, you know, we all got to do it.
It's like a yearly tradition. People like it's it's a it's an easy one. And I did watch the Molie Cunningham and I came away more optim mystic about him developing at quarterback than anything.
I think that.
There's some really big peaks and valleys to his game as a passer, especially his downfield deep passing. He's he's an inaccurate deep passer right now. I think he completed thirty one percent of his deep passes last year. He's not a very good twenty plus yard thrower right a deep real deep ball, so that that's a concern. But I actually thought that his ability to throw, you know, in rhythm, on time at the first and second level
was better than expected. And he takes a little bit off of me, like he does throw a little bit of a of a catchable ball, you know, the old pillowy catchable ball.
Cliche.
I think you can do that, and certainly he has the running ability. What he isn't is this cyborg Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes off platform second reaction magician. Right, he's not going to bring that to the table. He's not going to run around for four seconds and then flip the flick the wrist and fling it to the yards down the field to an open receiver. Like that's not the type of guy that he is, but he is more I would say, like Marcus Mariota. I don't know Tyrod Taylor like that.
Like he's more athletic than those guys.
But he's mobile in structure, like in design, and he can scramble a little bit. But I wouldn't say that he like I just mentioned that he's this off platform, second reaction or out of structure, not.
An improviser than you. So what he's going to do? And look, he is supremely athletic and he's great with the ball in his hands, but it's not a when he starts moving. So all right, here's I think what you're trying to say. Yeah, when when Mahomes or Alan or Aaron Rodgers of these guys, when they start moving. When they play breaks down and they start using their legs, they are still looking to throw, right, They're using their legs to extend their window to throw the football. Yeah,
Malik cunning him. He'll stand back in the pocket throw. He's not a guy that's going to look to run first. But when it breaks down, he's running. He's not running to extend the play to throw. And there's a lot of running to scramble.
I assume they're more they are in the playbook like RPOs. It might be like more like package style plays where there are routes being run, but he clearly has like a QB draw option. Oh yeah, right, and so it's it's like a it's an RPO draw, but the draws to the quarterback right. And he's got this ability where his blockers are run blocking and they're working up to
the second level of defenses are lead blocking. But he still has some routes that he could branch off of if he wants to, and if he likes the look or if it's an easy completion, he might throw it, but he more often than not runs the draw.
It's basically still the offense Lamar Jackson ran when he was there, they really changed much. So yeah, I just how much did you watch?
I watched probably four or five games. I watched some of it, you know, just broadcast angle, but I watched like one or two of the all twenty two.
So my take on the Leae cunning him throughout his four years at Louisville was just he was. There were times where he looked good. Yeah, he was never good enough for long enough for me to say, yeah, there's real NFL quarterback up side there, like.
Right, Like, he played well against Florida State. That was sort of the big game statistically for him. And then I watched the Syracuse game and he should have had four turnovers in that game.
Right, he was terrible. There's probably a handful of plays I think you can pull and he gave. You could put together a long enough reel where you could sell somebody. But I he just it. He gets very impatient, and I think his mechanics break down because of it.
Yeah, he's got a little bit of he doesn't throw from an even plane. Yeah, his shoulders and his his his axis is not even. So he tilts back like this. And when you till back like dad, you air miil. It's it's like that I forget who the mean is. So it's a little bit of like a shot put.
Just wait till we get to Joe Milton.
So you want to throw with your shoulders even, and you want everything to just kind of come linear through your body, and he kind of tilts back. Cam Newton had the same issue. And when you do that, the ball it goes high. He's you sail it.
I don't know if this is the technical term, but it should be the technical term. He eats the football. Yeah, yeah, he really does. And like it's it's all fixable. This is a guy, he's older, he's been you know, he's a fives concern that you have is how much ceiling does he have? It?
It's mechanically, I think it's fixable. But he kind of throws the way he throws at this point, and I think this is what a lot of people ran into with Cam Newton. It's like, yeah, we can rework his mechanics to be more by the book, but he's been doing it this way for so long that the muscle memory is just what it is, right, And I think
it's similar with Malie Cunningham to an extent. The other thing that stood out to me with him is I would really like to see them develop him at quarterback and see where he can get to as a passer.
That the one thing that other than the mechanical type of stuff is he's not a very good eye manipulator, so he stares down receivers and he really brings defenders to his intended targets, and especially his zone defenders will just jump routes on him left and right, and and it just that I think is more fixable seeing some.
Of the mechanics because he's he he knows where to look. Yes, problem is he looks there too long, but he certainly knows how to read a defense. Yeah, let me throw one more thing at you. Yeah, and you're gonna hate this, but I don't care. Cool. So everybody's assuming, oh, he's super athletic, and you know Julian Edelman and they're a tournament of receiver and he's gonna be great. So coming out of high school, he was recruited. Part of the reason he went to Louisville's they were one of the
few schools that were gonna let him play quarterback. He was recruited to Alabama. He was recruited to Oklahoma. There's a couple other like SEC Big twelve schools that were recruiting him as a safety. Yeah, I did. That was where he actually got most of the looks. So I if he's not going to play quarterback and look, you might as well see what you have with him in QUARTERBA. Yeah, I'm actually so.
The reason why I brought it up is because last week I dumped all over the idea, mainly because I dumped all over the idea of him becoming a receiver and being a being something right at receiver. But I'm looking forward to seeing him in camp though at quarterback. Yeah, like I And I'm not talking about pushing Mac or anything like that.
I'm just I'm.
Excited to see that skill set on the Patriots in a training camp in preseason environment. I think there's definitely a chance that he lights up a fourth quarter of a preseason game. He's got the experience and he's got the athleticism, and I think that that could happen. I also think that there's definitely some intrigue and some positive developments of scout team and what looks he can give them, like for Week one against Jalen Hurts like this, This
is watered down Jalen Hurts. So what better way to prepare for Jalen Hurts than to have a guy that has a similar skill set but just isn't as good as Jalen Hurts. It's better than putting Bailey's appy out there. Or I think what they were doing was Lin Bowden, and that's why Lin Boden's not here anymore.
Didn't Miles Bryant do it at one point? I think so at a certain I would just say that, and I agree with all that. If he is going to change positions, I wonder if he moves to the defensive side of the ball, that'd be that.
I don't think the fans would be too happy about that because they want to see that guy with the ball in his hands.
And I get that that Like, so, I'm not saying I broke down all his high school tape and this is six years ago. Yeah, he make so that part of what makes him so exciting with the ball in his hands is his ability to quit, cut and change direction. Yeah you again, this is the high school level, massive disclimer. I'm not saying he can do this in the NFL. It's gotten for a you watch him as a safety. You talk about deep safeties like reading him and cutting rounds.
You watch him recognize her out, put his foot in the ground and undercut it. Yeah. Yeah, I understand why Alabama wanted him to play safety. That was six years ago. He goes, if he can still do it, who knows, if he can do it at the NFL level, Maybe he look again trying a quarterback. Absolutely, Yeah, I'm just if that's not gonna be the path, I'm just as interested to seem as safety as it was so the last thing.
And I'm not completely out on this idea. If if, if they get into the season and short yardage is a big problem for them, they just can't pick up a third and one, or they can't punch it in on the goal line, which really hasn't been an issue for them. Honestly, last year it was, but everything was an issue for them last year when they had McDaniels, it wasn't an issue. And I don't think it will
be an issue with O'Brien. But if it does become an issue, or if they feel like they can trust really cutting Ham, having some sort of short yardage package with him at quarterback.
It's not, it's it could be fun. Yeah, it could.
It could give them something. And that was the big thing that stood out to me was there was a couple of like third and ones where they would just run zone read and what's the defense gonna do? Like if you crash inside, he's taken it off the ed and he's got the four or five speed to turn the corner and he can win foot races out there, or you get the numbers inside like it, that's the advantage. You turned into a college football and we know that's
the advantage. Yeah, And I think that there is a package that could be in play.
Now.
I'm not usually a big proponent of that.
I don't really.
I think you have a quarterback and the quarterback plays right, Like I just I'm not a big proponent of like the Taysom Hill thing, right, but with this offense, like maybe maybe that that does get them better within the margins, Maybe that does bring them on you know, third and one, they're now at eighty five percent instead of seventy five percent or whatever, you know, whatever the numbers end up being.
For what it is worth, Yes, maybe this is very little. Yeah, Bill O'Brien did that last year at Alabama. Yeah, they they're backup. Course, everybody knows about Bryce Young. Their backup quarterback is a guy named Jalen Milroe, who is a very similar skill. I mean, Cunningham is a better thrower, but like athletically is similar to Lee Cunningham. And they
would at times most on the goal line. I don't think they did it much in the middle of the field, like third and one and stuff like that, because they wanted the ability to take deep shots there, but you could move it over there. They would put Jalen Milroe on the field and run read options with image a mer Gibbs. Yeah, and they sprinkled in a couple of RPOs just to kind of keep the defense. Honest, Bill Obrian absolutely has that in his back.
Yeah, I'm not totally rulling it out. All right, Let's get to better word Sam again. Eight five to five, Pats five hundred is the phone number if you want to call in and weigh in on any of this, like our Malik Cunningham wildcat package that sounds riveting. You can give us a call. But I didn't know I wanted to. I don't mean this shit all over Malie Cunningham. It was more of just like I get frustrated by people that like, why can't we just hope Taekwon Thornton
ends up being good? Like why does it have to be the UDFA quarterback that becomes a receiver that all of a sudden, Oh, he's gonna be a super Like, let's just let's hope the receivers become super stars.
You know where it is too. We kind of did this last year with Bailey Zappi, where backup quarterback comes in there but all of a sudden like, oh, he's tom Brady. Yeah, look at this, he's gonna win the job. He's tom Bray. And it's like no, because not only is it dumb, you're taking away like if it was that easy to do what Tom Brady did wouldn't be impressive. So everybody sees Malie Cunningham and says Julian Edelman. No, not necessarily. Also, Julian Edelman took like four years to
become Julian Edelman. He was not Julian Edelman as a rookie, So it's not a one for one comp And again, if you're gonna say that, know the history. His second best position besides, quarterback might not even be receiver, it might be safety. Yeah.
And I would also say with Julian Edelman, they knew when they drafted Julian Edelman, they weren't ensure exactly where he was gonna play, but they knew it wasn't gonna be quarterble.
They actually were gonna try him as a defensive backup point I think, yeah, I mean they did later on, but you know what I mean.
And also along those lines, Jacobe Myers was a receiver in college, right, I know.
Everybody that was a completely different right.
I know everybody knows that Jacobin Myers played quarterback in his football career, but he changed over to wide receiver as a red shirt freshman at NC State and stayed as a wide receiver.
Of the rest of that would be like saying, oh, have ke On White play tight end? Yeah? Right? Right? Which stop? All right?
Speaking of ke On White, let's get the better wear of same. On defense, I will start with the defensive line that was. That was a good segue, and uh, hear the names on the defensive line currently we have Christian Barmore, Lawrence Guy Dietrich, Wise, Devon Godshaw, Carl Davis, Jeremiah Farms, Daniel Qualley, Sam Roberts, and one Keon White. I have Keon White as an end. I think he's a hand in the dirt end with a three technique versatility.
Were canting to Marcus Mitchell as.
Special teamer, maybe a stand up guy in spurts or in first down packages and things like that, but I I think he's truly an end. That's where I have him. But in general better worse for same on the defensive line.
Better better because they brought everybody back and then they added key On White, so that's kind of easy one. I also think, you know, Christian Barmore was supposed to unlock a lot last year.
I'm hoping that that. Yeah, so let's hope that it comes this way.
I would say people were unhappy with his performance at the start of the year. I know a lot of people were critical of him. I think he was better than a lot of people gave him credit for. He wasn't putting up stats, but if he actually went back and watched the games, he was influencing plays.
Yeah, his stuff like his like you know, pressure rates and massruption rates are better than his sacked.
Bright and then he had that knee injury. I think I'm not saying they brought him back too early, but he didn't look the same. Yeah, when he came back. I think that issue was bothering him even after he returned. So you hope right now he's fully healthy. They talk about the year three jump, right, and how that's a big one. I'm expecting a lot from Christian Barmore this year. Yeah.
I have this image from last year in Cleveland of Barmore trying to figure out if he can go with the knee on the sidelines, and he's he's he's kind of like do the block and dummy thing, and he's throwing his hands into somebody and kind of pushing off the knee and seeing if he can explode the way he wants to. And you could just see the visible frustration on his face and his whole body language. It was a tough injury for him that I definitely agree lingered I'm gonna go better as well.
I think this is an underrated.
Group, like league wide, like I think this is a sneaky good group. I do start to worry a little bit about Lawrence Guy's age and effectiveness at this point, but I think ideally, and not that I am shipping guy out of town or driving him to the bus or anything, but I think ideally somebody like a Dietrich wwis er Keon White ends up stepping up where Lawrence Guy's not playing the same type of snap tootal that he used to.
They have enough guys that can fill that role that I'm not super word. Yeah, the one thing I am if there was one knock on this group, if because they've had trouble stopping the run the last couple of years. Yeah, if Devon goes down. I know they like Carl Davis and he's a fine player, but you know that that they no tackle they could use no the nose tackles kind of helpen.
Yeah, yeah, they could probably use another one. Maybe, I don't know. I think that they they have a look right now of being a little bit more hybrid y upfront than even they are used to. And they're already a very hybrid mixed match type of defensive front as
it is. But I do wonder if we see some more even or or tilted three four, which is basically a four man front, Like you know, I think that that's in play, that we have some more four on the line looks, which they've they've done always and they've always kind of had a little bit of that sprinkled in.
But I wouldn't be shocked if that's more of a base for them this year with Judan as a stand up outside linebacker, but more in line over the tackle, like almost like a five technique, and then the three guys across with the hand in the dirt, like, I think that that's a possibility that we see a decent amount of that. Maybe even Keon White is that guy that ends up being in that role and Judon's a little bit further out. All right, I'm doing edge defenders.
I know you don't like. You don't like edge as a position.
It's not a real position. It is a real position. It's a real position. No, it's a defensive end outside linebacker. We use edge because coming into the draft, there are guys that in one system might play and in another system might play outside linebacker. So, right, but that's going into the draft and we don't know what system they're in, so we can't classify them as one or the other. One. We're talking about the Patriots. We're talking about a system
we know where they're going to be playing. All right, you even just say all right, you even alright, go ahead, Paipe just said you have Keon White is a defensive end. I do not. Is that edge? No, So you're just saying outside linebackers and you're calling them edge. Yeah, all right, So say outside linebackers. Then there are three four outside linebackers. That's what they all right, Well, it's a three four defense, so they're outside linebacker.
I just said they're three four outside linebackers.
Right, any three four defense or they're outside linebackers.
Matthew Judon, josh u Ja, Anthony Jennings, Ronnie Perkins. You're gonna have to help me with this.
One, Okasi. I don't know the first name.
So I didn't put Jelaniva in this group. I have him with the inside linebackers or the off ball linebackers the edge though, but he's both. He's he's in the he's a hybrid because there's some guys play on the line and some guys play off the line. My goodness, Uh, Jelaniva is is the one guy that if you're if you're doing the the old uh you know, what's the circles with.
The little diagram.
He's the one that's in the middle right of the linebacker group.
I don't think it's just him. Who else do you think is in the middle Mack Wilson.
I think Mack Wilson, he would when he plays on the line though he's in line right, like he's like over the guard or over the center. If we're talking about true like end of the line players. I think TV's the only one that truly does that at a blend the lines. Jawan Bentley has done it like at times and in like certain game planned package.
He's a middle lineback. So this group, this edge group.
I think when you factor in that Tavai can fill in on that edge group where necessary. It makes the depth look a little bit better there because on paper, you really don't know outside of Judan and Uche, if you're getting anything from any of these guys, right, especially with Ronnie Perkins, like you know it's he a human being, I don't know, So you don't really know if you're getting anything out of the rest of these guys. But but Tovai kind of solidifies that depth.
And I would also.
Say that they might view I view Keon White because two hundred and eighty five pounds. I viewed Keon White as an end, as a hand in the dirt end. But maybe they think he can stand up. He does have great athleticism, so maybe they think that he can stand up better or worse the same out of this edge group.
Same, maybe a little bit better if you just count on internal growth from guys like and Perkins and Jennings. But yeah, I'm going same. Yeah.
I think I asked you today about being more of every down player. He played forty percent of the snaps last year. I've always hoped that he was going to develop into a sixty sixty five seventy percent snap guy. His answer to me was interesting that everybody kind of he said, everybody has their role. Everybody has their role. It's about doing your job, maximizing your role. That that makes it sound to me like he knows I'm a
situational pass rusher here. I'm not gonna play on first down unless it's some sort of matchup situation and I'm gonna rush the passer, which if he has eleven and a half sacks again then fine.
Which meanwhile, too, there's nothing wrong with being a situational pass rusher. These guys are getting paid now like your full time players. Lucas van Ness just went in the top fifteen in the draft.
Yeah, so yeah, all right, so that's edge inside linebacker is a linebacker? Yeah, because the edge is edge. Jawan Bentley, Jelani Tavaiz in here as well, Raykwan, McMillan, mac Wilson, Marty Mapoo with the linebackers. Sure, aund on that linebacker, Marty Mapho, Chris Board, Terrez Hall, and the most surprising UDFA signing in the entire league all thirty two teams, Jordan Helig, who I almost put with the special teamers, to be honest with you, but I have him here
at linebackers. Who the heck knows.
Because he already missed Calvin Mounson. So oh yeah, Kevin Muss with the special team. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, I don't know this for sure. I think there are teams that did not know he was in the draft.
I think there are teams that didn't know he existed. And I'm not trying to pick on the kid, but he was at Appalachian State. He put his name in the portal right to transfer, and the idea was that he was going to go to some FCS school and be a stud linebacker at an FCS school and then maybe, like you know, Marty Mapho style, you know, get get his name out there and get into the draft. And the Patriots just called him up and offered him a contract.
Well, oh, he took his name. That that that's what I'm saying. He took his name out of the transfer portal and cleared for the draft. But it was I don't I'm still trying to figure out exactly how he technically did. This was after the deadline, Yeah, so wild. I think there may have been teams that legitimately didn't know he was available.
Yeah, okay, even if they knew who So he's a he's a special teamer. He's a four faced special teams.
But no, he played linebacker apps State, not very much. He had like fifty snaps in his career. Are you sure? Yeah? I feel like I remember seeing all right. Well, he had a couple of impactful ones because I remember see him. But yeah, no, he I think there are teams that didn't know he was available, even if they were aware of him. Oh good for the Patriots.
That's that's why that's why they paid Macro and Cam Williams the big bucks. Anyways, a better where it's the same at linebacker, I'm gonna go. I'm gonna hope for better because I'm I'm polish about Marty Mapu. I think this guy is a player like I. I maybe I've come around on him because I was harsh about it live because I was like, wait, who oh, yeah, that guy that got invited to the Senior Bowl after having a good end f l p A game even the
Senior Bowl. Admitted to me, Jim Nagy said he wasn't on our radar until the NFL p A game, Like he was not invited to the Senior Bowl until very very he was a call up to the Senior Bowl from the NFL p A game. And you know, Nikki made an interesting point that usually they they had the Shrine Bowl the week before, so they had some call ups from the Shrine Bowl too, So now they're really going from what's that like, Honolulu Bowl, the the one that uh.
The NFL, the NFL PA Bowl, and uy ay there's another one. Yeah, because what's his name? The quarterback win m VP of both.
All right, so I'm gonna I'm gonna say better. I'm really hopeful that the Patriots are are hoping that Marty Mapu and we'll see. I think the biggest thing is with him is that he is he gonna be healthy enough in camp with the shoulder to to go at full tilt and earn this role. But I think they're hopeful that that he's going to carve out that role. And I know it's not the sexiest thing in the world, but I think Chris Board is going to be a
really good Patriot. Like I think that that's gonna be one of those guys that maybe not as useful on defense as as some of the other guys like an Adrian Phillips or someone like that, but just someone that fits the suit right, like just that's a Patriot, core special teams guy, good depth be So I'm gonna say a little bit better.
Now, I'm with you on the I'm surprised to hear you say that about Chris Board. I've been comparing it to kind of like if Brandon Bolden played defense, like that kind of role where he's gonna be a core special teamer and he'll give you a bit on defense. We need him by the way, it's the Hula Bowl and hahwaii. Yeah, I knew something. Hula Bowl and the nfl PA Bowl in La Yah. Holton Aylors won MVP of both of them as well as the Birmingham Bull He just wins MVP of bowl games. Yeah.
So the NFL PA Bowl is the one that that got Marty map who on the that was the one No pun intended that that naggy and the Senior Bowl invited him off of they they heard from guys that were there, said, you got to see this kid, Marty mapp who from Sacramento stay.
They pull up the film on him. They invited him to the Senior Bowl like the next day. So in middle linebackers hall say better kind of like the defensive line, they brought back literally everybody, and then they added Marte Mapu and Chris Board.
So were you surprised. I think we've maybe touched on this a little bit, but I'm a little bit surprised Mac Wilson still here.
For what they got him for.
Not really, I guess, like I'm not surprised, Like I'm not saying they overpaid him or anything like that, but they basically benched him after he didn't push Josh Allen out of bounds in that in that first match up against Buffalo last year.
And we played a lot on specialty. He's played a lot on special teams. Yeah. No, I'm saying for what they paid him, saying he got very little money. My guess was he didn't have a ton of options of where to go, right, and they we know this.
It's a tough spot for him. I guess it's more of what I'm saying right, because he's not gonna play it's very.
Well on defense. I think the idea is he's somewhere where he knows the system, so you can come out, have a really good camp and then maybe get cut and end up elsewhere. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, I could see that. I definitely could see him getting cut in camp if Marty Mapp, who has has a real camp. Yeah, and uh and looks apart all right. Cornerbacks long list eleven guys, Christian Gonzalez, Jonathan Jones, Marcus Jones, Jack Jones, Miles Bryant, a Mere speed Is, Isaiah Bolden, Sean Wade, Quadre Moseley, Rodney Randall, and Tajes. This has to be better. This is definitely better in there.
But yeah, yeah, there's some special teamers. But you know guys that are I think are are gonna be working out at corner and training camp, right, you know they are still gonna be there. I think the most interesting thing to me about this group is other than Christian Gonzales, which that video yesterday did numbers and it was it was downright sexy. I told you guys, his hips didn't lie. He'd secure it all over the field. And rookie Minnie Camp apparently.
What we saw so combine. He changes direction, he looks like he's on skates, he looks like he could be playing defenseman for the Bruins.
And Girodmeo looks at him like he's a perfect ten, which I can appreciate.
You include Jalen Mills. No, okay, I did not. Uh.
The big thing for me, other than Christian Goanzalez is that I would like to see them make Marcus Jones the full time slot this year. And uh, I'm with the fans for the most the majority of fans that the time has come for Miles Bryant to be either significantly demoted or maybe he is a practice squad guy. That's a game day elevation when they need him that sort of thing. They have too much talent, like real cover talent on this roster. Now for guys like Miles Bryant to be playing serious time.
They're gonna have so many matchup opportunities because my question is, where does Jonathan Jones play? I think before you can get to Marcus Jones, where does Jonathan Jones?
I think he plays in the fields, Like I think he's he's with Z receivers like Tyreek Hill, like those move guys.
So Jack Jones is the third guy, then.
I think Jack Jones is really the fourth guy. I think Christian Gonzales is your outside boundary, John Jones your field corner, and I think Marcus Jones your slot, and I.
Meant third on the like third boundary, yeah, third boundary guy. Okay, yeah, I'm with But you also have the flexibility if you need to move Jonathan Jones inside, you could go because I think you could make an argument their three best corners are Christian Zalez, Jonathan Jones, and Jack Jones. Yeah, and and like then you get Mark. You take Marcus Jones off the field, which sucks because I just want him on the field.
I want him on the field for so many reasons. I think inside too, he's gonna have that instinctive ability to like hunt the football a little bit more than if he's pressed up against the boundary. I just feel like there's a lot more capabilities there.
Well.
The other thing you can do, like they're obviously built to match up really well against like teams like Miami. With those two guys, I think yeah, And then with the Bills, I do think in an absolute ideal world, Christian Gonzales is so good that it doesn't matter what addie type, what skill set, whatever, He's going to take the number one.
To say, in ideal world, he clamps the fun digs.
Right, in an ideal world, he can clamp the Von Diggs one week, and then he can clamp Garrett Wilson the next week, and then he can go, you know whatever. Yeah, I don't think he's ever going to pass. Jonathan Jones
is the ideal guy against Tyreek Hill. But in terms of those, you know, the the more natural not not guys that run a four to one, right in an ideal world, but I think as a rookie, we could see a decent amount of Christian Gonzalez on an island against the number two and Jonathan Jones on the number one guy with help. Like, I think that that could
be especially against Buffalo. Like it against Buffalo, it's Gonzales against Gabe Davis, and then it's Jonathan Jones with a bracket or with safety help over the top against the Von Diggs. Like, I think that that's more realistic because I don't want to put too much on Christian Gonzalez right away.
The one other thing they could do, and this is now we're kind of getting ahead, but does Jonathan Jones You could put it and but this is all good because the reality is we're throwing out all these different options.
They'll probably do all of these to some extent. Jonathan j sorry, Christian zoal Is on one boundary, Jack Jones on the other, Marcus Jones in the slot, and that Jonathan Jones is your deep safety because we've seen him play there and he's playing as well right And I know people think that Jalen Mills is kind of gonna step in for Devin mccordy. I think it's gonna be by committee. Yea, I said before, you know, how do you get your three best corners on the field, and
we do this with the offensive line all the time. Yeah, put your five best out there. Find a way to make it work. If we're gonna apply that logic to the secondary, the way to get the most talent on the field is Jack Jones, Christian Zas on the boundary, Marcus Jones on the slot, Jonathan Jones, Kyle Kyle Dugart, Adrian Phillips at safety. That's your most talented secondary those players, however you were arranging.
Yeah, I think the interesting thing, and we'll get to the safeties here in a second, is, Yeah, Jalen Mills is a is a little bit of a wild card. And I I don't think Jalen Mills is converting to safety to be a deep safety.
So I don't think so either. I think he's a tight end stop. Yeah, I agree as well. So here's what I have at safe. Wait real, two more things on the corners. Yes, when Jalen Mills is it. I did this on Patriots Feat the other week. We actually did the depth charts for like base defense and passing down defense, Jalen Mills is coming on to almost take a linebacker off the field. Correct. When Jalen Mills comes on.
It's to take a linebacker off to man up on a on a tight end, yes, or maybe I don't know, a running back, big wide receiver. The other thing i'd say on Myles Bryant because you mentioned him real quick, Miles Bryant needs to if he's gonna play defense, play safety because as much as people want to hate on Miles Bryant, and I get it, he's looked bad. He is. He's not an NFL man cover corner. They have used him completely wrong. You can't put him on Isaia McKenzie. He's not fast enough.
He's not a man corners. He's not fast enough to be a man corner. In the end, there are two play zone just fine.
I will say there are two things Miles Bryant does very well. Yeah, he knows. He's very smart. He knows what he's looking at. He can dissect the play and he knows where he's supposed to go right now. Getting there quick enough is the other thing. But like he can get there, the other thing he does he's a surprisingly good tackler, especially for his size. And I know people will go back to that game against the Jets two years ago where he got like run over for
a touchdown. Yeah. Also the he got run over and by ninety pins all things considered, for a defensive back, he's a pretty good tackler. Are you trying to disagree with me? No, I think he's a good tackler. I do.
My point is is that, like we tend to isolate like one or two plays, Yeah, especially when it comes to tackling.
I always hear this.
And this is not to go on some like rant here, but I always hear people that that, and they call into the show, the email on the show too, that complain about the Patriots tackling. The Patriots are routinely, routinely one of the best tackling defenses in the NFL, like number one, like top five and in mistackle rate in the good way every single year, every single year. Yeah, So what Dad tells you is that there's a lot of mistackles every single week. It's hard to tackle these guys, Okay.
Especially now.
Yeah, yeah, it's hard to tackle these guys. The Patriots are one of the best tackling defenses in the league.
So to go to bring it back to Miles Bryant, he recognizes plays well, he's a good tackler. To me, if he's gonna play on defense, I'm not saying he should be the replacement for Devin mccordy, but as a sub deep safety. Put him on the back end where everything's in front of him. He's coming up on the play, he's not chasing to put him on the back end. Let him diagnose the play in front of him, step up, make the play in that role as like a reserve
in that kind of role, not terrible, he'd be. Yeah, I mean that's what he's gonna give you what you need. And then he play him on special But at best he's a dinebacker, right, he's like the sixth defensive back on What I'm saying is stop putting him out there is a true slot corner to man up receivers. He can't do that, But that's not indicative of the player
he is. He does other things well. I just think his rookie year, his rookie year in twenty twenty, he was actually asked to do a lot of what he did well, and I think he looked pretty good. Yeah, the last two years, they haven't necessarily asked him to do what he does best, not a lot, and I think they should try to get back to.
That fair enough safeties Kyle Dugar, Adrian Phillips, ja Bill Peppers, Jalen Mills, Joshua bred Bledsoe, and Brad Hawkins.
So I say a Boldon might be a safety too every time in my corner right now, that's fair, But I think he might be a safety.
So I have to say worse about this group because I have just way too much damn respect for Devin Saturday to say better or even Sam, So I have to say worse for this group.
But I am.
Really as a as a film junkies and nerds that we are, I am just really fascinated to see how exactly they go about replacing Devin mccordy and who plays where and what that's gonna be. Something that I'll probably do a breakdown at some point on and really log like who's where and what role and things like that. The main thing that I think here, I believe that between Adrian Phillips and Kyle Dugger, those two guys I think are gonna be the true free safeties in this group.
They'll probably be a little bit interchangeable and they'll probably play a little bit more split safety than we've seen them in the past. Are too high, you know'll cover two style. Jalen Mills to me, is there to cover tight ends. I think that's just gonna be his role, and that then frees up Dugger of course, to be a little bit more of a rover or like a rat or a deep safety and be a little bit more of that instinctive ballhwker in the middle of the defense, which I think has a lot of value.
One of the big things.
That I've always thought about Dugger and I hope that this is the long term plan, and I hope he is in the long term plans. By the way, is I don't think that he's his best use is covering tight ends. I think that that really pigeonholes him to not being able to make as much impact on the
ball as he truly could. I've always said that I think he's Rodney Harrison right like I think ideally he's a guy that like Rodney, who would just fill up the stat sheet like don't you think presser on the quarterback, forrest fumbles, interceptions, tackles like always around the ball, And that's really what I want to see them do with Kyle Duggart because that type of playmaking, I think it would really help out this defense, especially now that they
have Christian Gonzales to kind of steady the back end a little bit more where it's can have some players that are maybe a little bit more volatile, right and kind of going for those big plays instead of just always playing positionally soundball. I just really liked the idea of Kyle dugger being a little bit more free, Like
let's let's let's take the training wheels off. Let's stop putting him on the tight end where he just has this one guy and that's just his assignment on this play, and let's make him a jack of all trades, like truly, because he's got that type of athleticism and he's got that type of nose for the football. So like they used to do with Rodney right, like just everywhere, that's what I want to see them be with Kyle Duggar.
So on the safety position as a whole, I say better, kind of like it's the opposite. Remember last week and we did offensive line, it was I feel better, but like it doesn't really mean much. Yeah, I feel worse, I guess because they don't have Devin mccorty, but it still might be the best position group on the team.
Yeah, it just gives him a lot more flexibility because and Devin even said this, like you always knew where Devin was gonna be.
There's a little ewing theory going on here.
Devin is a center fielder, and you always knew he was going to be there, and it kind of made everybody else, like Kyle Dugger, it made them fit into other roles, right, Like Kyle Dugger had had to learn the Chung style role because that was his way on the field because he wasn't going to play free safety because Devin McCarty was blocking him at playing from playing
free safety. So he just had to be that. Maybe there is an even better level for Kyle Duggar now that Devin McCarty isn't here in a weird way, even though the team as a whole I think gets worse from Devin McCarty, I think there's individual players, Kyle Duggar especially, that might get better from Devin mccorty not being here in his own vacuum, right, not not saying as an entire defense.
I yeah, just on Dougger real quick. It's to sort of bring back the conversation we had last week. And I'm not asking I'm not asking you this to pick a fight. I'm asking this because I'm legitimately asking you, said Rodney Harrison. Yeah, if Rodney Harrison enters the league now with position to see play here or everywhere, just in like if he was in the trouble linebacker, Yeah exactly. Yeah. So and that's the role you want, Kyle Duggar.
I want Kyle Duggar to basically be a rover, like I want him to not have an assignment. I want him to just play football like Seaball, get ball, Kyle, Like, that's all I want, because you know what I really want in my my my Wildest dreams Taylor Swift reference.
You like that? Okay he didn't know that, did you? No? God damn, come on, that was a good one. Is that one of our songs in my wild Dreams? Yes? Uh? I like my Wildest Dreams?
Yeah, Kyle Duggar, you to see him like streaking across the field and Josh Allen's trying to scramble and Kyle Duggar just comes out of nowhere and just lights him up. Like that's that's that's what I want Sea Wall get ball, Kyle, whether you're in zone and you're you're playing the football in the air, or you're attacking the line of scrimmage, and he when they allow him to do that, that's how we had what five defensive touchdowns or whatever, the
three defensive touchdowns whatever it was last year. Like, that's how you get to that number is because he's just he's just flying.
So you want him to be a guy that could push like thirty thirty. Yeah, interesting, I do You're essentially he's Rodney Harris. You want him to be box safety at Red Yes, interesting Rodney Harrison. Okay, yeah, you're not right. Yeah, there's only two thirty thirty guys, Rodney Harrison, ray Lewis. That's it, Rodney Harrison. Thirty thirty being interceptions and yeah we're interceptions crews. We're gonna get the specialists. Don't worry.
I know you're worried about us doing the specialists here in a second, but I want to take Patty from Aguam on the phone. Thanks for hanging on, Patty.
What's up hey anytime? Guys?
What's going on?
What you're talking about? Defense? Is it crazy to think that if this defense is statistically like a top three but they also look and play like a top three defense this year. And I'm going to give you, guys my my offensive breakout player. I think it's going to be Max this year. And if like Mac has seasons similar to like what he looked like his senior year in Alabama. I'm not saying that he's gonna like throw for forty eight touchdowns and five thousand yards, but if
he looks if he looks like he can play. Is it crazy to think that this team could win like between ten and twelve games this year.
I think I think twelve is pushing it a little bit. I don't think it's crazy for them to win ten ten games if Mac, yeah, a step, but I don't think it's crazy. But I love the optimism Patty that that Matt Jhones is your breakout player. I like that, and I think certainly, and thanks for the call, Patty, I think certainly, the the way that they get to that level is if Mac breaks out right, like that's the only way, exactly Like I as much as I i'm I'm bullish on the defense, I think the defense
is gonna be good. I think the collection of players on offense is going to be better because of the coaching. But the only way that they truly let's not I don't even like, let's forget about win totals. The only way they win a playoff game or are truly competitive in a playoff game, so that means they made the playoffs and they potentially win one is if mac Jones has a breakout year. Right, that's it, right, That's what it comes down to you. All right, let's do your specialists.
I have specialists, and I have cover jases, right, I have we're doing too Oh wow, you really got it. So on specialists, we're not doing kicker, puncher, long snap for alsover on, they're they're just specialists. We have you realize that they have competition at every spot. Yeah, which is kind of funny technically yeaheah. Joe Cardona, Tucker Addington, Nick Folk, Chad Ryland, Bryce Behringer, crawless weightman crawlss.
That was cordless cordless cordless weightman. No, now you have me confused.
No, I think it's cordless. You're right, Uh, better, We're same. Is kind of hard on this one because we don't know what the rookies are. If they're gonna be able to look they're better at punter.
They're better That's what I was gonna say. They got to better punter. They're better punter. Kicker is a question mark. It's like, how real did you think Nick folks slide was at the end of last year. But the reality is even if there's a chance that that was a sign of just this is who he is now, he's thirty seventies done. Yeah, you so want to get ahead of it at kicker. You don't want to have a kicker mid season who doesn't have kickckick in long term,
they're in better shape. And they just made Joe cardonat the highest paid well for like a month, he was the highest pay right snapper in the NFL's got broken. Tucker Addington is here for a training camp and that's it. I wonder, let me just point that out there. Everybody freaked out that they are. Why do they have to make in the highest paid long snapper's highest paid anymore? I think was the Ravens guy broke it. Every long snapper that gets paid becomes the highest paid long snapper.
It's get paid, right anyways, Uh, that's just what you do. I'm gonna I'm gonna put a little bit of pressure on Chad Ryland. Chad Ryland has to be has to win that competition. If you're gonna tell me that you used a fourth round pick on the guy you're cutting because Nick folks a better kicker than him, that's that's gonna be tough to pill this wall. They need Chad Ryland to work out. They do.
And I'm not saying it's like the end of the world, like you know, Fire Belichick is the kicker you No, I'm not saying that, but they really need that to work.
And you can't miss on two kicker picks.
And especially when you're Dick in the fourth round, when you have all these other needs and you take a kicker anyways, you right it up for him, which like I don't really care about, but like that's also a part of it.
That was where they had to take him to get him, because the Niners took Moody ninety nine. That's the game. They were playing the game. But if he doesn't pan out, it looks like they panicked that Moody went and they just took the next guy. Yeah, yeah, there is there is some weight on that pick.
There is one hundred all right cover Jases, and there's obviously some some guys like Chris Board and maybe some of the rookie corners like Bolden and a mere Speed that might factor in here. But these are just pure cover Jason in my mind. Matthew Slater, De Marcus Mitchell, Cody Davis, Brennan Scooer, Calvin Munson, and Roley Webb.
Same, same, maybe a little better, just because you figure they get Cody Davis back, right, they lost him last year early on the speaky one. We don't know what he'll look like. He had a pretty serious injury and will he be the same guy, but same, maybe a little better.
Yeah, I think Sam, I think Sam, But I do think as a unit. I mean, the amount of resources that they've invested into special teams this offseason to make that unit better is kind of wild, like when you.
Really forget too Actually, because you did this last week with the quarterbacks. You brought up Bill O'Brien to say the quarterbacks will be better. Joe Judge is back over there now. Yeah, so yeah, I'll say better.
Yeah, And if you invest this much and I and look, I know a lot of fans already there with cam accord, Like, I think there's a lot of people out there. I get this once a week, like like why does camic cord still have a job? Right, Like I can't even tell you how many times I've heard that I am with Bill on this. I think camccord's a good coach. I think I think he loves football. I think he loves special teams. And you need to love special teams to be a special teams coach.
Like that's not.
There's so many weird nuances to knowing anything about special teams that if you're really going to nerd out and learn about like angles of like holding wherever when he taught us that, like the different Like if you're really gonna nerd out and learn how about learn about stuff
like that? To coach it, you gotta really love it, Like there's I'm sorry, you're not gonna sit there and worry about oh, like I like it tilted like a on a this way or that way or this, you know, depending on the win and this and then that, Like you're not gonna do all that kind of stuff if you're not really into it. I think he's got the passion for it. I think he brings great energy and I do think that he's a good a good coach. But you have now taken two specialists in the draft.
You have paid Joe Cordona, you have signed Chris Board, you have all these cover jases right, all the guys I just named, Like, does any other team carry six guys into training camp that are really only gonna play on special teams? I don't think that that's really that common across the league. They definitely need to see results on special teams this year because they've put a ton of resources personnel wise into it. And we always retry
to read between the lines with Bill. He clearly thinks that personnel was the issue last year on special team because that's that's what they've done and they've completely revamped it. So they got to be really good in that phase, like not just better than last year and not you know, have the disasters that they had last year on special teams. They need to be like what they were a couple of years.
They need to be winning games on special teams. They should be blocking kicks and housing returns and things like that that decide games.
Yeah, flipping the field with the new punter, things like that, So there's better worse to saying for the entire roster. Like I mentioned that you can go back and listen to offense from last week. We did defense special teams this week, so we covered all of the bases. A couple of final things exciting that we'll get out to OTA's next week, so we'll have OTAs from eleven to one fifteen. I think is like the time that we were told today is going to generally be it. So
we'll have Catch twenty two on Thursday afternoon. Two o'clock
might be pushing it. We might be a little bit later than normal, but we'll do it right fresh off of observing OTA, so you'll have a full OTA recap from us, and we'll do that after every single OTA, so that will be a lot of fun and you can have all of a wu'll empty the notebook on that one, like we'll give you all the everything that happened and everything that went on at OTAs before we get to OTA's though, alex I just dropped a perfectly
placed Taylor Swift reference that went right over your head. Which one was the Wildest Dreams one, which is one of her biggest songs. So I'm a little disappointed in you. This is like nothing I have seen, Like this might be more than like a home.
AFC championship game.
What's going on right now for this concert?
This is wild.
The amount of people that were down here just to buy merch on like a random Thursday morning. I pull up to the stadium before avails this morning and there's like a line out the freaking parking lot to just buy a T shirt that says Taylor Swift on it. Your face is telling me that you have no f's about this whatsoever. But these three days are this is like, you know, this is one of the biggest events in in Foxborough history. I think that's that's safe to say.
Yeah, I guess. I mean it's cool. It's a lot going on. He does not care. Yeah, give me one tailor shift. You gotta have one? Are you ready for it? Was the ESPN college football theme in twenty seventeen. I think you had that answer. No, I like, I mean, like, you know, we used to when I was in college. Was when I think it's uh is it red? Is the album with like twenty two in trouble? Yeah? Yeah, so we used to blast that all the time. I
kind of stopped following her after that. Yeah, not like still I'm obviously still aware of it, but that was like my peak.
Yeah, I think Red in nineteen eighty nine. We were in college for both of those. Those were huge. Her new stuff is still good, it's still it's still bops. I'm a bops guy, like I like, I like the pop stuff becaus.
Like she's got it's gotten to the point where it's so much like the mythology of Taylor Stift and all that, and that's where you lose me. So I don't have the energy to follow. Well, here's the thing I was talking to.
Uh, you know this is recently, not not very recently, but somewhat recently. My dad and my uncle on my
dad's side are real big into music, like you know, seventies. Uh, you know, is like they're big decade, I would say, But they're really into music, and you know, they they grew up and they had so many great acts, like so many great all time bands, you know, Rolling Stones, the Who's Zeppelin, like just go on down the line, and even like single acts like Elton John and Bruce and Billy Joel and Madonna and like all these and when you really think about it in our generation, like
she's kind of it, like she's the only one that touches that.
There like, aren't many acts that can fill up an entire stadium for two three.
Nights, three straight nights right completely sold out.
I mean it's her Foo Fighters I think did back to back nights sold out here kind of recently. Yeah, Green Days up there. Green Days the one like rock band that I can think of that has some of that. But you're right, it's just a lot of the bigger acts now they couldn't sell our Chellette, not multiple nights, so she could have done a fourth night and still so oh yeah, like she could get down a week she had done residency. The really interesting there's from a
couple of years ago. Somebody wrote this piece about how Taylor Swift is essentially our generation's Bruce Springsteen. There's the same sort of culture around her and her music and all of that. I always think of that one because my parents are big Bruce people. That's been passed down
to me. I'm a big Bruce fan, and when I look at what's going on here and all of that, Obviously it's different now because Bruce's fans are older, and I don't want to say his contents so watered down, but he's done what ten times, if not one hundred times the shows the Taylor's done. It's just kind of it's been done. When I kind of look at all this, I see it. I can kind of see that similarity. So that being said, I have hiped for Bruce in August.
Get that that's gonna be on a Thursday, So I don't know if we'll have a show that day, but.
It's gonna be wild this whole concert. Like, don't if you have no purpose to come down here Friday through Sunday, do not come down here, like this is gonna be mayhem. And I also will say, because I already said this to you off the air, don't come down here trying to tailgate and just like listen to the concert from outside,
because like there there's gonna be police. And still like they're not letting that, they're not letting that happen, because there's been other that's happened in other locations on this tour that people have just posted up outside the venue and listened to it from the parking lot, and that's not gonna go down here, like they're gonna be really strict.
I grew up like really close to the stadium. Yeah, like really close to the point where so two things. I was talking to one of my old I don't live there anymore, My parents don't live there anymore. But I was talking to one of my old neighbors the other day. We used to know Sunday's in the fall, and then when there were certain concerts, you go out, you get what you need to get done. On Saturday, you're gonna stay it. Sunday is a day to stay in and they are very like for the week. They're
like they went to the supermarket. They got stocked up. Because I could be able to get to the sup mark with all this. The other thing we used to do that was very cool. You mentioned that people couldn't go and can't come and just sit outside unch the concert on the right night, I could sit in my backyard. I remember Beyonce was here in Beyonce and Jay was at that. Was that twenty eleven, twenty eleven or twenty twelve,
Oh my god, was it that long ago? Yeah, I was in high school and a couple of my buddies came. It came over early in the day because didn't want deal with traffic. Yeah, and we sat out in the backyard. We had the girl going. We could hear the concert. Yeah, and if if my parents still live there, that's what I would go and listen from there. That was. That was some fun memories. And I'll just since I'm telling the story because it's a Patriots podcast, I'll bring it
back to this. I remember like in I remember for some reason, I remember specifically in O seven. I could probably do it other seasons. I would like listen to the game. I have a TV in my room. Grown up, I'd listened to the game. My parents didn't let me. I listened to the game on the radio. Gil Santos, right, but I would get spoilers because my window was a open. You can hear I can hear the crowd go nuts,
and that'd be. But meanwhile, Gil's still setting up first and I'm like, all right, what's gonna happen here we go?
Yeah, this is a good off season topic. And yeah, I don't want to go too long here. But I think people like Gil Santos are just like that's such a his voice. It will be in like the soundtrack to I Will Never Forget Childhood.
I Will never forget it.
What a legend really quickly, Yeah, the Celtics, Like, I gotta get something off my chest about the Celtics from last night.
Because it's been killing me.
The main thing that I find so frustrating about the Celtics team is really two things, but they're related. One, they only win games one way. They really only win games one way. And when I mean one way, I mean like one style, right, Like, they only win they can't win playing the other team's pace or playing the
other team's way. And if the other team, like last night, you know, Spo I thought, had a good game plan to kind of get them out of the drive and kick three point barrage that they put on a Philly in Game seven. If they don't play to that script, they don't win. And I don't know if you this is I think where all the skepticism and all the distrust in this team comes from is because if you can't win in you know, one, two, three, four different ways,
it's really hard to win a title that way. Like it's really hard to win sixteen games in the postseason when you need to win sixteen of them carbon copies of each other. And even in football, like the Patriots out, how many different types of games to the Dynasty era Patriots win, you know, like right, defensive battles, offensive out, you know, shootouts, like middle grounds, like they just they
won them in so many different ways. The Celtics team wins one way, it's Missoula ball, it's forty threes, it's drive and kick, it's it's the same thing. It's one hundred and thirty points like that. That's how this team wins. And I think that's where a lot of the distress comes from. The second thing, that third quarter, Like you can't have that third quarter. You can't be you can't win championships with giving up forty six point quarters like that, right,
And so that that's where it all comes from. But with all that said, I still like them in the series. I still like them to win it all. Like I still think that it doesn't matter, Like I still think that they're good enough there it might not matter, but man, watching them.
As a roller coaster, it is a roller coaster, been a thing. They've been a bad third quarter team in the playoffs since last year. It's the you know, they've been a negative team and.
They're so Jacqueline Hyde and it's it's it's it's tired. Though I'm tired, here's what I'll say about it. And yeah, they need to be better in the third quarter, and they still certainly can win the series. But I told people not to sleep on this Miami Heat team.
I told people, we're not sleep it's such a people are sleep I think a lot of people saw them as an eight seed. No, they don't think Jimmy Butler is a superstar. Jimmy Butler is a superstar, but a lot of people don't think so. And I think the T and T bro oh, I mean, that's ridiculous. But the T and T broadcast, I think said it well at halftime. If you were to draft the two teams like old school on a playground, like here's these twenty four guy mass draft the series, Felgri and Mas draft.
The series, Jimmy Butler might be the number one guy drafted, might be. I think him and Jason Tatum both have a case. And bam Adebaio certainly gets drafted early. Yeah, other than like how many straight Celtics do you get?
After that? The different but the Heat. They they play so far above their talent level because the motor is just insane.
That that was one thing that I was reminded of last night because the Celticants were up nine at the half and they just kept coming, man right, and they're like they just put their head down and they keep coming.
In that spot, the Sixers would have quit. Yeah, the Heat actually played better when you're behind. It's terrible, like so infuriating to watch the Heat play. Yeah, they are. Don't sleep on them. I'm not sleeping on them.
On them, I would love to root for them like they're they're a perfect basketball team. I will root for them in the finals and they're a perfect beast.
I don't do that. I don't root for teams like that.
Can't do it.
I'm gonna root against the Lakers.
Obviously, I root against teams, but like people ask me, like, oh, like, like, who are you rooting for in the hockey playoffs with the Ruins out?
Nobody, no one, everybody loses Vegas, just armageddon. Bruce Cassidy, all right, we'll be back next week, and hopefully we're back to talk about the Celtics winning that series, or at least being ahead in this yeriares or something like that. But like I mentioned, we'll be back and we'll recap o ta's first o TA practice next Thursday. We're looking forward to it until then, signing off for Alex Bartha'm Evan Lazar. Thanks for listening to everybody, and we'll see
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