UPDATED: Devin McCourty: Patriots Offensive Line “Biggest Concern”

UPDATE: The Patriots social media team reached out to Chowder & Champions today to clarify that the tweet that this story is based on was actually a mistake during the #AskDMac Q&A yesterday.  Here’s what the team told us:

Hi Matt,

To clarify on yesterday’s Twitter chat:

Devin was asked “Who is the biggest prankster on the team?” and his answer was “the offensive line in general.” Unfortunately, the wrong button got clicked and the wrong question was tweeted out as a quote tweet to go along with his answer about the biggest prankster. As soon as we noticed the error, the tweet was taken down.

Oops.

If you’re of the opinion that this year’s Red Sox team are an embarrassing waste of talent (they are), the New England Patriots are already getting similar disdain from a lot of fans for their defensive backs.

And we haven’t even started training camp yet.

Four-time captain and newly rich man Devin McCourty, though, isn’t sweating the defense. During a Q&A on the Patriots Twitter account this morning, which you can read with the tag #AskDMac, he got a question from a fan asking about his biggest concern going into this year’s season. The answer was a bit surprising:

When you think about it, there’s really no good answer for that question from D-Mac’s perspective. No matter who he references in his answer, it’ll come off as a lack of confidence at best, or a call-out at worst. Based on McCourty’s personality and the way he’s interacted with fans and the media in the past, though, he surely meant for his statement to be taken as a “These guys are going to need to step up in order for us to be as good as we can be” type of way.

Truthfully, though, perception notwithstanding, Devin’s probably right. I wrote a bit last week about how outside of the left and right tackle positions, nobody really has a clue who’s going to be up front playing center or either guard position, which, if you remember the first four games last season, very nearly sunk the Pats’ season. Former Pats safety and NFL analyst Rodney Harrison had that infamous quote that “Brady looks scared to death back there” after the game I have christened the “Kansas City Barbecue” last fall, and a large part of that was god-awful play in the trenches. Brady already has to analyze the defense, look for blitzes and extra rushers, and change protections and receiver assignments based on what he sees, and when your guards and tackles are spending most of their time on the ground, then the Pats are in real trouble.

Later on in the Q&A, though, McCourty answered a question from Bianca Wilfork (Vince Wilfork’s wife) and jumped on the chance to deliver a good-natured burn to the longtime Patriots defensive tackle:

McCourty, if you remember, was also the first one to post the “Air Wilfork” picture after Big Vince blocked a field goal during a Jets game last season, so it’s safe to say that they’re cool.

But yeah.  Offensive line.  Let’s make sure that gets worked out, K?