The Patriots Got the Lowest Draft Grade of Any Team and I'm Not Feeling Bad About It
If you want to make the case the Human Resources Department at One Patriots Place flunked college recruiting when it came to the Class of 2022, you can take Steven Cheah's word for it. But you don't have to limit yourself to just his analysis. Everyone is pretty much in agreement the Patriots personnel staff underperformed badly. It's all just a matter of degrees.
Yahoo! - Pretty much no matter which draft grade you want to read, the New England Patriots finished at the bottom or near it. And that's where the problem begins.
Bill Belichick and the Patriots have been doing things their own way for 20 years, probably going back to cutting Lawyer Milloy when everyone thought they were crazy. It turned out pretty well for them, resulting in the greatest dynasty in major American professional team sports.
Therefore, every grade comes with a disclaimer. Everyone dislikes the Patriots grades.
SI- [I]t’s about where the Patriots took guys over the weekend that raised eyebrows, and which positions were and were not filled.
• [Cole] Strange was the 29th pick ... The issue, again, isn’t the player. It’s where he was picked. Most teams (and teams seem to really like him across the board) figured Strange, a guard-center, would go in the third round, with a chance to sneak into the bottom of the second. The Bucs, for example, were one team the Patriots were concerned about. But it turns out Strange would’ve been a consideration at 60, not 33, for them.
• [Tyquan] Thornton, an absolute burner who’s built like a lamp post, could provide a downfield element to the Patriots’ offense, maybe to eventually replace Nelson Agholor (who’s in a contract year). But one area scout assigned to Baylor told me he had a fifth-round grade on Thornton. Few had more than a fourth-round grade on him. He went in the second round.
I could go on, but you get the point. The internet is wall-to-wall with a thick shag carpet of these sentiments. Bill Belichick went against the grain again. His staff's grades are all off. Or they reach for guys. Or the game has simply passed his scouting methods by. And he's still using the same template he drew up in Cleveland at a time when having a big, thick butt didn't just get you picked in the first round, it got you in heavy rotation on MTV.
Those takes have been bouncing off the walls of the Imbecile Echo Chamber that is Boston sports radio since the predawn hours last Friday, knocking the Celtics and Bruins playoffs right off the call screens and the text lines for days. "Sully in the car wants Kraft to take Bill's power away and bring in a new GM. Go ahead, Sully. You're on the air. ..."
Which brings me to the point of that headline. I chose those words specifically. Not just because I mean them. But for the irony. Because I said the exact opposite, almost exactly three years ago. After the 2019 draft, which all the same experts adored:
[W]hile I should feel encouraged by the fact 18 different draft pundits gave them no less than a B+ and the highest GPA of any team in the league, instead I’m just … worried? I guess? Concerned, perhaps? Troubled?
No, “disturbed” might be the right word.
Look, I’ve been at this a long time. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that when all the experts agree with you, you know something is wrong. …
That’s how the NFL draft tends to go. Certainly for the Patriots during the rule of House Belichick. And most certainly from the New England media.
My point being that the draft that enough high marks to make the Dean's List was this one:
- N'Keal Harry - Just had his 5th year option declined by the team after a 12 game, 12 catch season
- Joejuan Williams - A career depth corner last seen nowhere in the vicinity of a Stefon Diggs TD bomb in the playoffs
- Chase Winovich - Traded
- Damien Harris - Redshirted for his rookie season, now a legitimate RB1 who's about to get PAID.
- Four backups, including Jarrett Stidham, whose replacement was just drafted
- Jake Bailey - Still one of the best punters in the league and an All Pro in 2020
- Some other guy
That 2019 draft class is largely blamed for an overall decline in the talent level on this team, if not the reason Tom Brady left me curled up in a corner clutching my knees to my chest on St. Patrick's Day, 2020. And let me state the obvious, that I loved it when it happened too. Harry was supposed to be the tough, big-bodied red zone target that would make Brady love football again. I'd predicted they'd take Williams, so I was obviously happy they did. Winovich was an intriguing, if somewhat polarizing DE prospect with a promising upside.
But the unavoidable fact is, the experts - and I - could not have been more wrong.
In that above blog I mentioned a story I read in an old newspaper gambling column about a Catholic priest who used to go to one particular gambling venue to put bets on NFL games. But he also only wagered occasionally. And he seemingly never lost. Finally, when someone asked him how he did it, he explained his system. What he did was wait until all the experts agreed on a team, and bet against them.
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The experts are most definitely unanimous in betting against the class of Strange, Thornton (I'm used to those words being used in that order), Marcus and Jack Jones and the rest. So therefore, the wise thing is to bet against them. The way we should have last year when we heard doubts about the 2021 draft class. Like this nugget from Walter Football:
Jones was one Ja'Marr Chase away from winning ROTY. For his success last year, Belichick won the EOTY. Disagree with his strategy all you want, but the notion that he all of a sudden forgot how to draft is ludicrous. The narrative being pushed that last year he ceded all his power in 2021, thereby producing a quality draft, and this year took it all back and created chaos is laughably stupid. He defies conventional wisdom because defying conventional wisdom has been the building blocks of the mighty empire he has built.
And when the pundits think one way about how he performed, the smart money stays with him and says they're wrong. History bears that out. Kiss the Rings.
