This is the Patriots Training Camp Cast. The Patriots Training Camp Cast is your source for all the news from Patriots training Camp.
Well, I do still watch the news.
Practice is over, but the writers of Patriots dot com have you covered.
What did I miss yesterday?
Now here to review today's practice. The writers of Patriots dot Com.
Mike or So and Paul Perlo here again following day eight of Patriots training camp and when Bill Belichick starts to talk about stacking the days, Mike, this particular camp, Camp twenty three is stacking the days because it's every day out there. The weather has been absolutely fantastic, Probably not quite as warm as maybe the coach would like, but beautiful conditions out here in Foxborough. In the physicality
to me, full pads, second day in a row. The physicality is what stood out to me today in terms of tackling to the ground. Mike, we haven't seen a lot of that over the years. I think offensively, I think they continue to sort of build a little bit of momentum here a couple of wrinkles. What were your first impressions today?
Yeah, I agree. I thought the first, you know, big takeaway was just the offense being a little you know, continuing to kind of develop, looking like they're you know, finding their stride a little bit, some some nice a bunch of eleven on eleven periods that they were working on various stuff. One particular throw, you know, by Mac up the sideline. I've been saying, I want to see a deep throw to Trey Nixon. Really beautiful ball, nice catch.
You know.
It was one of those weird reps though, where only half the line was rushing, and you know, so it was a little bit weird. It wasn't perfect, but otherwise, I'm with you. I thought it was great to see another day of pads, great to see someone on ones again, seeing that physicality pile up, and you know, with the in stadium practice schedule for tomorrow, looks like they're going to be off at least as far as media access
goes for the weekend. So it was a good day probably to get some physicality in.
Yeah. And one of the wrinkles that I, you know, sort of alluded to was Mac Jones. The first handful of team reps. Eleven on eleven reps was dealing with the quote unquote starting offensive line, but the two number two receivers, So you know Mike mentioned the big throat to Trey Nixon. He was he had Nixon and Douglas and Booty and those guys to work with, and Bailey Zappi was behind the second offensive line but had Juju
and Parker and Born. So I thought that was a little bit of a wrinkle that maybe Bill Belichick and Bill O'Brien dialed up today, and then it sort of went back to the normal groupings at the end when they started doing some of their down in distance. They worked a lot of second and third down today and then down in the red zone. So I agree, I
thought there was a little bit more rhythm. It seems like the rhythm is coming a little bit more every day in terms of timing, and one guy in particular, it looks like he's developing a little bit of a rapport with his Juju. Smith Schuster, who had another touchdown say in a little tunnel screen well designed, really caught the defense by surprise in the red zone. So I think those are some building blocks to work with for both bills.
Yeah, I would, I would just run down some of the depth issues because it's certainly notable that Matthew Judon, Trent Brown haven't really been participating in physical portions of practice whatever that has to be done doing with But I would say vermondra Stevenson back in the mix today a little bit getting some so they upped him a little bit. But you know, it's just a lot of guys kind of limited chasing Hines another one who's you know,
hasn't really been participating. So just some offensive line depth and they're continuing to have to shuffle guys in and out. I'm not sure where, you know, are they looking for answers or are they just trying to put guys in of who they have healthy right now?
Yeah, so little that's a good point that you make. I'll just the bookkeeping that we'd like to do every podcast. Ti Montgomery, Terres Hall, and Cole Strange again, you know, you know, missing practice. Montgomery and Strange came back on the field late, probably last twenty twenty five minutes, helmets in hand shirts on no pads, both with sleeves on their left leg. So it looks like they're probably both dealing with some sort of left knee injury would be my guess.
Still a good sign they're out.
There, so they they probably getting closer and to your point about the offensive line, it again was Cody Russy and Antonio Maffi, not Bill Murray. Murray was going with the later groups, and you mentioned Hines sort of mixing in with those groups too, So you know, again, it's kind of curious to me the whole Trent Brown, Matthew Judhon plan. For the lack of a better word, Julian Edelman on hand today looked like he talked to the
team a little bit at the end of practice. One thing we should note, not exactly sure what happened here. I don't know if you saw something differently from up top. Jack Jones looked like he dove broke up or at least bothered Kendrick Bourn enough on an out route and got up and celebrated it. And then all of a sudden he's walking with Jabrill Peppers back to the locker room. That was at about let's say about ten twenty, and he went to the locker room about ten forty five.
He comes back, spent the time on a knee by himself. Matt grow went over and talked to him for a little bit. Jalen Mills had some conversations, but he really didn't do anything the rest of the practice. I'm not exactly sure what was going on. Did you see anything different? No, that was pretty much how I saw it.
I mean, it's just, you know, it looked to me like Pepper's kind of arm around him, like giving him some veteran advice. It seems like Pepper's kind of emerging is a little bit more of a leader this year.
But yeah, tough to say.
And obviously there's so many issues right now, you know, overhanging Jack Jones this season that you just you wonder he needs to kind of, you know, be stacking days with positivity, and I don't think today probably was one. So I guess we'll see what the fallout is over the next couper.
Yeah, and just you know, one of those things that we haven't seen a lot of. I alluded to the tackling to the ground. Christian Gonzalez came up and made a really nice play. It probably got the big biggest reaction of the day from any any of the plays. Kind of recognized a little little swing pass in the flat, came up, darted, chopped the legs right out for a for a lost tackle for loss, and that seemed to
get a lot of energy on the defensive side. But even the the little you know, the pursuit drills, the ball kit. You know, there's one ball carrier, one tackle. They usually tap on the hip. They were tackling to the ground today and by the way, not surprisingly unless they knocked him out of bounds. To Mario Douglas, no one was able to tackle him. But they did knock him out of bounds a couple of times. So some different wrinkles to the drills that we've seen over the years.
I thought that was interesting.
Yeah, Douglas has just been all over the place. I mean, it's just you know, he's always in motion, he's fast, he's he's going to be, I think, an asset to this team. I mean, I don't want to jump the gun and say, you know, not only is going to make the team, but he's going to be part of
the offense this year. But based on you know, Taekwon Thornton being down in the lower field, opportunities are presenting themselves and I feel like Davis and over the last two days Booty a little bit have taken made.
A nice catch. I don't know if he was in bounds, but that was a nice play, nice catch on the back corner of the end zone, so he's building a little momentum. He admitted that he got off to a little bit of a slow start and feels a little bit more comfortable. So we'll wrap up Day eight with those comments. Just le f yi for our loyal followers,
because I know there are millions of you. Tomorrow, on Friday, the Patriots are scheduled to have their in stadium practice open to Foxborough residents and season ticket members only inside Jillette Stadium. That's tomorrow night, six thirty ish scheduled to get underway. So if you're looking for our podcast tomorrow and you're not sure where it is, it won't be coming until around, you know, probably nine o'clock or so.
So you want to make sure, I know, everybody be waited with baited breath to hear what say correct, So until then, that's going to put a wrap on Day eight.