Sunday Patriots Notes: Making sense of New England’s free agency strategy

Notes and thoughts on the Patriots and the rest of the NFL on March 17.

NFL free agency week has arrived, and the New England Patriots were quite busy. Since the opening of the legal tampering window, the organization has added six outside free agents and re-signed 10 others, while also releasing a pair of players.

Naturally, our attention was on those moves. There is more to free agency week, however, so let’s clean out the notebook. Welcome to our weekly Sunday Patriots Notes.

1. Making sense of New England’s free agency strategy: With free agency starting to wind down, the Patriots’ approach has raised some questions from those watching from the outside. While the team did manage to keep a significant part of its internal free agency class — including prominent names like Kyle Dugger, Michael Onwenu, Hunter Henry, Kendrick Bourne, Anfernee Jennings and Josh Uche — the outside additions lack star power.

In total, six players were added to the mix this week. The contracts they signed, however, are reflective of their projected statuses as role players.

The combined contract value for running back Antonio Gibson, quarterback Jacoby Brissett, linebacker Sione Takitaki, tight end Austin Hooper, defensive lineman Armon Watts, and offensive lineman Nick Leverett comes in at less than $33 million. Out of that group, only Gibson and Takitaki signed deals that go beyond the 2024 season.

In total, the Patriots’ current external free agents will count under $21 million versus the team’s salary cap in 2024. For comparison, the club currently still has around $51.7 million to work with.

All of those signings could end up playing valuable roles for New England. The absence of any splash signings given the vast resources available has been met with a certain level of criticism from fans and media members alike.

“What is the plan?”

That question is impossible to fully answer from outside the organization. Based on the information we do have available, however, this sentiment from earlier in the week still rings true: the Patriots are doing exactly what they set out to do in free agency, and what they themselves said in previous media appearances.

“I think it’s really important in today’s football to be able to play young players and develop from within,” director of scouting Eliot Wolf said at the Scouting Combine in Indianapolis.

That, in a nutshell, appears to be at the heart of New England’s offseason strategy in Year 1 of a wide-scale rebuild. Focus on keeping the existing talent level intact as well as possible. Don’t blindly throw money at players not valued appropriately. Make the most out of the draft, and give those players chances to shape the future of the franchise.

That approach is a sensible one, even though it runs counter to a prior statement from new head coach Jerod Mayo about being “ready to burn some cash.” Mayo himself acknowledged as much in a follow-up interview, when he said that “this is going to be a process.”

The Patriots in the first year after long-time head of football operations Bill Belichick, who served as both head coach and de facto general manager, appear to be committed to a methodical rebuild. Identifying and securing the team’s core for the next few years was one of the first steps in that process; making sure to invest the No. 3 pick in the draft wisely — presumably on what will hopefully be a long-term quarterback — is among the next.

Along the way, New England will continue using its financial resources in a responsible manner. Per NFL rules, the club can move all of its unused cap space into 2025, when several key players such as Christian Barmore, Kyle Dugger, Davon Godchaux, Jonathan Jones, Matthew Judon, Jabrill Peppers, Rhamondre Stevenson, Jahlani Tavai and Deatrich Wise Jr. will be out of contract.

Chances are some of the current cap space will be invested into that group as well. And once that core is taken care of, and the future QB under wraps, that’s when a more serious push to add outside talent might begin.

2. Three years later, the 2021 quarterback class is looking rough: The Patriots officially pulled the plug on the Mac Jones era last Sunday, trading their former first-round draft pick to the Jacksonville Jaguars for a sixth-round selection in this year’s draft. Jones had shown promise as a rookie, but over the subsequent two years it became clear that a reset was needed for both sides.

Despite the disappointing outcome, there is an argument to be made that Jones was nonetheless the second best quarterback pick in the 2021 draft. Even when discounting the rest of the class beyond the first round, the group as a whole looks rather “meh” three years into its professional careers:

1-1 Trevor Lawrence (Jacksonville Jaguars): Lawrence bounced back nicely after a disappointing rookie campaign, and has developed into a solid starter for the Jaguars. He has yet to live up to the pre-draft hype, however.

1-2 Zach Wilson (New York Jets): Wilson had intriguing tools, but the Jets decided to replace him as a starter after just two years. He ended up starting most of 2023 as well in lieu of an injured Aaron Rodgers, but continued to struggle. He appears to be on his way out of New York.

1-3 Trey Lance (San Francisco 49ers): Lance was the first quarterback of this group to get traded, moving from San Francisco to Dallas last August. Considering what the 49ers paid to move up to get him — three first-round picks plus a third-rounder — they missed badly: Lance started four games for them in two seasons before getting moved for a fourth-round selection.

1-8 Justin Fields (Chicago Bears): The latest QB trade, Fields is now the backup quarterback in Pittsburgh after being sent there on Saturday. Chicago got a sixth-round pick out of the trade that will turn into a fourth-rounder if he plays more than 51 percent of offensive snaps in 2024, but the return on investment still does not add up. He had shown promise at times in Chicago, but his good moments were too few and far between.

1-15 Mac Jones (New England Patriots): After the 2021 season, Jones looked like a potential future franchise quarterback. Two seasons later, and he was sent to Jacksonville to back up Trevor Lawrence for a sixth-round pick. A combination of personnel issues both on and off the field, plus his own shortcomings and inability to develop, doomed him.

There is no way to sugarcoat it: of the five quarterbacks selected in the first round in 2021, four flamed out with their initial teams, with three of them already traded and four potentially following sooner than later.

3. Revisiting the 2023 trade activity: Speaking of trading players, the Patriots also were quite active on the market last offseason. With the 2024 trade window now open and one full season to look back on, we can now properly evaluate those moves to find out how they turned out for all the teams and players involved:

March 16: TE Jonnu Smith to Atlanta for 2023 seventh-round pick: The high-prized but disappointing tight end was shipped to the Falcons to reunite with former offensive coordinator Arthur Smith. The pairing worked well, and Smith ended up catching 50 passes for 582 yards and three touchdowns — gaining more yards and finding the end zone more often in one season in Atlanta than he has in two in New England. In return, the Patriots acquired the draft pick invested in cornerback Isaiah Bolden, who had shown promise before a concussion ended his rookie campaign in preseason.

August 27: RB Pierre Strong Jr. to Cleveland for OT Tyrone Wheatley Jr.: While Wheatley Jr. saw no offensive snaps in 2023, Strong Jr. served as a part-time option at running back for the Browns. He touched the ball 68 times in his 17 in-game appearances, gaining 338 yards, scoring once, and losing one fumble. He also returned eight kickoffs for an average of 25.0 yards per runback.

August 27: 2024 sixth-round pick for Minnesota OT Vederian Lowe: The Patriots sent a sixth-round pick to the Vikings that was later part of the club’s trade up to acquire a second first-round selection this year. As for Lowe, he did start eight games for New England’s injury-ravaged O-line but struggled.

August 29: K Nick Folk to Tennessee for 2025 seventh-round pick: The Patriots opted to go with the younger Chad Ryland rather than incumbent Nick Folk, sending him to the Titans via a pre-cutdown trade. Folk went on to make 95 percent of his combined field goal and extra point tries. Ryland, meanwhile, had an 80 percent success rate.

October 5: 2025 sixth-round pick for Los Angeles CB J.C. Jackson and 2025 seventh-round pick: Jackson’s second stint in New England after arriving via in-season trade was largely a disappointment. He was eventually cut earlier this month, but there appears to be interest in the two sides possibly re-joining forces further down the line.

The full scope of those moves cannot be properly assessed until the draft capital involved is spent. One season in, however, it appears that the only significant effects felt where by the Patriots’ trade partners: both Jonnu Smith and Nick Folk had a positive impact on their respective teams when looking strictly at 2023 (Smith, after all, has since been released by the Falcons).

New England, meanwhile, will hope that the players and draft picks it acquired will eventually also turn into valuable assets.

4. Josh Uche ends a dubious streak: Part of the reason why the Patriots now find themselves in a major rebuild is the fact that their draft success over the last few years was underwhelming. Case in point: when edge linebacker Josh Uche signed a one-year contract extension earlier this week, he became the first player selected within the first three rounds of the draft to stay in New England beyond his rookie deal since Duron Harmon in 2017.

Not counting players that left and later returned or those that were franchise- and transition-tagged, Uche became just the ninth total player since Harmon’s draft class in 2013 to sign a second contract with the Patriots. One day later, fellow edge Anfernee Jennings increased that number to 10.

5. Patriots will get cap credit for DeVante Parker’s Eagles deal: The Patriots were focused primarily on internal players this week, including parting ways with a member of their wide receiver group. DeVante Parker, who is coming off a mostly disappointing two-year stint with the club, is reportedly being released.

It did not take Parker long to find a new team, however, with the Philadelphia Eagles expected to pick him up on a one-year contract. The Patriots will keep a close eye on the deal he will eventually get.

According to a report by salary cap expert Miguel Benzan, the original two-year deal Parker had signed with the Patriots includes a guaranteed salary offset provision clause. This means that the team will receive credit on its 2025 salary cap depending on how much money he will receive from the Eagles in 2024.

The minimum salary for a player of Parker’s experience is $1.21million.

6. Kendrick Bourne optimistic heading into a new era of Patriots football: Even before the start of free agency, wide receiver Kendrick Bourne decided to return to New England on a new three-year, $19.5 million contract. Besides the financial aspect, Bourne also cherished the opportunity to be part of a new era of Patriots football under new head coach Jerod Mayo.

“I think it’s going to be more open with Jarrod, and I’m excited,” Bourne said on a new episode of the Pats Interference podcast. “It’s just crazy timing for me to be on Bill [Belichick]’s last team and now to be coming back, and to just be a part of the new culture or whatever may happen. We don’t know, I don’t know, no one knows, we have to see obviously. But it’s exciting to be a part.

“And hat was one of the biggest triggers for me to come back was because I believe that it’s going to be very fruitful being a Patriot in this new era. Love Bill to death as we all know, I definitely do. But it was time and I want to be a part of Jerod’s legacy and to see what’s to flourish.”

7. The Vikings may not be the only potential trade-down candidate for the Patriots: When Minnesota acquired a second first-round selection in this year’s draft, it set the stage for the team to make an even bigger move in hopes of picking one of the top quarterbacks available. New England could be a potential trade partner, but form a Patriots perspective another move down the board proposed by Pats Pulpit alumnus Keagan Stiefel might also make sense: move from No. 3 to No. 5 in a trade with the Los Angeles Chargers.

In this scenario, the Chargers would leap-frog the Arizona Cardinals for wide receiver Marvin Harrison Jr., with New England still in a position to pick a quarterback while also adding extra capital. Obviously, there are several factors involved in any draft trade, but this goes to show there are multiple scenarios possible for the Patriots given their current position.

8. Malcolm Butler receives a warm post-retirement welcome in Boston: After last having appeared in a game in a non-preseason NFL game in January 2021, Patriots cornerback Malcolm Butler recently announced his retirement from pro football. Shortly afterwards, the 34-year-old found himself at Boston’s TD Garden watching a game between the Celtics and the Phoenix Suns.

And when he was shown on the jumbotron, the fans in attendance made it clear that his status as a franchise legend is solidified.

An undrafted free agent out of West Alabama in 2014, Butler appeared in a combined 112 regular season and playoff games over the course of his career. He wore a Patriots uniform 70 times, including for two of the team’s Super Bowl wins.

Of course, his game-changing goal line interception in Super Bowl XLIX will forever remain as one of the biggest plays in Patriots and NFL history.

9. Robert Kraft can’t have his cake and eat it: The final two episodes of the polarizing Apple TV+ docuseries The Dynasty were made available on Friday, focusing on the latter part of the Patriots’ unprecedented run. Included in the series was a part about the trade that sent former second-round quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo to the San Francisco 49ers.

Team owner Robert Kraft spoke about the move and whether he ordered head coach/general manger Bill Belichick to make it as basically a vote of confidence in incumbent Tom Brady.

“I never asked him to do it,” Kraft said. “I just told Bill that we weren’t trading Brady ever. So, that made it a little awkward.”

Kraft’s statement was recorded in 2023. It stands in stark contrast to what he would later tell reporters during the introductory press conference of Belichick’s successor, Jerod Mayo, in January.

“We try to hire the best people we can find and let them do their job and hold them accountable,” Kraft said at that time. “If you get involved and tell them what to do or try to influence them, you can’t hold them responsible and have them accountable. It’ll be within the people’s discretion who are the decision makers to do it […]”

One of the main criticisms of The Dynasty is Kraft’s apparent attempt to paint himself in the best possible light relative to his long-time head coach, Belichick. Given contradictory statements such as these, one has to wonder whether it really has the desired effect — or if it rather makes the 82-year-old look like somebody who is not quite truthful about his actual involvement and role in creating that eponymous dynasty.

10. Setting up the week ahead: With free agency starting to wind down, teams will quickly start turning their full attention toward the draft. And while the next marquee offseason event is still more than a month away, the preparation is going full-swing already. This week, for example, 33 schools are scheduled to hold their pro days:

Monday, March 18: Colorado State, Fresno State, Georgia State, Iowa, Miami, Syracuse, Texas A&M, Troy

Tuesday, March 19: Toledo, Wyoming

Wednesday, March 20: Alabama, Connecticut, Liberty, Ohio State, Texas, USC

Thursday, March 21: California, Eastern Kentucky, Florida, Holy Cross, Houston Christian, New Hampshire, Notre Dame, Rice, Stanford, Utah, Virginia State

Friday, March 22: Auburn, Boston College, Florida State, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri