New England Patriots 2020 offseason: Team has botched things so far

Summary: A huge bore

First, in their greatest faux pas of all time, the New England Patriots sent Tom Brady packing through indifference and insult. This was not only a terrible football decision, but it was also bad optics for New England.

Brady was still playing at a high level. Mosty of his offensive teammates, well, weren’t. Even Brady couldn’t make the tired, injured, talent-deficient 2019 offense go. Now he’s gone. So Jarrett Stidham will make it work? Please. This type of logic just defies explanation. It’s bizarre.

The rest of free agency was also a bore. Really. Just like many of their draft picks have been over the past twenty years. This year’s draft was also, well, a bore.

The draft was underwhelming. They went defense with their top 3 picks. Defense! When their offense was atrocious last season. So bad, that even the greatest of the great, Tom Brady was totally frustrated by them and couldn’t do what he wanted with them.

With 5 premium picks they could have made a real difference in offensive skill positions. Revolutionary. But they failed to draft a quarterback high up. Strike one. They failed to draft any wide receivers when their next highest receiver’s total catches after the great Julian Edelman was 29 catches. Strike two.

Then, they failed to add a big back or any back in the draft, when their running back room was mediocre at best (outside the terrific James White). Strike 3. Then to add insult to injury, they finally drafted 2 tight ends, but reached for both and missed the boat. Strike 4.

Their additions in undrafted free agency were also non-descript except for one, J.J. Taylor from Arizona. He’s a small but very good running back. But quite small.

All-in-all, the New England Patriots offseason performance to-date has to be graded as a D+/C-. It just hasn’t been very good. For years, such performances were glossed over, though if you were paying attention, you knew. This offseason’s inadequacies won’t be overlooked so much or overcome.

They were glossed over because they had the greatest quarterback of all time to bail them out of their personnel inadequacies. I’d called Tom Brady the “Great Safety Valve”. Mess up free agency? No problem. Botch the draft? It’s OK.  Fail to build a solid offensive line? Fine.

Always, there was No. 12 to cover up for all the mishaps. Well, that safety valve is now gone south to Tampa Bay. The Patriots poor performing personnel operation is now on their own. I don’t see that they have taken the proper steps to ready the team for the post-Brady era. Far from it.

I can’t see this team scoring more than about 15 points per game. And that’s not good enough. The dynasty is over. And downtimes are ahead. I see this year and next before the next football leadership team is set in place. I hope I’m wrong. But I doubt it. We’ll see.