Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots March 6, 2019 - Tags, Drills and Dragons

Episode Date: March 6, 2019

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Hey there everybody, welcome on into a Wednesday installment of the Lockdown Patriots podcast. Mark Schofield sliding back to the big chair for today, Wednesday, March 6th, 2019. Big show today. What are we going to talk about? Well, we've got a lot of ground to cover. First, we're going to recap yesterday in the NFL because 4 p.m. on Tuesday was the deadline to tag players with a franchise tag. Six players league-wide did get that tag applied to them. Nobody from the New England Patriots. We'll talk about that. We're also going to talk a little bit

about the combine. We're going to have some winners and losers of two different positions, tight end and quarterback positions of need, at least in my mind for the New England Patriots. So we'll talk about that a little bit. And finally, in the third segment of the show, we're going to get away from the game of football just for a bit, talk about another event that happened on Tuesday. Because look, let's face it, this is a phenomenon that we've already been talking about over the Locked On Patriots Slack channel. We're already hyped to sort of cover it and break it down in the Locked On Patriots Slack channel. So since people are talking about it, what do I do on the show? I try to talk about what everybody else is talking about. But before we get into all of that,

I'm reminded to follow me on Twitter at Mark Schofield. Check out the work at places like InsideThePylon.com, Pro Football Weekly, The Score, Matt Waldman's Rookie Scouting Portfolio, Big Blue View, part of the SB Nation family of websites. Bleeding Green Nation, also part of the SB Nation family of websites. And, of course, Pat's Pulpit. Now, also part of the SB Nation family of websites. Look, I'm doing a ton of work. I'm adding some titles and titles and titles and titles and titles.

And just call me Robert Baratheon. Titles upon titles upon titles and titles and just call me Robert Baratheon titles upon titles upon titles upon titles now at the outset no Patriot was hit with the franchise tag so the three names that were most commonly associated with a potential franchise tag are now in a week destined to become free agents and those are Trey Flowers the end, pass rushers for the New England Patriots, Trent Brown, left tackle for the New England Patriots, and kicker Steven Gostowski. And at the outset, it kind of makes some sense that none of these guys were hit with a tag because from a numbers standpoint, look, tagging a kicker, that was going to cost you around

$5 million. The tag number on a kicker or a punter is $4.971 million. Now, the tag on a defensive end, which Flowers would have been hit with, was $17.128 million. Now, the six players that were tagged were Atlanta Falcons defensive tackle Grady Jarrett, Cowboys defensive end Demarcus Lawrence tagged for the second straight year, so his number is going to be a bit higher. His figure is more in the 20.1 range because it's a 20% bump over what the tag number would be for a defensive end.

49ers tag kicker Robbie Gould, Seahawks defensive end Frank Clark, and then two linebackers were tagged. And this is interesting. This will be something to sort of watch because both Judevion Clowney from the Texans and Dee Ford for the Chiefs were tagged as linebackers. Why? Those teams run three fours. They are typically, even though they're rushing off the edge,

they're typically considered outside linebackers. And what's interesting about that is the tag number on a linebacker, 15.443 million. The tag number on a defensive end where they're typically coming from, well, that number, as we just said, is 17.128 million. And so both Dee Ford and Jadavion Clowney are hurt a bit by the fact that they're tagged as linebackers and not defensive ends. No, they can fight it.

That has happened before. Players have sort of questioned the tag sometimes tied white receiver tight end types this has also happened before with edge type guys as well offensive i mean excuse me outside linebackers versus defensive ends so that will be something interesting to sort of think about and see if those guys try to fight that and get a little bit of extra money the big thing as far as the patriots go is this. You can probably kiss Trey Flowers goodbye. Because as we said, he is the premier past Russian guy out there. I just got done recording a show on a Browns podcast,

and he was one of the guys I was asked about. There's going to be interest in bringing Trey Flowers in. And so you can envision a scenario where he's going to command a deal. It's in the $16, $17, $18 million range, getting close to that cap number anyway. And I'm not so sure that the Patriots would have made a wise financial decision if they were just going to tag him for one year on that number. So let him test free agency. He's probably going to get paid. There we go. With Trent Brown, that's also an interesting one because he'll probably get paid

as well. There are a lot of teams and a lot of cap space, and so the issue becomes how do you replace those guys? With Flowers, as we've been talking about, it's probably going to be a rotation, a combination of guys behind him. Derek Rivers, Adrian Claiborne, John Simon, Dietrich Wise. Probably get somebody in via the draft, maybe one or two players in the draft. You know, you hope that you can get guys like Keonta Davis to get up to speed. If you get Juwan Bentley and Christian Sam involved, maybe that gives you the flexibility to put guys like Van Nooyen, Hightower, Downmore, and The Edge.

And so they can probably use a combination of characters to get some pass rush. Maybe they don't individually have the ability that a Trey Flowers does, but on a rotational basis, you'll get some guys that can make some plays. On the offensive line, we're all sort of keeping the fingers crossed and hoping that Isaiah Wynn can fill in at the left tackle spot. They're going to have to have a plan B. Now, whether that's getting some more guys back, like an Ulrich John, bringing him back into the fold, seeing if a little Adrian Waddell could come back, he can give you a backup spot at the left tackle if Isaiah Wynn doesn't work out.

With the 12 picks that they have, maybe they address an offensive tackle at some point on day two. That's going to be interesting to watch as well because as confident as I am that Isaiah Wynn can step in and play left tackle in the NFL, you know, a failure to prepare is preparing to fail, kids. You know, and so you've got to have somebody behind him that can sort of step in and do

the job if Isaiah Wynn can't handle protecting Tom Brady. Another thing to consider, some guys that did not get tagged include Landon Collins. You know, the Giants decided not to use the tag on him, which is interesting. And another safety, Eric Waddell, Eric Waddell, excuse me, from the Baltimore Ravens. He was cut. And so there's a very interesting class

of free agent safeties right now. Because in addition to, you know, you've got Collins, you've got Waddell, you've got Tyron Mathau, Earl Thomas, John Ciprian, Reggie Nelson. You know, it's an interesting group of free agent safeties. And we know how Belichick likes to do business. Sometimes he likes to get in some veteran type guys. You know, Wendell's a bit older, the 34.

You wouldn't surprise me though, to see him sort of kick the tires on bringing him into the mold and so i think he's a name to keep an eye on jonathan cyprian he's just 29 again his last contract was in the six million range but maybe the pageants kicked the tires on him i've thought that safety would be a position they would address in what's been an interesting safety class it seems to be a bit more top heavy perhaps and so maybe if a lot of those guys are off the board, you're not going to find a guy that you're willing to sort of entrust, perhaps start it if Patrick Chung can't come back, or at least can't come back right away.

And so maybe they go the veteran safety route of what is shaping up to be a very interesting, perhaps deep class of free agent safeties. And so that's kind of some news to kick things off. Up next, we're going to talk a little combine, talk some winners and losers at both the tight end and the offensive, I mean, excuse me, at the quarterback position a little bit later. Something big happened on Tuesday

outside of the franchise tag stuff, and we'll get into that. That's all ahead on this Wednesday installment of Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now on this Wednesday installment of the Locked on Patriots podcast. And we're going to talk a little combine stuff, a little tight ends and quarterbacks right now.

Do some winners and losers because we love to do winners and losers. It's such an easy thing to do coming out of a combine, an event like this. I love talking quarterbacks. You all know that. We've been talking tight ends in the Locked on Patriots Slack channel. So let's get into it quickly here. Starting with the tight ends. And I think you're going to start with the two Iowa guys, Font and Hawkinson.

Both of those guys had fantastic weeks on an Indy. You know, no offense, he just was fantastic. You know, measures in at 6'4", 249, 33.5-inch arms, the 4.5 40-yard dash, 20 reps on the bench, 39.5-inch vertical, 127-inch broad jump, 6.813 cone on a 4.22 short shuttle. He was explosive, the top performer in the 40, the vertical, the broad, the three-cone, and the 60 at the tight end position. I mean, we were all sort of expecting that Hawkinson was going to be tight end one, maybe

Smith tight end two, and no offense, tight end three. He had the kind of performance that might see him vault everybody and go to the top of the tight end board just a huge week for him obviously we've talked about him more of a move type tight end a fantastic week hawkinson you know he had a nice balanced week to him you know 4.7 40 37 and a half inch-inch broad jump, 7.02 in the three cone, 4.18 in the short shuttle. So he was pretty good, you know, just a bit behind Noah Fantin in a lot of these things. He had some nice explosive measures, the 40, the vertical, and the broad. The agilities were solid.

And plus, you pair it with the film and the fact that he is an all-around balanced type tight end that can block, that can be a devastating blocker at the point of attack, that can give you stuff down the field in the receiving game. Fantastic, fantastic time for him. Two other guys that turned some heads, Khalil Warren from San Diego State, looked great. 6'5", 252, 4.6740 yard dash.

That's moving for a guy that size. 36.5 inch vertical, 122 on the broad, 4.25 on the short shuttle. He's got a nice blend of size and speed and explosiveness. He's generating a ton of buzz. People are going to go back and check the tape on him. I know some people on the Locked On Patriots Slack channel really like him. Nice week in Indy. He certainly helped himself.

Foster Monroe, he had the 4.6640, which people weren't seeing coming. 22 reps on the bench, people weren't seeing that coming. Nice blend of size, speed, and explosiveness. And what's interesting about him is on Instagram, I follow Test Football. Tony Rocopi, a quarterback coach over there, he's a good friend of mine. He's helped me on a lot of stuff. So I followed that account on Instagram, and they were showing some pictures of Foster Monroe

when he came to them with his shirt off, and then when he went to the combine and showed me the work that they did with him. And they turned him into an absolutely chiseled human being. So if you've got a young kid and you're in the New Jersey area, get him to the Test Football Academy. They're apparently doing great work over there. Some guys that struggled, two that we've had our eyes on.

Isaac Nata and Caden Smith. Nata comes in at a 4.91 40-yard dash, just 19 reps on the bench. And Caden Smith, 4.92 and 15 reps on the bench. Not exactly great. And then when you look at the vertical for Nata, just 28 inches. That's 7.45, 3-cone, 4.43 short shuttle, not great numbers. 32 inch vertical for Caden Smith, not the explosiveness, which you're going to see. Guys over at the Draft Network, they basically said Nato, and it's true, Nato was the worst performer of any tight end in the vertical and

the three cone. And he seems to be sliding more into that block and tight end mold and what was interesting when we studied not on film over in the lockdown patriotic slack channel what we thought about him when we thought was interesting about him was it was a five-star recruit that took on more of a block and type do your job role we thought that might endear him to belichick well maybe the reason that he had to do that was because he lost some of that receiving ability lost some of that explosiveness that might endear him to Belichick. Well, maybe the reason that he had to do that was because he lost some of that receiving ability, lost some of that explosiveness that might have given him that five-star recruiting role.

And so those two guys, coming out of Indy was some work to do. Let's talk quarterbacks. Obviously, the big thing was Kyler Murray weighing in at 207. You know, he doesn't throw, doesn't do any of the agilities, but he weighs in at 207.

He measures in at above 510. Now all the buzz is, look, he's going so arizona is going to trade josh rosen we're hearing right now from charlie casually they're actively shopping josh rosen which for all you people that are crushing me on twitter because of that piece i wrote over pat's pulpit look it seems like he's going to be available so no i will not put down the crack pipe. Okay? Love the website. Love me some Twitter. Getting told to put down the crack pipe the first thing in the morning. Always good stuff.

But they are apparently actively shopping him, at least if you believe Charlie Casterly and the other hundreds of people that are talking about Kyler Murray being in Arizona and Josh Rosen being out. Now, Casterly is also saying that Kyler Murray was a disaster, a disaster in sort of the meeting rooms with teams. Now, if the Arizona Cardinals are actively shopping Josh Rosen and Kyler Murray was a disaster in the meeting rooms, there's a bit

of a disconnect there. Because if he was such a disaster, then why are the Cardinals shopping Rosen? Something doesn't end up. I feel like Colombo. I want to ask one more question. But the reality of it is he may have been a disaster for 31 teams, but if he knocked the interview with Arizona out of the park, you can understand that they'd still be all in on him.

And so the Murray to Arizona thing seems to make sense. And so just because of the fact that we're talking about Kyler Murray at one overall leads me to believe that he comes out of Indianapolis a pretty big winner. I think Dwayne Haskins did fine. I think he showed you during the throwing drills why he might be quarterback one for a lot of people, myself included. He's your prototype pocket passer. He checks those boxes.

And so I think he did fine. His 40-yard dash does not matter. I think a guy that helped himself with the 40-yard dash might have been Easton Stick. You know, has a great 40, has a fantastic three-cone, would have been one of the best as a wide receiver. So I think he helped himself, and he threw the ball a bit better. You know, he needed a week like that after the combine. I think Drew Locke helped himself a little bit.

He continues to show you better mechanics as a passer with his feet under him, better throwing mechanics. He's stepping into throws rather than fading away from him. I think he's firmly in that sort of quarterback three mold, although a lot of people do have their question marks about him. I was talking about him with Matt Waldman recently, and he seems to be souring on him just a little bit, just a little bit, just a little bit.

Remember, you don't want to get your hands on the Matt Waldman rookie scouting portfolio. That eight by one so please please please check that out Tyree Jackson that man had a fantastic combine runs a blazing 40 for the quarterback position was explosive has an absolute cannon we saw that on film Steve Smith basically telling him look man calm down when you're throwing it in the gauntlet drill you're giving the receivers too tough of a time to catch the football so he had a fantastic combine i think this was an interesting thing that was raised to me bryce prosler over does work for inside the pylon lines wires working over at sis right now smart football mind you know he and i were talking last friday night about how

if we look at say each year and there's a quarterback that has that raw, toolsy ability to him, a guy that you want to develop, why isn't Tyree Jackson that guy? And we get into a discussion about biomechanics and how that front leg on Jackson keeps locking up on him. And maybe it's just an issue with taller quarterbacks. That is something to watch. But if you're into sort of that late day two, early day three range now and you want a developmental quarterback i say roll the

dice on tyree jackson a guy that maybe didn't have the best week near and dear to my heart brett rippin seemed to struggle on some of the deeper throws i'm going through these quarterbacks yet again and i'm doing some charted on them i'm trying to do some nerdy football stuff stay tuned to see if this actually pans out. But I do wonder if we have sort of a schematic limitation with Ripon. And so that's going to be something to watch. And so there's some quick thoughts on the combine from the quarterbacks and the tight ends up next.

Closing out with a little bit of a slice of something different. That's ahead on this Wednesday episode of Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now to close out this Wednesday installment. And what you just heard there was, shall we begin from the season seven soundtrack of Game of Thrones? And why are we talking about Game of Thrones? Well, unless you were nowhere near the internet on Tuesday, you probably saw the trailer for season eight, the final season of the HBO show based on the books by George R.R. Martin.

And you're probably wondering now, even if you're a huge Game of Thrones fan, why in the world are we talking about Game of Thrones on a Patriots podcast? Well, A, it's the off season. B, it's my show. And C, we have been discussing Game of thrones over in the locked on patriot slack channel because given this the off season you can only talk so much about hand size and arm length and wingspan and 40 yard dash times and franchise tags we've been started to get into game of thrones we've got an entire channel over on the locked on patriot slack channel dedicated to talking about

game of thrones and so when the trailer dropped, everybody dropped what they were doing. We all sort of went crazy. Everybody broke it down on the internet. The Rinner has a fantastic piece sort of breaking down from a shot by shot by shot basis of everything you saw in that trailer. If you haven't seen season seven, if you haven't watched yet,

I will keep it spoiler free for the most part, but it's going to be hard to do since we're talking about the final season of a show. So maybe if you haven't seen it and you're intending to watch it maybe i guess we'll see you tomorrow but for those of you that are willing to stay look what did we see we saw some fantastic stuff we saw aria's face bloody looking like she was in the crypts at winterfell we saw sansa seeing dragons for the first time we saw mel we saw masanda and gray worm doing masanda and gray worm stuff we saw the Unsullied seemingly at Winterfell ready for the Battle of Winterfell, which we're all sort of expecting to happen between the White Walkers and who knows, maybe a lot

of people because you saw Jorah, you saw the Onion Knight there. We've been hearing reports that it's going to be the biggest battle scene they've shot yet. And it's actually going to happen early in the season, which makes you wonder about how some people are going to survive that battle. We saw Dany and Jon together a lot. We saw Dany and Jon seemingly ready to ride dragons together, which for me, that's how I want this thing to end.

I have long hoped that the end of this show was Jon and Dany and Tyrion, each on a dragon, riding off into the sunset, everybody happy. But, you know, Valar Morghulis, we know that all men must die. We've already lost a dragon, so chances are one,

or if not all three of those people are going to die at the end of the show. And so we just kind of get ourselves ready for that. Also, what's interesting, I was given this tag. Somebody show me this. There are already odds on who is going to end up sitting on the Iron Throne at the end. And Bran Stark right now is the favorite at minus 150.

Jon Snow then plus 600. Sansa plus 800. Jon and Daenerys' child plus 1,000. The Night King plus 1,000' child, plus 1,000. The Night King, plus 1,000. Tyrion, plus 1,000. Daenerys, Targaryen, plus 1,200. Gendry, I like this, 1,500. I kind of like that, a plus 1,500.

All the way down to Euron Greyjoy, plus 10,000. And Bronn, plus 10,000. Brienne of Tarth, plus 10,000. So I like that. Varys, plus 10,000. And so, yes yes the trailer dropped everybody's already thinking Game of Thrones we're going to be covering

the final season of Game of Thrones sparingly from here to there as we get closer to the season and then look we're going to be talking about it once it happens because that gets April and May and June when we've got draft and not much else to break down and so yeah we're going to be talking some Game of Thrones here on the show.

If you want to talk about Game of Thrones with Pats fans, look, hit me up for an invite to the Locked on Patriots Slack channel, at Mark Schofield on Twitter is the best way to do that because we're talking about it all the time. People are talking about the show right now as I'm sitting here recording this. And so it's going to be fun. It's going to be exciting. It gives us something else to talk about.

Everybody seems to be excited about this show. I know there are people out there for Jameel Hill. She apparently just started watching the show and she tweeted out, I'm four episodes in, I don't get it. I understand that this isn't everybody's cup of tea, but look, the books are great. The shows have been great.

The episodes have been great. Seems to be a great season ahead of us. And so, yeah, it gives us something else to talk about because let's face it, I did a whole season series last summer. And so, yeah, it gives us something else to talk about because let's face it, I did a whole season, series last summer on the best football movies.

I've got to need some stuff to talk about, especially I'm doing five shows a week as we get into the off-season here. And so the chance to talk about dragons

and stuff, I'm excited about that. So that will do it for today. I'll be back tomorrow with a Take Thursday show. And then Friday, I'm going to do sort of a recap

of the week, everything we learned about the off-season and things like that on Friday. Until next time, keep it locked to do sort of a recap of the week, everything we learned about the offseason and things like that on Friday. Until next time, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on P. Thank you.