PatsPropaganda

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Me personally I love the Easley pick but how do yhu see the dline rotation playing out. Easley, Bequette, Buchanan, Siligia, Chris Jones, Vellano, Armstead,Wilfork, Kelly, Will Smith, Chandler Jones , & Ninkovich. Who makes the team. Which unit could be most dangerous. Best pass rushing unit & best run stopping unit.

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Getting a lot of questions like this today for obvious reasons. I think the important thing is that injuries and competition have to play out. Especially in a situation like this, where there is some uncertainty due to injury.

But it’s fun to pretend, so let’s assume everybody’s healthy and there are no major surprises.

4-3 (standard run defense): Ninkovich-Wilfork-Kelly-Chandler

4-3 (double nose): Ninkovich-Siliga-Wilfork-Chandler

3-4: Kelly-Wilfork-Chandler Ninkovich-Hightower-Mayo-Collins

Nickel (run protection): Ninkovich-Wilfork-Easley-Chandler

Nickel (pass rush): Ninkovich-Chris Jones/Armstead-Easley-Chandler

or

Ninkovich-Chandler-Easley-Buchanan/Wil Smith

Dime (3-2-6): Buchanan-Wilfork-Easley Collins/Mayo at LB

As you can see there are plenty of options and a number of guys can be mixed and matched. I think Easley and probably Chris Jones are locks at DT, but after them Armstead/Kelly/Vellano will have to duke it out. Kelly could sneak on by getting PUP’d. I’d guess the Pats will be creative and calculating when it comes to the PUP list.

The good news is that there is depth and a number of options, however the lack of depth on the edges could be a problem. Ninkovich and Chandler are keys to almost every package.

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Last year [Marquice] Cole sort of did that, played some safety, played some nickel corner, played a little bit on the perimeter. Logan did that [too]. We’ll have to see how it all comes together, but I would imagine in the spring that we probably give [him] some exposure [at safety again],” Belichick said. “I think there’s definitely a place for that too with the different personnel groups and the different types of receivers that we see. Every time it’s three receivers, it isn’t quite three receivers; it depends on who those three guys are and how you want to match up on them and so forth. So some flexibility for us defensively is probably a good thing over a long haul.

New England Patriots Blog – ESPN Boston

This makes sense. What didn’t make sense was putting Logan Ryan out as a safety with McCourty as the starting safety tandem.

https://www.patspropaganda.com/last-year-marquice-cole-sort-of-did-that/