New England Patriots 2021 offensive playbook: Who stays, who goes

Addressing the New England Patriots tight end situation.

Since Rob Gronkowski’s departure after the 2018 season. absent a decent performance by elder statesman and second-time-around Patriot Ben Watson in 2019, the tight end situation for the New England Patriots has been in flux. And it hasn’t been good.

In fact, one would be hard-pressed to find a worse until in the NFL period. The position is currently manned by three players.

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The senior member of the cast is Ryan Izzo who has 13 catches for 199 yards in 13 games this season. He’s the best of the lot. His strength is blocking but he’s no more than a third tight end if that on any other NFL team most likely. That about says it all about this position.

The other two tight ends are rookie 2020 third-round draft picks, Devin Asiasi and Dalton Keene. Investing two high picks and trading added pick(s) to move up for both left high expectations for these rookies.

Unfortunately, they were not at all met. Asiasi has no catches at all for the season in eight games and Keene has two in five games.

Expectations for third-round picks should be at a minimum to contribute on special teams and play some meaningful minutes with some production at their position. At least some. The two tight end draftees by New England have basically contributed almost nothing at all to the team.

Couple that with Izzo’s lack of catches and the dreadful wide receiver grouping after Edelman’s injury, and Newton was basically left without much of anyone to throw to.

Izzo maybe stays. Asiasi and Keene probably stay because they were high picks.