Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots February 15, 2018 - Florida Thoughts and Scouting Danny Amendola with Bryce Rossler

Episode Date: February 15, 2018

Mark Schofield opens with some thoughts on yesterday's events in Florida, then chats with Bryce Rossler about his recent analysis and study of Danny Amendola.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Good morning and welcome on into Lockdown Patriots for Thursday, February 15th, 2018. Mark Schofield here with you in the big chair. Reminder to follow me on Twitter at Mark Schofield. You can follow my work over at InsideThePylon.com, LockdownPatriots.com, DailyMockDraft.com, where every other day I'm posting a Patriots mock draft to help get you ready for the 2018 NFL draft. We're going to talk football in a moment, but I want to take a few minutes here at the start and talk about Florida. And for some of you, this may be sort of an uncomfortable conversation.

You may turn this podcast off. You may fast forward through this part, and that's fair. But uncomfortable conversations are sometimes necessary conversations. And I think it's necessary to have, at least at the start, a conversation about the events we saw yesterday, where 17 people were killed. More clinging to their life right now in a hospital at the hands of a 19-year-old who, after being expelled from the school, returned some time later, that day being yesterday,

and acted the way that he did. And I don't want to get into the weeds here of a big sort of debate, but I do sort of want to start by relaying a bit of a story. And I'll start by saying that I'm lucky in the sense that the current career path that I'm on allows me to work from home. Gone are the days where I'm commuting into downtown DC to spend my hours in an office. I get to work from home and I get to work at a house that's around the corner from my son's elementary school. We live in Montgomery County, Maryland, kind of just across the border from DC into Maryland, right between Silver Spring and

Bethesda, for those of you that might know the area well. And I'm, like I said, around the corner from my son's school. It's a one and a half minute drive. It's a five minute walk and that's with kids, faster if you're walking by yourself. And so that allows me the chance to go to my son's school a lot. I can go and talk to his class like I've done about the work that I do. I can go to events.

I can help out at things. And yesterday being Valentine's Day, each class at the end of the day had sort of a Valentine's Day party. And I was able to go and help out and see the kids. And I love it. I love being able to spend time with my son in his element. And, you know, he's in first grade. The area where we live, it's a very diverse sort of area.

It's a very diverse group of kids. I had the chance to talk to one of his teachers. He's lucky to have two teachers, one a student teacher who's getting ready to sort of finish her teaching program and become a full-time teacher herself, and she was telling me yesterday that there was a new student in the class, and it's just such a great group of kids and how they've welcomed in this new student immediately, seeing these children interact these first graders interact and the joy that they have together and the Karen and the kindness that they show for each other it's always amazing and this past week this this week of school has had a focus on Karen and kindness they're calling it Karen and kindness week and during the sort of Valentine's Day party that we were there for,

our teacher showed a video that the kids have been watching and sort of talking about all week long. And it's a quick little five-minute video, and it's one of those sort of circular stories. And it's similar to a series of, I think, insurance commercials that were somewhat popular in the past year or so, where you see a stranger do an act of kindness for one person and then that person goes on and does an act of kindness for another and it kind of goes circular. So it starts with a construction worker on a busy

street helping a kid who drops his book bag. And then the kid, after he gets helped, helps an old lady cross the street and then she goes on and pays for somebody's parking at a parking meter and that person picks up a wallet that somebody left and returns it to them. And it goes on until you have a waitress who was just given a huge tip by a diner who had been given flowers after somebody saw her dining alone. So the waitress, after receiving this big tip, pours a fresh glass of water for somebody to hand it to the construction worker who started all of this, who's out working on a hot afternoon. And so the video ends and all the children are then asked by the teacher to sort of relay some of the things they learned and the responses were amazing. Again, these are first graders and

they're talking about, you know, kindness boomerangs and how if you go help somebody, eventually that will come back to you and somebody will do something nice for you. And even one of the students said, you know, we could do this and it will be great when countries do something nice for other countries. And he took it from the micro to the macro. And it was amazing. It was amazing to sort of see these kids and how great they are together. How kind they are to one another. And then the party ended, and I was walking back to our car with my son

because we had to go to my daughter's party at her school, and I checked my phone, and I saw what was happening down in Florida. And it struck me at that moment that from where these kids are, the kids that I just saw, and the kindness that they were talking about, something happens along somebody's life

that puts them to that moment, where they have that idea, and then they act out on it. And it was just chilling. So that's where I want to focus this for the next couple of minutes, is we need to figure out what happens along that path.

What turns the kids I saw yesterday into somebody like we saw act out at roughly the same exact time. And there's no easy answer to that. And it's not a situation where there's going to be a one-size-fits-all solution. This is a hard problem, which is why it's an uncomfortable discussion. And already right now we're seeing people on, you know, whether you want to say both sides of the political aisle retreat to their positions, whether it's mental health awareness or whether it's gun control.

But one solution isn't going to fix this problem. And we have a problem. And my point is this. In any other sort of scenario, when we as a society have identified a problem, we've at least studied it to try to find the best possible solution or solutions. But in this scenario, we don't even study it.

We don't even study it because of something that's called the Dickey Amendment. And what that is, it was a small little provision inserted into the 1996 federal government spending bill, which mandated that none of the funds made available for injury prevention and control

at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control. And the amendment was named for Jay Dickey, a Republican member of the House of Representatives from Arkansas. And the way that has worked is anytime the CDC wants to conduct any sort of research into firearm-related injuries, whether it's youth violence, domestic violence, sexual violence, suicide, they can't. Because no

federal money can be used for that. And it's basically worked to shut down any sort of research into it. It's why we can't study it. And some experts have said that this is basically worked to ban any gun violence research by the centers for disease control and dickie himself has now recently argued that he regrets his role in stopping the cdc from researching gun violence and he simply didn't want to let any of those dollars go to gun control advocacy. So my point is simply this, can we at least study it? Because if it turns out that there's something that we can do that has nothing whatsoever to do

with gun control, then we could try it. What if it is violence in the media? Whether it's movies, music, games, whatever, we at least owe it to our children, to the kids that I saw yesterday, to the kids that lived through yesterday's events in Florida, to try to figure it out? What if it turns out that the biggest contributor to incidents like we saw yesterday are mediocre Patriots podcast hosted by washed up athletes who talk too much about quarterbacks in total? What if that's the result? Because I will go off the air right now

if that's the result of this. But we can't find that out. Maybe it is mental health. Whatever the cause, we should at least look into it. We should at least study it. But we can't even agree to do that. And that's the most frustrating thing to me. It shouldn't feel like a spin of the

roulette wheel every time I drop my kids off at school, but it does. We should be better than this. And we're never going to eliminate evil from the world. Of course not. But we should at least try to find a way and study a way to reduce these incidents. So we can stop this cycle of the beautiful children I saw yesterday. Then 13, 14 years later, some of them going down one path and some of them going down others where some are perpetrators and others are victims. We can't continue like this. That's my quick spiel. I just wish we could study it and

maybe we could find some things we could try but in the wake of events like this there's always sort of those comments that we need to start somewhere well that's a good place to start we can at least study it up next I'm going to talk to Bryce Rossler.

He's a current student at the Scouting Academy. He is a contributor to Inside the Pylon as well as Browns Wire and a host of the Detroit Lions podcast. He has a piece up right now on LockedOnPatriots.com breaking down Danny Amendola. He studied him for the Scouting Academy. I'm going to talk to him about what he saw

when he studied Amendola and whether the Patriots should bring him back into the fold. That's next with me, Mark Schofield and Locked On Patriots. Okay, everybody back here. Mark Schofield here on Locked On Patriots and going to talk some football now. Going to dive into one

of the big decisions facing the New England Patriots this offseason, and that is the status of free agent wide receiver Danny Amendola. And to do that, I've brought on an expert because, let's face it, you listen to me for Toto takes, you listen to me for quarterback takes, but when you want wide receiver takes, you want to hear from somebody else. So I brought in Bryce Rossler. He is a contributor to Inside the Pylon, to Bronze Wire.

He co-hosts the Detroit Lions podcast. He's also, and this is pertinent to our discussion here, a current student at the Scouting Academy. Bryce, welcome to Locked on Patriots. How are you doing, buddy? I'm doing well. I'm glad to be here, but now I'm a little bit nervous because I think you might have hyped me up too much.

No, man. Except not to fail. No, I'm just hyping you up just enough. And for those of you listeners to Locked On Patriots that also visit LockedOnPatriots.com, which you should be doing, you will see a piece on Danny Amendola from Bryce that he wrote, breaking him down. And that was after he studied him this year for the Scouted Academy. And so, Bryce, I want to start there because not all of the listeners to the podcast or readers of Locked On Patriots might know what the Scouted Academy. And so, Bryce, I want to start there because not all of the listeners

to the podcast or readers of Locked On Patriots might know what the Scouted Academy is. So can you sort of break that down for us? Okay, so the Scouted Academy, for those that don't know, it's a course or a series of courses, rather, that teach you how to evaluate specific position groups within football. The main driver behind it is Dan Hatman. He's the director at Inside the Pylon.

He's the director over there at Scouting Academy. He's done a very good job at Scouting Academy of bringing on several instructors, former NFL GMs and personnel guys, former coaches to contribute there and add their knowledge of the game to the coursework over there. And it's been a really great experience. It's one of the best things I've ever done as far as football goes. And it's my understanding, Bryce, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, that you've been studying wide receivers sort of this year, right?

Yep, that's correct. I just got done with the wide receivers module. Amendola was one of the guys that I studied along with. Paul Richardson from the Seahawks. Jarvis Landry of the Dolphins, who Patriots fans know well. Albert Wilson of the Chiefs. And Eric Decker of the Titans. Okay, and just so listeners know,

Dan Hattman is also one of the forces behind Inside the Pylon. I've also taken the Scouting Academy quarterback module as well. And so when Bryce speaks highly of it, I can tell you that it is an incredible program, and it's a worthwhile investment if you want to learn more about studying players, valuing players' schemes, and things like that. Now, Bryce, obviously the reason why I brought you on, you've got the piece up on Locked On Patriots where you broke down Amendola based on your scouting report. Patriots do have a decision this offseason, what they want to do with Amendola. When you studied him, what were some of the strengths, some of the good traits that you came away from when you studied Damian

Dole? What were some of the positive traits that you found? So I really, really liked Amendola's mental processing. I know it's kind of, it's kind of a stereotype that all the receivers that come through New England are really smart players, but Amendola, I mean, he, when you watch him work, particularly against zone coverage, you, you, you can, you can see how he understands the game, the way he, the way he finds the holes and zones, the way he adjusts his route depth based on the defender's depth in zone, the different reads he makes based on the coverages. I mean, he's just a very smart player, and that, to me, was what stood out most in watching him.

Another thing, he's a very reliable pass catcher. He can adjust the ball well below his frame, helps him working with Brady who can put the ball just about anywhere, give him an opportunity to catch it when there are defenders in the area. And then the third thing would be his competitive toughness. He works the middle fearlessly. He steps up big on third downs and critical game situations. Robert Gronkowski calls him Danny Playoff, I believe. So those were the three biggest things that stood

out to me with Amendola. When you're studying players, particularly my realm, and you know this, Bryce, is quarterbacks, and it's easy to sort of highlight and identify process and speed and mental awareness when you're talking about quarterbacks. But it's a little bit tougher to find out the wide receivers. And like you mentioned, sort of the zone coverage and things like that, it seems like that's something that stands out. And is that important in New England's offense? Yeah, it's really important for them.

I did a piece for Inside the Pylon talking about the run and shoot concepts that they incorporate. A lot of New England's offense is really based on reads from the wide receivers. They ask a lot of their guys up there, and he's able to do that really well. In evaluating receiver play, and it's something that I can still stand to get better at myself, but understanding what exactly the defense is doing on a play is important. And that can be difficult enough, you know, watching it two or three times over on all 22. So for the guys they have, the guys the Patriots have, to be able to do that all on the fly is very impressive because it's not easy.

Yeah, and one of the things that I think sort of stands out when you watch this Patriots offense is we can see it like you sort of alluded to there when you're rewinding it and stuff, but the option routes and the adjustments and the conversions that are built into this offense, that also makes it critical for a Patriots receiver, whether it's an inside guy like Amendola or an outside guy like say Cooks or Hogan to have that mental process and that process speed to adjust to rolled coverage and things like that yeah absolutely I mean they just just to name a few concepts that the Patriots regularly run they run they like to run choice plays on the outside which is which is a seven stem. It's a read based on the leverage of the cornerback,

so you've got to understand what the coverage is, what his leverage is, where his help is, and base your read off that. They do a lot of – when Amendola's working from the slot, he does a lot of stick routes, which is that kind of route that Jason Witten has become famous for. If it's zone and they're playing off you sit down if it's man you break outside then they do a lot of mesh concepts which are the the two receivers dragging over the middle and you know man you're you're dragging across zone

you're sitting down and and just to see him work on those I don't think there was ever a time where I went and said, okay, that's the wrong read. He didn't do this instead. I mean, he's very good in that area. Yeah, you mentioned also competitive toughness. And, you know, it sometimes gets, I don't want to say mocked, but people can say, oh, you know, that doesn't really mean anything. But it matters across positions, you know, sort of that competitive toughness,

that fire to finish plays, whether it's, you know, sort of that competitive toughness, that fire to finish plays, whether it's, you know, as a quarterback to fight through mistakes or as an offensive lineman to finish blocks. And for receivers, like you said, going over the middle. And that's something you also highlighted in your Amendola report. How does he stand out in that way? So, obviously, Amendola, anybody that's watched him, realized that he's not a big guy. So I gave him high marks for this because, and this kind of factors into play speed as well,

but you'll see guys that when they run those digs or when they run those drags or when they run those slants, they're not running as fast as they do on the outside. And that limits their ability to separate. Amendola, it doesn't matter where you put him, if he's on the outside or if he's going over the outside, and that limits their ability to separate. Amendola, it doesn't matter where you put him. If he's on the outside or if he's going over the middle, he's going to execute and run the play as fast as he can. Another area he's good at is blocking. Not a lot of receivers are interested in blocking. He's a committed blocker, then uh another thing is i like how after and this is outside the whistle but you see him take a shot he's popping right back up and that's and that's

what you want to see from a guy yeah and you know now let's sort of shift gears a little bit and talk about some of you know perhaps the negative some of the you know the things where amandola either you know hasn't developed or just might never develop because of sort of athletic limitations. What were some of the weaknesses you saw in Danny Amendola's game when you studied him for the Scouting Academy? So obviously you touched on it already, athleticism. He's not the most athletic guy, and that shows up in several areas. His separation quickness when he's against man

is not nearly as good as when he's against zone. He's a good route runner so that, you know, he sets up his brakes well. But if, you know, if a cornerback squats on his route or anticipates the route, he struggles to maintain separation out of his brakes. So he's not going to ever be a guy that you're going to line up consistently against number two cornerbacks, especially not number one cornerbacks, and ask him to beat them one-on-one. Another area, and this is also part of the athletic piece, is when he's got the ball in his hands, he can make the first guy miss, but he's not going to do much outside of that.

He doesn't have, you know, he's not going to string multiple cuts together because he's not going to do much outside of that. He doesn't have, you know, he's not going to string multiple cuts together because he's just not that agile. He's not going to, you know, he's not going to run away from anybody. And then the third thing is how strong he is. He doesn't have very long arms. He's not very tall. He's not very big. He does a good job of releasing against press and using his hands to clear press. But as soon as a longer corner gets their arms into him, he's out of the play.

You're talking about three seconds to open, and he just labors on those jams for too long. Bryce, we're sort of into—well, not into. It seems like draft season is going year-round these days. But as we sort of look to the 2018 draft, a lot of the things that evaluators like you and I do is we project sort of best or most ideal scheme fits for a player, whether it's a quarterback, wide receiver, whatever. When you study Amendola and you sort of get done with doing the work on him, is there an ideal scheme fit for him as a

wide receiver and if there is is New England that ideal fit I would say so and I'm not I'm not saying I know every single scheme that the teams run well and I certainly am not you know the New England scheme I'm fairly familiar with but I don't know it inside and out either. But just what they did there and what he was asked to do on film, I mean, he's a perfect fit. Or a near-perfect fit, rather. He's not going to, again, he's not a number one or number two receiver. He's probably a guy that you're going to have to put in the slot. But for what they asked him to do there, I mean, he does it very, very well.

And it's hard for me to envision another scheme that would put him in a better place to succeed than New England has. So that leads us, Bryce, now to the sort of million-dollar question. He is entering free agency. He is a little bit older. What do you think New England should do? What would you do if you were Bill Belichick regarding Danny Amendola sort of million dollar question he is entering free agency he is a little bit older what do you think new england should do what would you do if you were bill belichick regarding danny amandola and his status this offseason so if if i'm bill belichick i would at least be willing to negotiate with amandola he uh he stepped up for you when chris hogan was out a couple games this year he he was serviceable on the outside for those games when they put him

outside. With anything, it's ultimately a question of money. He did take a huge pay cut. I think he took like a four plus million dollar pay cut to return to the team this year after restructuring last April. So I have a hard time seeing him wanting a huge payday in free agency. I think he's probably more of a guy that wants to win than anything else. But you never know. The way he did, I think he had something like 83 receptions or something like that this past year. So he produced. There are a lot of wide receiver needy teams. You know, one place you could go is the Dolphins if Landry walks. I think Amendola is a better receiver than Landry personally, but that's another matter entirely. But it's just a matter of what other teams want him to offer.

I don't see him being worth much more than a few million dollars a year, but I'm also not an NFL GM. But in a perfect world, they'd have him back, I would think. And I also, I got to say, man, I like that sort of Amadou over Landry trick. I think Landry sort of does get overvalued, given some of the numbers that he's put up over the past couple of years. Yeah, he does. If you watch him in Miami, it's kind of the same thing. I would say he's less of an athlete than Amendola is. I don't think he's

as smart as Amendola is. He probably makes, he's probably a better catcher than Amendola is. Not that Amendola is a bad catcher, but outside of that, there's not much he does better than him. Miami kind of force-fed him. And to me, just not even equating value, I think Amendola is better. At least this year, based on what I saw. Now, projection-wise, Amendola obviously has some injury issues. Landry's younger. But double-digit millions for Landry is just, I can't see.

I wouldn't be able to justify that. Yeah, I'm right there with you. And the person I'm with, he's Bryce Rossler. Again, contributed to InsideThePylon.com, Detroit Lions podcast, as well as The Browns Wire. Please, please, please follow him on Twitter where he is amazing. You can follow him on Twitter at B-T-R-O-S-S-L-E-R. Bryce, did I miss anything?

If I did, let the people know where to find you and what you got coming down the pike pond. No, I don't think you missed anything. I'm just doing some, I'll do some, I haven't yet reached draft season. I'm just doing some – I'll do some – I haven't yet reached draft season. I'm focusing on free agency. So over at Detroit Lions Podcast, myself and a couple of other Scouting Academy alums are putting together free agency reports, and that's not just for people the Lions might target.

That will be useful for everybody. And then as free agency winds up, we'll start to get in the swing of draft season. And in the meantime, I'll be doing some breakdowns on the Browns wire for prospects. And again, that's something that everybody can use as a resource, not just Browns fans. So I'm a little bit everywhere. And I'll be inside the pylon, of course, doing whatever it is that y'all will have me do over there. Well, let's do whatever you want, man, because this stuff is always great. As you just heard, Bryce Ross is a fantastic resource, not just in wide receivers, but

all across the NFL. Please do follow him on Twitter at B-T-R-O-S-S-L-E-R. That will do it for this Thursday episode of Locked on Patriots. We will actually be back tomorrow for a Friday show. I know I said we were going to four days a week, but we got a special guest to line up to talk some tight ends. Somebody that Bryce knows well, Jeff Riston from Browns Wire. We'll be coming to talk some tight ends, some tight end prospects.

We're going to be addressing that group for the Patriots, what they might do with an eye towards the end of Gronkowski, something we seemingly have to prepare for as Bryce, as you heard Bryce Gronkowski hinted at retirement, so perhaps we have to get ready to replace the Gronk. That will be Friday. Until then, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots. There you go, brother. That was awesome