Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots June 7, 2018 - Timeline Takes!

Episode Date: June 7, 2018

QB rankings; Could you complete a pass; Punter battles; Rookie reps; and football books.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Good morning, welcome into Lockdown Patriots for Thursday, June 7th, 2018. Mark Schofield back in the big chair. I'm ranting to follow me on Twitter at Mark Schofield. Follow the work over at InsideThePylon.com where I'm one of the lead writers. Follow the work over at ProFootballWeekly.com and I invite you to check out my recent scheme piece on Deshaun Watson and Carson Wentz, what to expect from those guys in the year ahead.

You can also check out the video work that I do on quarterbacks, YouTube.com slash InsideThePylon. We're going to do a couple of things differently today i know we've been rolling through football and film we've been rolling through storylines we've been rolling through the top 10 defensive plays of the patriots 2017 2018 season but i'm gonna hit the pause button on all three of those serieses series series series and we're gonna do timeline takes it's been a while since we've dedicated a show to timeline takes. And there's some stuff I want to get to. Punter battles, extra reps for incoming rookies, football books. A shout out to my friend Bill Rossetti, at Bill Rossetti on

Twitter, who's been asking me about some good football books. I'm going to run through a list of football books. Maybe that's the next thing after football and film. Football in book form. Maybe we can roll through some of the football books. I can dive into these deeper. Maybe we can get a locked on Patriots football book club. That would be fun and nerdy over the summer. But first, since this is Timeline Takes, it's time to talk quarterback rankings. Again, I know. But here's the thing. I'm intimately, and I mean this, intimately familiar with the process of ranking quarterbacks.

Put it out your list of all 32 starting quarterbacks or 40 starting quarterbacks or however you want to do it. And then seeing it getting ripped to shreds on the timeline. I've lived that. And so I have a certain amount of respect and a certain understanding for people that do lists like these and put them out there. And then just get destroyed on the timeline. Whether it's one fan base, a couple of fan bases. Everybody just up in arms and screaming at you and telling you to delete your account and quit your job and go back to doing something else. I get it.

Vinny Iyer, who hosts Locked On Fantasy on this network, which you should listen to, he also writes for the Sporting News, and he put together his ranking of all 32 NFL starting quarterbacks, and it has gotten a ton of blowback on the timeline. So I wanted to address it briefly. First by saying, look Vinny, I know, I hear you. It's tough to do this. And you're going to get some people mad. Including me.

Okay. Again, don't want to crush Vinny here. But let's just go through it quickly, at number one, Tom Brady, completely on board with that, that's where I ranked him for Bleacher Report last year, at the end of the season, yeah, QB1, still, deal with everybody else, Aaron Rodgers, QB2, okay, I'm right there with you too, that's where I had him, and if Rodgers had had an injury-free season, maybe you could have made the case that he was QB1. A lot of people crushed me for having Rodgers too.

I get it. It's fine. But based on last year alone, I think it was Brady. Russell Wilson III. I could see that too. And I'm pretty sure that's about where I had him. He had a fantastic year with not a ton of help, especially up front.

He's basically the guy that carries that offense. That statistic, 98% of their offensive output was from him. I'm right there with you. Drew Brees, number four. Again, I think that's the top four for most people. It starts to get rocky at five. Remember, I just did a show last week talking about how addressing that question, I had Matthew Stafford five, just sitting here right now, and I got destroyed.

Vinny goes with Carson Wentz at five. I think there's a case to be made for him. Vinny makes it. I wouldn't do it. Ben Roethlisberger at six. I can, again, he's in that sort of next tier In that 5-8 range Which I'm on board with

So having him at 6 I don't really have a problem with that I can see it Matt Ryan at 7 This was the fan base that destroyed me recently on Twitter Anywhere from that 5-8 range Is I think perfect for Matt Ryan I can see him 5, 6, 7, 8

I'm fine with all that. Jimmy Garoppolo at eight. This is where I think you get ahead of your skis and a little bit over in front of your skis a bit here because he had a nice little five-game run, won all of his starts. The hype might be real. But it's still hype right now. I would need to see more before I put him in say the top 15. Talent wise perhaps.

But I still need to see more. Nine, Phillip Rivers. Okay. I think that we're going to see if Phillip Rivers can sort of live up to some of the expectations that have faced him throughout his entire career this season because now he's going to finally

have a more complete team around him at least on the defensive side of the ball as well and so they won't have to do and they won't have to ask as much of him as they used to in the past. Matthew Stafford, 10. He's the guy I had five. I think he's made such developmental strides

that I love the career arc to him. Very excited about him going forward. I think he's just, the potential to be one of the next truly elite quarterbacks in this league. Marcus Mariota at 11. There's a guy that I love. Had him as AFC quarterback number three coming into last season. Really took a dive. You know, I think it was largely schematic. I wrote a piece about it over at profootballweekly.com that I'd invite you to check out where I talk about

how the route concepts and the space into the route concepts was really poor last year. And then when you look at Matt LaFleur coming in as the new offensive coordinator for the Tennessee Titans, you look at who he learned from working under Sean McVay last year, and you look at how effectively Sean McVay used space on the field to stretch defenses from sideline to sideline and deep downfield, I think it's a great fit.

Sean Watson at 12. I mean, if we're ranking guys sort of on potential, I might have him a little bit higher. I mean, I might even have Watson higher than Garoppolo because I think you look at some of the things that Watson was able to do last year. But again, I'm okay with all this so far. Jared Goff at 13. Some people might have him higher, but I would still want to see more. So I get having him at 13. Kirk Cousins at 14. I think that's kind of his range. Same with Dak Prescott at 15. 16, Tyrod Taylor. I like Tyrod Taylor a lot.

I've gone to bat for him a couple of times in a couple of different places, including in Buffalo, on radio in Buffalo. I think 16 is a nice little area for him. You might have noticed by now there's a name missing, which we're going to get to. 17, Jameis Winston. I think he took a really nice leap last year. I think that if you studied him like the way I did last year, if you look at some of the things he's starting to improve on, had a reputation as being a very turnover-prone, gunslinger type, I think he made a little bit, or not even a little bit,

I think he made a lot of strides in that area last year. Year four is going to be a big one for him. Bill Walsh famously said, if a quarterback doesn't get it by year three, that was last year, year three from Mariota and Winston. And you wonder if I think they've gotten it, but now can they go beyond it? But 17, okay, I get that for Winston. Derek Carr, 18, I'm okay with that as well. Here we go. Cam Newton at 19. This is the ranking that has put the timeline into an absolute frenzy, and that's where I really want to focus here. Because to me, when I graded these quarterbacks last year, now remember the process at Bleach Report,

we graded them on four traits. Armed talent was chief among them, which certainly helped Cam Newton. But in addition to armed talent and sort of velocity and all that stuff that goes into armed strength, accuracy, decisions under pressure, decision-making. Those were basically the traits. So decision-making, under pressure, arm talent, accuracy. Those were how we were grading these guys. You grade them on a scale,

and then their grades contribute to plus their positional value, which we incorporated as well, 10 out of 10 for quarterbacks. That gets you to their final grade. And Cam Newton ended up QB 7 for me. Now he's 19 for Vinny. And, you know, I will go to bat for Cam Newton being in that sort of 5 to 8 range of quarterbacks, particularly from a talent-based, a trait-based perspective. Because you look at what he's asked to do in that Panthers offense, at least to date.

You look at how he's asked to sort of carry that, throw into receivers that struggle to get separation, which is a big lift for a quarterback that's not really known for precision ball placement. That's a big ask. You look at the fact that at least when we graded him over a bleach report, arm talent, arm strength being a component of that were a big factor of the grade. Yeah, that's going to give Cam Newton a boost because hard to find somebody that throws the ball better than he does, at least in terms of arm strength, velocity, and arm talent. And so as I wrote over Pro Football Weekly recently, I will go to bat for Cam Newton. I'm on board with Cam Newton. Vinny's getting crushed for the QB 19 grade. I disagree with it.

I think a lot of people disagree with it, judging by my timeline. But again, I have a certain affinity and understanding for what Vinny's trying to do. You are going to get people mad when you rank quarterbacks. Because it's the one position that everybody, everybody, believes that they can understand and study. While being the hardest position to understand and know and study. So there's that. But I feel for you, Vinny. It's not easy.

One other quick take from the timeline. At 4Verts, Charles McDonald on Twitter. In sort of response to all of the discussion with Cam Newton posted a clip of a play which I actually featured in the Cam Newton piece I did over pro football weekly where he just throws a dig route to Brandon Burson coming from the right to the left against the Saints threads it between two defenders and he's basically like Charles's point was we ask so much of quarterbacks how does anybody complete a pass in the National Football League? Which spawned this question from Charles, do you think you could complete a pass in the National Football League? Which I think is a fascinating question. And honestly, I think I could. Honestly, I think I could. Now, throw in a running back screen

or a swing pass, sure. But Charles defines it though. If you got 40 tries, do you think you could complete one pass 10 yards down the field in an NFL game? The pass must travel 10 plus yards in the air. 53% voted yes out of 2,204 votes. 47% voted no. I voted yes. I think with 40 tries, I could complete one 10-yard out. You get off coverage.

Sure. Or maybe just a YOLO YOLO back shoulder type throw. You know? 50-50 type ball. I think one could be done.

Although, you know, take that back. I got a torn labrum in both of my shoulders including my throwing shoulder. There's no way I'm throwing anything 10 yards downfield let alone completing it. Who am I kidding? I'm a man. I've got a torn labrum in both of my shoulders, including my throwing shoulder. There's no way I'm throwing anything 10 yards downfield, let alone completing it. Who am I

kidding? I'm a man. I'm 41. Thanks, Charles. Making me feel old today. Anyway, that's some QB stuff. We're going to come back. We're going to talk punter battles. We're going to talk reps for rookies and football books. That's all ahead with me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield, back with you now for this Thursday edition of Locked on Patriots doing some timeline takes because, you know,

felt like we needed a break from the other stuff. And it's always fun to do timeline takes because as I realized, you know, not everybody's on the timeline all day long, like I am, which probably does numbers on my mental health. But there are always some interesting things on the timeline that I like to bring to you. Like this piece from Kevin Dillon over at MassLive. Patriots punters Ryan Allen and Corey Borquez are embracing competition in minicamp. That's right, folks. We have a punter battle on our hands.

Kevin starts this piece by pointing out that Ryan Allen earned the right to be called one of the New England Patriots stars from last year's AFC Championship game. He pinned the Jaguars inside their own 10-yard line three times in a row to finish the game, which helped the Patriots control field position and win the contest. Bill Belichick, who cares more about punting than just about anyone, was sure to know that Allen's performance in that game was key for us. But here's the thing. As Kevin points out in the piece, Allen could be punting for his job right now. The 28-year-old is entering his sixth NFL season. He's in the final year of his contract. If the Patriots cut him, they save $1.5 million and would owe $500,000 against the cap. Enter Corey Borquets,

left-footed punter, which we all know Bill Belichick loves. Punting out of the University of New Mexico. He's had some positional battles before. He won the gig over Sam Gentry, who was the returning backup at New Mexico. He began punting in high school when he decided he wanted to switch up his soccer training. The football team needed a punter. He gave it a shot and learned quickly, and he had real skill for the sport. He was a left midfielder in soccer,

but the transition from kicking a soccer ball to kicking a football is a difficult transition, as he points out in this piece with Kevin Dillon. But he brings to the table some impressive stats, not just the fact that he punts with his left foot. He ranked fourth in the nation with 47.3 yards per punt, and only 11 of his 67 punts were returned at all. He had four punts of 70-plus yards last year as well. But Ryan Allen is one of the better sort of situational punters in the National Football League. He's averaged 45.3 yards per punt, which isn't among the league leaders, but he's very

adept at placement. And if you know the work from Chuck Zotta, writer over at Inside the Pylon, punting and kicking guru, former punter and kicker in the Ivy League at Dartmouth. He would tell you that placement and hang time are as much, if not more important than just punting average, yardage average. Because it's one thing to boot the thing 65 yards, but it's another to put it right where you want to, to force the punt returner to either adjust, to move off of his spot, to get away from his blocking schemes, to set up a return,

and to force him to either take in a fair catch or get in next to nothing after the catch on the return. And that's what Ryan Allen does so incredibly well, and it remains to be seen whether the rookie can come in and be better at that than the NFL veteran. So it does set up an interesting sort of camp battle. And there are obviously, as outlined by Kevin, some financial considerations here. That's definitely something interesting to watch. Punters are people too, as Rich Eisen would say. Punters are people too. Fascinating camp battle to watch.

Speaking of camp and OTAs, obviously Gronkowski is back. Brady is back. Everybody's happy. Perhaps not Danny Etlin, Braxton Berrios, and guys like that. Guys, rookies on the fringe that aren't going to get a ton of reps in practice because obviously the big guys, the ones and the twos, are getting a lot more of those. And so that's why it was fantastic to see

the other day on Twitter a tweet from Phil Perry, at Phil A. Perry, on the Twitter machine, covering the Patriots for NBC Sports Boston, put out a tweet, Danny Etlin and Braxton Barrios are the last two off the field. A couple of rookies put in an extra work when reps are limited for them during

practice. And he attaches to it. Nice picture of that. Danny Etlin spent, he had Zach Cox as well. Zach Cox, N-E-S-N, at Zach Cox Nesson. Danny Etlin spent an extra 20 minutes after practice thrown to Braxton Barrios, who was limited today. They were the last players off the field. And this is critical for guys in this position because you're not going to get the reps during the session that you need. And when you get them, you need to make them count. And in all likelihood, when Danny Etlin gets into the huddle, Braxton Berrios will be with him. So they need to be on the same page so they can make those reps count, so they can complete those few passing opportunities they get in practice.

And seeing stuff like that, it's fantastic to see. I know it's just OTAs. And I've said this recently on this show and others. Guys aren't winning jobs right now, but you're building that foundation to put you in a position to win a job come July. That's something Bill Belichick said himself about OTAs. This is all about teaching.

It's not about winning and losing jobs right now. But you need to put yourself in position. And so when we get into July, when we get into training camp and Danny Antley gets his three reps at the end of practice and team, one of which will, or two of which will be a handoff, and he gets one chance to throw the ball, he'll have a comfortable receiver on the other end of his passes. Fantastic to see that from the two young guys. Up next, we're going to close out this show with football and literature. Maybe I turn this into a whole series. Maybe we turn it into a Locked On Patriots book club.

If that's an idea you'd be on board for for this summertime, let me know, at Mark Schofield on Twitter. I'd be happy. I'd be happy to read some football books and talk about them because the stack of books on my nightstand right now, it's like a graduate master's level history class. I'm reading right now John Meacham's new book, The Soul of America. I'm next is Michael McFaul's new book from Cold Water Hot Peace. I've got some books on, you know, the Bismarck era in Germany

that I want to get through. I've got some World War II books to get through. I'm a history buff and it's fantastic reading that stuff. But sometimes I need a break. So if people want to do a Locked On Patriots book club, let me know at Mark Schofield on Twitter.

Like I said, up next, I want to talk about some football books, including one that I know extremely well. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield and Twitter. Like I said, up next, I want to talk about some football books, including one that I know extremely well. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield, and Locked On Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now to close out this Thursday. Timeline takes edition of Locked On Patriots. And we're going to talk some football books here. And this was brought to my attention.

This was asked of me by my good friend Bill Resetti at Bill Resetti on Twitter. He's the host of Locked on Panthers. You can give him a follow over at Bill Resetti on Twitter. And Bill asked me recently, you know, to recommend some football books. And the first place I went to when I was getting ready to put this together was scoutandacademy.com. That is Dan Hatman's program. Dan has been on the show. I work with Dan over at ITP. Dan's put together a program, you know, being a former scout who's worked in NFL front offices, he's put together a program,

the Scouting Academy, to help teach people the evaluation process if they want to go on and be NFL scouts or do media, do content creation like I do. I took the Scouting Academy to learn about the quarterback study, to learn about quarterback evaluation. It's a fantastic resource. It's a great networking resource as well because you get, you know, access to Dan and, you know, the people that he knows and some great football minds come in like Louis Riddick to help with the program. And so it's a fantastic resource. And one of the great resources they have is their book list, which you can find at scoutedacademy.com, football book list. You can Google it, Scouted Academy book list. I don't even,

can't even count how many books they have listed here. As far as books that I would recommend, obviously, scouting books, Steve Belichick's Football Scouting Methods. That's the Bible in terms of sort of scouting. Pat Kerwan's Take your eye off the ball. It's also a fantastic, fantastic resource. Nike Coach of the Year Clinics.

These are football manuals put out by Earl Brownen, who edits them. And what they are, they're basically written up coaches' presentations. I get them every single year. The Nike Coach of the Year Clinic has both high school and college coaches from smaller guys at the high school level to guys like Nick Saban, Mike D'Antonio. No, that's not right. Big-time college coaches, Kirby Smart, for example. Jimbo Fisher, breaking down what they do from an offensive or a defensive or even

a special team's schematic basis. Whether it's Mike Leach had a fantastic presentation on the mesh concept, which is like the core of his air raid offense. Just one play and all the different ways that he teaches it, the ways that he installs it, the ways that he has his players practice it. Just fantastic stuff. I highly recommend those. As a quarterback guy, Joe Montana is the art and magic of quarterbacking. I read it as a kid. When I got back into writing about football now, I bought it again. My parents had, you know, we had donated it back when I was a kid. I got it again. Same thing with quarterbacking by Ken Anderson. Also, same situation. I read it as a kid to learn how to play the position. I got it again. It's the art of quarterbacking. Excuse me.

I got it again to now write about it. It's right on my desk. I'm staring at it right now. Sometimes I'll refer to it in pieces. Steve Axman, he's a great offensive mind. Attacking coverages with the passing game is a good one. Scrolling through the rest of this list. Mike Leach, Swing Your Sword, Leading the Charge in Football and Life. That's more a leadership type book, but I would recommend it. It's a very good piece.

Amy Trask, You Negotiate Like a Girl. Amy's one of the most informative, knowledgeable people about the game of football. That book is incredible, written with Mike Freeman. She's just a fantastic person to follow on Twitter. Fantastic guest on podcast. I was incredibly lucky to have her as a guest on a podcast a while ago and just a fantastic football mind. Christopher Price, The Blueprint, How the New England Patriots Beat the System to Create the Last Great NFL Dynasty. Fantastic book there. A book I'm working through right now, Caponomics from Zach Moore, studying the NFL cap. I tweeted about it recently. You can find it on my timeline at Mark Schofield. Definitely worth checking out. Emery Hunt, Football Game Plan on

Twitter. He has some great books about just the game of football, stiff arm and football myths, football love story. What did football teach me? What did football teach me is in football love story are two fantastic books. Can't recommend them enough. He goes around, you know, talking to other coaches, other guys who played the game about, you know, the game of football and what it meant to them and how it, you know, shaped their lives. Highly recommend those. The Chris Brown books, Art of Smart Football, Essential Smart Football, those are great as well. Roger Worsky and Greg Gosell, The Games That Changed the Game. I read that a couple years ago.

That's fantastic. If you really like X's and O's stuff, you can find Alex Kirby, Every Play Revealed, New England versus Seattle. He broke down every single play from that Super Bowl. That's well worth your time. And while you're looking at football books, 17 drives. College football's 2015

season, one game at a time. It's a work put together that breaks down one drive. Just one drive from each week of the 2015 college football season, kind of taking you through the early stuff in that season up into the national championship game between Clemson and Alabama. Just looking at how one drive can sometimes shape not just a game,

not just a team season, but the entirety of the college football season. That was written by a guy called Mark Schofield. So if you want to pick up my book, hey, you can check it out. Also some great coaching blogs if you want to learn nerdy stuff. Inside the Pylon Glossary, I highly recommend that, of course. Dan Syed, Syed Schemes does some really good stuff. Chris Brown, Smart Football, of course. So definitely check out stuff like that. And then finally, coaching clinics, the Nike Coach of the Year Clinic. It's just NikeCOYFootball.com, as well as the Glazer Clinics, Glazer, G-L-A-Z-I-E-R Clinics.com. Those are all great resources. So I hope that helps. There's so many good football

books out there. I just touched the surface of the stuff that's out there. I'd check out this Scouting Academy list to get the fuller picture of everything that's available to you. And again, if people want to start an ITP football book club, we can figure out a way to talk about these things either on Twitter or even on the show. I could have people on to talk about, hey, there you go. If you ever wanted to be a guest on this fantastic, fantastic Patriots podcast, we could start a book club and I can have people on to talk about these books. How about that? That's just an idea. I'm just throwing stuff out there, some fun stuff to do to build the

audience, to have some fun as we get through the summer months and get ready for the 2018 Patriots season. That will do it for today's show. Obviously, I'll be off on Friday because it is the summer. And look, I've got 38 quarterbacks to finish up watching for the 2019 draft. I've got some playbook studying to do, working my way through Nick Saban's Alabama defensive playbook right now. And I might even have a super, super secret Patriots project in the works as well. We'll see. Hashtag teaser.

So until Monday, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Scofield, and Locked on Patreon.