Weird draft by the Pats. I thought for sure they would add more pass rushers. The RB and QB picks strike me as luxury picks, which tells me one (or more) of the following:
- The Pats don't like the prospects in the draft. In a 3-4, you need to either find a college DE that can play 3-4 OLB and be quick enough to drop into coverage, or a college DT with some pass rushing capability. Both are hard to project.
- The real weakness on defense last year was in coverage, not pressure. The injury of Bodden really hurt last year, and outside of McCourty, there were no solid
- Injuries killed the Pats D-line last year (especially Ty Warren), and he actually likes the personnel currently in place.
None of these explanations really satisfy me, though. I feel they could have made at least one of the RB picks a DE/OLB.
I get the whole saving money business and stock piling for the future, but one of the biggest needs that they needed going into the draft was a pass rusher.
If I was Brady, I'd be pissed. They treat him like crap, saying the team always comes first, and basically waste the latter end of his career with rebuilding moves for the future.
I think they felt like they needed an elite running back or were otherwise unhappy with their running game because BJGE and Woodhead are good 2nd tier backs, not like Jackson, Peterson, and some of those guys. After all, they drafted *two* RBs with sort of high picks. What I don't get is deferring their #1 to next year. It'll be in the same general overall range and instead they drafted 2 questionable to semi-good 2nd tier backs again. BB is good and I'm sure those 2 guys will be okay but I don't think next year's #1 is going to be better than Ingram unless they really hated him for whatever reason. It's not like you need to shell out big bucks for #28. Even Bush turned out okay. So-so numbers but great as a decoy and helped them win a SB so I'd call that a success.
BB could still be right and all these guys could be busts but then he goes out and burned a 3rd round pick on Mallet when Brady may have 5 years left of decent productivity. Mallet is good and all that but he's not going to lead you to a SB victory any time soon. He's a thing for the far future. I'm sure Brady is feeling like Lebron in Cleveland or something. With this kind of mentality, I don't see the Pats winning any more SBs in the next 5 years.
Cam Newton: He feels like such a coin flip. Could be similar to McNair, but I think the downside is a lot larger. Off the field problems can snowball when the spotlight is bigger.
Looks like the Cards are going to end up paying through the nose for some random guy, like Kolb/McNabb with nothing drafted at QB.
- Then he'll trade some of his best players (minus brady) later this year so he can get more draft picks next year and they'll end up falling short again this year in the playoffs. Almost seems like he'd rather keep his job then win another Superbowl.
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