NFL
By: Steve Atkinson
Now, that the Super Bowl is over it’s time to focus on the offseason. As it pertains to the Patriots, they have a lot of work to do both in the front office, and the coaching staff. With Dan Zieglar and Josh McDaniels on the Las Vegas Raiders staff they need a new director of player personnel and an offensive coordinator. Not only that but McDaniels took other offensive assistants with him to Vegas. Wide receiver’s coach Mick Lombardi, and offensive line coach Carmen Bricllo. McDaniels also took former quarterback coach for the Patriots Bo Hardegree with him as well. So, far the Patriots brought back Joe Judge as an offensive assistant and may promote Troy Brown to wide receiver’s coach.
It’s not the ideal way to start the offseason with a second-year quarterback in Mac Jones who performed well last year. Joe Judge coming back as being an assistant doesn’t mean he will be calling the plays and it doesn’t mean they couldn’t bring in someone else. The definitely need a quarterback coach to work with Jones whoever that may be. Mike Reiss reported that Matt Patricia an assistant to Bill Belichick may help with the offense next year. He is a defensive coach and has never called plays on offense.
There Is No Defensive Coordinator on the Patriots
On the defensive side there is no coordinator either. Jerod Mayo runs the meetings while Steve Belichick calls the plays. Belichick should name Mayo the defensive coordinator who has actually played with the Patriots and keep Steve as an assistant because he’s been around his dad his whole life. Steve Belichick shouldn’t be calling the plays Jerod Mayo should be calling the plays. I thought this quote was interesting last week from Matt Judon on Felger and Mazz he said Coach Mayo holds the meetings and Steve calls the plays. Notice how he didn’t put coach in front of Steve. Players respect Mayo more because he played and won championships. They’ll listen to him over the coaches son. Which is why Bill should do the right thing and name Mayo the defensive coordinator.
Mayo hopes the defense can get faster this offseason after an appearance on Zolak and Bertrand last week.
The Patriots have a ton of free agents this year up for contract. The big names on defense are Devin McCourty, Dont’a Hightower, J.C. Jackson, The big names on offense are Trent Brown, Ted Karras and James White. While on special teams it’s Matthew Slater, and Brandon King. There’s a lot of leaders on this team veterans that are free agents. I would hate for them to lose McCourty, Slater, and Hightower. Those guys are the key to the locker room. Having Jones learn leadership qualities from those guys this year was huge. I’d love to have Jones learn from them again next year too.
Finally, the Patriots need players on both sides of the ball. They need to draft cornerbacks on defense because I doubt, they are going to give J.C. Jackson a franchise tag of 17 million.
The Cornerback the Patriots should draft
CB ROGER MCCREARY Auburn
McCreary has 135 tackles in 42 games at Auburn. He also has six interceptions. He is also coming off a 42-tackle season where he returned one of his two interceptions for a touchdown. The Patriots currently have Jalen Mills who isn’t a top tier cornerback, if they draft someone like McCreary that could be alongside him that might be better than putting the franchise tag on Jackson.
Roger McCreary: 25 forced incompletions since 2020
Most in College Football❌ pic.twitter.com/YWebDyj0R2
— PFF College (@PFF_College) January 6, 2022
The Wide Receiver the Patriots should draft
WR JAMESON WILLIAMS Alabama
They need to draft one of Mac Jones’ teammates at Alabama. He needs his Ja’Marr Chase like Joe Burrow has at LSU. It seems Williams would fit that mold. Not only can he go deep but also be a slot guy too and go over the middle. The Patriots currently have Bourne and who knows if they are going to sign Jakobi Meyers. I think drafting someone like Williams who played with Jones would be a perfect fit.
The speed and the route by Jameson Williams 🤯🤯pic.twitter.com/W6iyFdmSqr
— Ben Glassmire (@BenGlassmireNFL) February 11, 2022
