Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots August 15, 2018 - News, Patriots Timeline Takes and What I'm Reading

Episode Date: August 15, 2018

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Hello everybody, welcome to Locked On Patriots for Wednesday, August 15th, 2018. Mark Schofield back in the big chair here at your favorite daily Patriots podcast. Reminder to follow me on Twitter at Mark Schofield. Check out the work over at insidethepylon.com profootballweeklythescore.com got a new piece up that I'll be talking about a little bit later Matt Waldman, Rookie Scouting Portfolio Matt and I did a video yesterday

on Auburn quarterback Jared Stidham Patriots fans out there might want to pay attention to this one because at the end I say that he would be a really really good fit for New England and what they do offensively. So you might want to check that out when you can. Locked and loaded show for you today.

We're going to talk a little Patriots timeline take, some stuff that's coming across the timeline that I thought I'd bring to your attention. We're going to do a little what I'm reading, some really interesting pieces out there. Clearly one of my own, which I alluded to earlier that I'm going to happily, happily plug here also a little bit of news on the show going forward we're going to talk about that in a bit but first some news and notes to kick things off dealing with number 12 tom brady himself making a little bit of news when he came back to weei for his first appearance of the season and brady said

that he would be interested in playing and anticipates playing into next year and beyond which is really interesting language there Brady wanted to play as we've heard from him before until he's 45 now as a 41 year old man myself I do sort of wonder about the viability of playing in the National Football League at such a high level at this advanced age. And I say advanced because when you're an athlete, as I once was, it gets a little bit tougher and tougher each day. But Brady keeps himself in such incredible shape. We even saw yesterday at practice, when practice ended, Brady's still doing some band work, still doing some leash work with some trainers. So we know Brady keeps himself in shape. We all hear the stories about the avocado ice cream and all that stuff.

Brady still says that he wants to play into 2019 and beyond. And he may want to do that. But let's not forget, the train will keep rolling on when Brady decides to hand him up. So Patriots are going to have to continually need to look at the quarterback position, potentially address the quarterback position in the next draft. We thought they would do it in the last one. Unless you're sold on Danny Etlin, it doesn't seem like anybody's really sold on Etlin yet. So again, check out that video that I did with Matt Waldman.

You might want to learn a bit more about Auburn quarterback Jared Stidham. Brady also making some news a little bit. Addressing the media, his second press conference of training camp. Obviously, his first press conference was cut a little bit short when he was asked a question about Julian Edelman and Edelman's relationship with Tom Brady's trainer Alex Guerrero. But Brady did address the media again. Talked a little bit about his preseason debut. He's saying the preseason reps, they are important. He tells the media whether it's a walkthrough, a practice, a game, it all matters because I think if it was a waste of time,

you know, we wouldn't do it. I do think there's a lot of urgency, and you know we're not where we need to be. We've got a lot of work to do, and these practices are a part of it. The opportunities that we get in the game, when everything's full, live, quarterbacks getting hit, that provides a different element. So it's good to get out there.

It's good to be out here practicing. And we've got to try to see if we can put together a great performance on Thursday. Brady also talked a bit about the lack of joint practices. And this is something I talked about in the last week's show. The Patriots not doing that this year. Joint practices we're seeing, for example, right now, the Detroit Lions and the New York Giants are putting on some joint practices.

The Jets and Washington put on some joint practices, which got a little out of hand, not just on the field, but in the stands. Some fights were breaking out in the stands after the teams were going after it on the field as well. There's a video of DJ Swearinger faking a punch at Terrell Pryor and Pryor ducking. One of those two for flinching type moments. But the Patriots not doing some joint practices this year.

Brady talked about that as well. Saying sometimes when you practice against another impotent, it actually gives you a pretty good idea of where you're at because we've been going against each other for a while. We just haven't had that chance. we had a game to show it but we get a big one against the eagles and we know the challenge they present so trying to put a lot into it to see if we can obviously get a lot out of it it's a big test they're a good team we're going to have to play well brady also addressed health ever so briefly telling the media that he feels good it feels really good.

And again, the plan is for him to play against the Eagles tomorrow night. Brady also talked, and this is important to me, as I've told you guys yesterday. He talked about the new helmet. He talked a little bit about the new helmet. He said that equipment manager Brendan Murphy has been begging Tom to try it and that Tom has been very resistant, but he says it's pretty sweet.

And then he kind of likes it. And that they're still trying to work the face mask that isn't quite right, but he is still trying it out. He's not sure if he's going to keep it. But Helmet Watch, that's what we're going to call it here over at Locked on Patriots,

Helmet Watch rolls on. The final little bit of news and i want to talk about from brady's remarks jacob hollister if you were a bet in person you might really want to start placing those bets on jacob hollister not just making this roster but being tied into he was asked about hollister asked about his jump for his first to his second training camp and here's's what Brady says. Jake's put a lot of hard work in. I mean, I'm really proud of him to come in undrafted, a free agent, and create a role for himself like he did last year, and then have the ups and downs of a rookie year. He played some, he was not playing some, and he's kind of taken advantage of that role that he's got, and he's willing to put the work in, and that's all you could ask from, from a quarterback standpoint, from a guy who wants

to get better, wants to improve. You can only do that one way, by getting out and doing it, earning the trust of your fellow teammates and your coaches, and I think Jake's done that. We've talked a lot on this show. Others have talked as well about the importance of earning TB12's trust as a receiver, as a target for him. We talked about it a lot with Malcolm Mitchell, for example.

And to hear Brady come on and say, look, Hollister has earned the trust of your fellow teammates and coaches, that is a big deal. And so, again, it comes back to the fact that place your bets on Jacob Hollister sort of earning that tight end three, at least, if not that tight end two spot. Really excited to see how Hollister and the rest of his preseason that into the second year of his NFL career unfolds.

Last little bit of news, I want to touch upon briefly some stuff from practice, from Patriots practice yesterday. It was the last practice of training camp, and some injuries reared their heads a bit. Dwayne Allen, Marquise Flowers, Trent Harris, all left practice with injuries. Those three players notable. Allen, we've talked about potentially on the Patriots roster bubble.

Marquise Flowers, my thoughts on him are well-documented. I believe he's firmly earned himself a spot on this team because of his athleticism at the second level. And Trent Harris, a guy that I'm wavering on, I think could make this team. We saw some of what he can do some other stuff though Philip Dorsett scary injury situation was coming across the middle on a crossing route went down Jeff Howe over at the athletic at Jeff P Howe on Twitter said that the grass gave out under Dorsett's feet he was taken into the medical tent walked off the field on his own, was evaluated.

Howe says that he will likely be at practice tomorrow, according to our source. But this is something to watch. This wide receiver group, this wide receiver room that has undergone a transformation from perhaps a position of strength back in, say, February into now somewhat of a growing question mark and concern. Now with Dorsett, perhaps he'll suffer an injury, so we'll have to watch that. In his absence, Patriots were working on some hurry-up offense situations. Their three receivers in that 11 personnel, three wide receiver, one tight end, one running back.

Look, Julian Edelman,man Chris Hogan Riley McCarron that's something to watch if they're looking at Riley McCarron perhaps as being their number two Z type receiver after Philip Dorsett that's something to watch another thing to watch Matt Tobin was the top backup at left tackle with Isaiah Wynn over at right tackle, seeing more of the Isaiah Wynn at right tackle experiment. But Matt Tobin, a player I talked about, I was sort of impressed with what he did last Thursday night against Washington, some of the athleticism he showed pulling in front of a toss play. Might want to watch Matt Tobin for potentially another guy

that can make this roster. So that's some Patriots news and notes on Brady, on Dorsett, some medical stuff. Up next, we're going to talk a little Patriots timeline takes. There's some three pieces that I want to get into that came across the timeline that I just wanted to dive into, one of which from my boy Dave Archibald over at Inside the Pylon. Then a little bit later, we're going to do a little bit of what I'm reading, and I'm going to plug some of my own work because it's a Wednesday

and it's my show, and that's what I'm going to do. That's all ahead with me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you here for this Wednesday installment of Locked on Patriots. Going to do some Patriots timeline takes here in a second. But first, a little bit of news on the show here. You might remember back during Super Bowl time, I opened up the phone lines. Gave everybody the Locked on Patriots hotline to either call, to text, to leave messages. Let me know your thoughts on how you were feeling about the run-up to Super Bowl 52,

how you were feeling about the game, whatever you wanted to share. Did a special Saturday installment of Locked On Patriots, you know, Saturday at the Super Bowl type show. We're bringing it back. I'm bringing it back for this season, you know, Saturday at the Super Bowl type show. We're bringing it back. I'm bringing it back for this season. You know, if you want to send in texts, if you want to send in voicemails, however you want to reach out, let me know your thoughts on the team, how things are progressing into training camp, how you're feeling right now. That number, 240-670-6016.

Again, 240-670-6016. Hopefully I get some feedback, maybe for Monday's show, 6016 again 240 670 6016 hopefully I get some feedback maybe for Monday's show if we get some good feedback from you guys got a lot of great feedback in the run up to Super Bowl 52 so again the Locked On Patriots Hotline is back for it's second season well really the first

full season we just busted it out I just busted it out right at the end there for you for Super Bowl 52 but I'm excited to get that back going again because, again, I'm just the caretaker of the Locked on Patriots podcast. This is your show. I'm just keeping the hot seat warm, the big chair warm. Let's talk a little Patriots timeline takes. Albert Breer from Sports Illustrated made his stop at New England Patriots training camp on Friday, July 27th. He finally wrote that piece, cut it up over on Sports Illustrated. It came out yesterday. I just wanted to touch on a couple of things that he noted in his write-up, again, from the end of

July when he visited a training camp. And, you know, of course, being a more national media outlet, more of the wide-angle lens type approach, he begins with the Malcolm Butler stuff. And, you know, most of us are trying to move on from that. Belichick is certainly trying to move on from it. You know, that's where Albert Breer begins, and that's fine, the approach that he's going to take. But as you can see, the Patriots, for example, he has a quote from Trey Flowers.

For me, it's a brand-new season. I'm not a guy that looks into the past or looks to what happened or harped on the past for too long. It's definitely new motivation coming up short last year, but that's everybody. Everybody in the league is chasing the goal, and this is where it starts. Breer also gets into, of course, the storyline to watch, which is the relationship between Brady and Belichick.

And this, again, fits with the narrative of unease, particularly when you look at it from the shoulder of the national wide-angle lens, about Patriots Nation right now. Now, I've said, of course, that there is a certain sense of unease as the Patriots head into this season. But I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that you're coming off a Super Bowl loss. You know, it's tough for teams to get back to a Super Bowl after losing a Super Bowl the year before.

It's been notoriously tougher, and I believe the numbers bear this out. It's tougher for a team to get back after losing than it is for a team to get back at least to the playoffs after winning a Super Bowl. So I think that's the bigger storyline for this team, not the Brady versus Belichick stuff, even if there is a Brady versus Belichick thing to begin with. I don't think there is, but if you want to talk about the relationship or Brady versus Belichick type thing, I don't think there's anything there. I think the bigger storyline is not the Malcolm Butler stuff,

the Brady-Belichick stuff, the Gronkowski contract stuff. The bigger storyline is this team trying to get back to a Super Bowl, trying to get back to a third straight Super Bowl. I believe they'd be the first team since the Bills to get to three straight Super Bowls. But this, you know, coming after losing one. So I think that's sort of the thing to watch there. Training camp position battle that Breer notes, and I would agree with him on this one, it's the wide receiver room. There was a question mark about Isaiah Wynn versus Trent Brown at left tackle, but it does seem like Trent Brown has sort of made that job his. So that I would agree with him on. He mentions guys like Hogan and Edelman having the roster spots

locked down. Patterson and Slater were probably big pieces on special teams. So he says veterans Kenny Britt, Philip Dorsett, and Eric Decker, as well as developmental guys like Riley McCarron and Braxton Berrios are fighting not just for jobs, but potentially sizable roles. So again, something to watch right there. So that was one piece that I'm looking at. Another piece that I was very interested to read

and a piece that I strongly agree with comes to us from Pat's Pulpit. It's a piece that I, like I said, I agree with it very much. It's from Bernd Buckmaster at Bernd, B-E-R-N-D-B-U-C-H-M-A-S-S-E-R on Twitter. It's part of their roster breakdown series.

It's a look at Shaq Mason. The subtitle on this, Mason is one of the NFL's best players at his position. And he notes in the piece here, Mason's 2017 season, despite ending it on a low note, was a very good one and saw him establish himself as one of the NFL's best guards. The Georgia Tech product did that by, again, dominating as a run blocker

and further growing as a pass protector. Pro football focused his number four guard, number four overall, finished the year with five sacks given up as well as 14 quarterback hits and one hurry. All significant improvements when compared to 2016. Byron also notes in this piece, Mason was his typical outstanding self in the running game. He helped the Patriots gain 4.3 yards per rushing attempt to his side of the field.

But he also showed excellent movement skills as a pull and downfield blocker. And that was something we noted, for example, their first game against the Bills, him pulling in front of Rex Burkhead on a play to the right side. Mason was a player that we talked about a ton on this show last year. I kept highlighting Shaq Mason both on this show as well as LockedOnPatriots.com. May that website rest in peace. Bit of news there, though. Patriots, once we get back into the season,

I will be doing some Patriots writing on Inside the Pylon. I will do some Patriots stuff there that you guys can check out. I remember back to last year sometimes when I would do podcasts focused on some hardcore X's and O's stuff, it's good to have a reference point. You'll have those reference points over at ITP, so you can be excited for that. But back to this, back to Shaq Mason. I strongly agree that, look, he's one of the best guards in this league right now. Now, the question is, and this is noted, he's entered the final year of his rookie salary cap contract, excuse me, salary cap hit of 2.02 million. So you do know that there's going to be an issue here of a contractual one. Will they try to lock him up in season on a long-term deal? Or will they wait and let the market dictate

like they've done with other free agents? So that's something to watch. But for me, Mason is an integral part of this offensive line. Now, that being said, they did just draft Isaiah Wynn in the first round, who maybe could kick into right guard rather than left guard. So that's something to watch. But great piece over there at Pat's Pulpit from Byrne.

Definitely check that out. Finally, a piece on InsideThePylon.com, not by myself, but inspired in part by the Locked on Patriots podcast. Dave Archibald,

at Dave Archie on Twitter. You're definitely going to be following Dave. Tremendous football follow. Tremendous Pats follow. He was listening to a release on an episode of this show, a mailback episode, where I answered a question

about the pick of Sonny Michel, asked by our good friend Jack Duffin on Twitter. Jack was the one that sent in that question at Jack, J-A-C-K, D-U-F-F-I-N on Twitter. He now hosts a Browns podcast, the Browns International Podcast.

So if you want to check that out, it's on Podbean, International Browns podcast. You can check out Jack's work. Skip that a little plug. But Dave does a great job sort of answering the question, was the selection of Sony Michelle on brand or not? And to Dave's credit, he did something really interesting. He linked to his own previous work where he had addressed sort of the running back investment. Dave had done a great series back in 2015 looking at position by position investment

throughout the National Football League and sort of basically came to a conclusion that the running back position has been devalued generally, although some teams continue to invest significantly in the position. However, Dave's research found that higher investment hasn't translated to more production in the running game. Dave theorized that perhaps spending more on backs means spending less on offensive lines. So that was an interesting sort of, you know, discovery there from Dave. But he gets back into sort of how the Patriots have expended money

at the running back position, you know, over the past couple of years. You know, dating back to 2000 and actually the year 2000 with J.R. Redman, both in terms of draft pick where they drafted Redmond in the 76th pick overall and in terms of cap hit. The biggest cap hit recently was Kevin Falk, $4.25 million back in 2009. And so it's a very good piece, and Dave sort of comes to the conclusion that this pick was on brand for the New England Patriots. As Dave says at the end of it, if we think narrowly about the kind of offense

the Patriots have run over the last decade, it makes sense to see Sonny Michel as a departure from the status quo. But departing from the status quo is more or less Bill Belichick's team-building philosophy. Sonny Michel brings versatility and dynamicism to the offense as a productive player at a position that is somewhat devalued around the league.

And I love the way he ends this. What could be more on brand for the patriots than that so definitely check out that piece from dave at dave archie on twitter you can check that piece out making the case that the sony michelle pick was entirely on brand for bill bell checking the new england patriots you can check that out over at inside the pylon.com up next we're to close this out with some more what i'm reading. Some other pieces out there you should definitely take a look at. Two pieces from The Rinner, one of which I was literally sitting down to write

when it dropped. So I'm a little angry about that, but that's okay. I'll talk about that perhaps for a minute. And then I'm going to plug something I wrote. It's up now over at The Score talking about Jimmy Garoppolo, Kyle Shanahan and the two-back pass game. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield, in Locked on Patriots.

Mark Schofield, back with you now to close out this Wednesday installment of Locked on Patriots. Going to do a little wet-arm reading. We're going to start with a pair of pieces from the winner. One by Roger Sherman. One by Danny Kelly. Danny, a good friend of the show. And they both get into the notion of what modern offenses in the NFL are looking like as we enter into the 2018 season. And I mentioned a little bit earlier that I was literally about to write one of these pieces. And it's true. I was sitting

down on Tuesday morning, cup of coffee in hand to drop the kids off at school. And I was getting ready to finalize my research to write a piece titled working title was the mesh play why the air raid is here to stay in the national football league and I had all these quotes from Mike Leach at you know coaching clinics on the mesh play and how he coaches it I had all these clips you know ready to put in from guys like Josh McAllen running the mesh play to Ben Roethlisberger running the mesh play to Tom Brady running the mesh play I was going to startlisberger running the mesh play, to Tom Brady running the mesh play. I was going to start with Lincoln Riley and his comments about all these NFL coaches coming to Norman to pick his brain about offense.

And I was going to end it with Baker Mayfield's first touchdown pass on the NFL against the Giants, which of course came on the mesh play. I was ready to go. I figured I would just type in one last search NFL college mesh one last Google search to see you know this was about an hour later after I'd sat down you know if anything else had popped up and sure enough this piece from Roger Sherman at the winner literally had just dropped in that time frame where he talks about the case for the NFL's air raid revolution and he takes you through how last year was the year that the air raid quarterback succeeded in

the national football league you know you had other air raid quarterbacks such as brandon whedon tim couch johnny manziel that couldn't cut it in the pros but that trend was bucked last year you saw jared goff had a good year you saw case he didn't have a good year, and you saw Nick Foles obviously have a great ending to his year. And Sherman takes you through the case foreign against Baker Mayfield, talks about the air raid offenses, and how we should be wondering why NFL coaches are so steadfast in forcing tough quarterbacks to make tough throws in the first place. Why do teams keep looking for great quarterbacks instead of running the system that consistently makes bad quarterbacks look great? And his whole conclusion

is the air rate does that. And so it's a great piece. I would definitely recommend you check that out. The other piece over the render that I would recommend is from, like I said, Danny Kelly talking about what exactly is a college offense. We hear it during draft season, particularly when it comes to evaluating quarterbacks. Oh, he can't run a pro style offense. He can only run a college offense. We hear it during draft season, particularly when it comes to evaluating quarterbacks. Oh, he can't run a pro-style offense. He can only run a college-style offense. But Danny makes the strong case that what we're seeing now is sort of, and this is something I was going to get into, the evolution of upward schematic movement. Schemes that are being used in college are working their ways into the NFL because, again, it makes sense, right? When you have all these kids that are running these types of offenses

coming into the league, when you have all these coaches that are coaching these kinds of offenses starting to come into the league, they're going to bring this stuff with them. A guy like Baker Mayfield has been running a spread RPO-type offense since he could walk, basically. And so it makes more sense that you're going to bring that into the National Football League. And what Danny kind of outlines is the fact that what you're really seeing work its way back into the nfl after being maybe out of style for a bit was misdirection you know he cites some you know quotes from chris brown over at smart football as well as jeff schwartz formerly of the national football league offensive lineman that's doing some work for the action

network and they make the case that look now you're just seeing instead of either you know a throwaway type fake on a play action pass where the quarterback's just handing the ball off or dropping it in the pocket you're seeing more fakes whether it's fake jet sweeps rpo type looks they're bringing back misdirection trying to change the eye levels and angles of the second level defenders and that's putting these defenders into conflict, which is a case that I made over at Inside the Pylon last year about why the RPO is just the next evolution in putting defenders into conflict. And so I definitely recommend Danny's piece.

That being said, I'm going to plug something that I wrote. Because again, it's my show. I wrote a piece that's coming up on the score today. It might not be up right when you're listening to this, but it should be up at some point. I'm talking about Kyle Shanahan, Jimmy Garoppolo, and the two-back passing game. And I do a deep dive into Garoppolo's time under center

for the 49ers last year and really sort of point out the fact that they used 21 offensive personnel a lot, the San Francisco 49ers did, with Jimmy Garoppolo under center. And it's really impressive how well they were able to do it. And when you look at the fact that NFL teams ran the ball, first of all, NFL teams employed 21 personnel and only 7.7% of offensive snaps last year.

But teams ran the ball 57% of the time when they were in this package. However, the 49ers used 21 offensive personnel the most in the entire league, a whopping 42% of the time when Garoppolo was the quarterback. So, in addition, the 49ers ran the ball 39% of the time, won in 21 personnel, the most of any of their personnel groupings. So it makes sense that when you come out as an offense, as the San Francisco 49ers, in that two-back package, you use it a ton, you run it the most when you're using this personnel group,

a team is going to think you're running the ball, which is why the 49ers were so effective on both play action and RPO type plays when they were using this two-back passing game. So that was one. And another thing that Shanahan liked to do, motion and movement pre-snap with the two running backs, switching the strength of the formation, which is nice to do. There's a great example in the piece where I showed them switching the strength of the formation with a tight end shift and then a motion gets the defense to rotate from cover two to cover three. And then you throw a nice little curl route underneath in front of that cornerback. It was a great little play.

And finally, sort of I.I. in the piece where they did a lot with sort of half field reads. Yet the field sort of split in half with two different concepts, sometimes something as simple as a go route on one side that Garoppolo could peak to quickly and then come back to a concept on the other side of the field. So that's going to be up over at the score. You can check that out as well. Kyle Shanahan, Jimmy Garoppolo, and the two-back passing game.

And now we're done because I've been talking for a while now. That will do it for today's show. Tomorrow will be a game day edition working on perhaps, perhaps, perhaps a surprise guest. If not do it for today's show. Tomorrow will be a game day edition, working on perhaps, perhaps, perhaps a surprise guest. If not, it'll just be me. Hopefully we get a surprise guest too, because I kind of like the person I'm trying to get on. We'll be doing a little preview either way of the Patriots Eagles matchup on Thursday night.

Friday I'll be back, sort of breaking it all down. Until then, everybody, thanks for listening. Remember, that Patriots Lockdown Podcast hotline is back. 240-670-6016. Calls, texts, voicemails, get them in. Love to hear from you. Love to hear your thoughts on the Patriots, the NFL, whatever you want to talk about.

Until next time, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Schofield, and Locked On Patriots. Thank you.