As it stands, the Patriots will end up finishing in the Top 5 of the draft, most likely in the Top 3. With how highly QBs have been drafted, we can assume that one of Harrison/Fashanu/Alt would be available at Pick 5, all but guaranteeing us the opportunity to draft one of the best non-QB prospects in the draft. With both WR and OT being obvious needs for us, any of these three would be a good pick and fill a hole on the roster immediately.
Now why would I make the case for not drafting a QB? After all, QB seems to be an obvious need as well and it is the most important position in football. It’s quite simple: Opportunity cost. With the state of the offense, a rookie QB is not going to solve all the problems immediately. He’d be still throwing to what can be argued is the leagues worst WR corps as well as standing behind what is at best an average Offensive Line. This is not a good situation for a rookie QB to get thrown into. Even upgrades in Free Agency won’t compensate for that and forcing veterans to learn the playbook at the same time as the rookie QB will rob that rookie QB of an important support pillar as he can no longer lean on veterans to help him out, at least not in the same fashion as if they were already around for a while. This leads me to believe that a rookie QB might be able to improve our offense somewhat, it’s likely to be just enough for us to not be able to get him a decent supporting cast in the draft after that, definitely not someone of the caliber of Harrison or Fashanu.
Now why do I propose to stick with Mac for another year and draft some support for him?
Regardless of how he plays, we win: If he’s as terrible as you guys here keep saying and he’ll sink the offense, then we’re going to be at roughly the same spot as we’ll be this year, allowing us to either be in position or able to move up to grab a top QB prospect. Only this time, the rookie will actually be set up to succeed. However, if Mac actually plays good then we likely don’t need a new QB and can instead focus on improving the team by drafting let’s say another good WR or another talented OL.
In addition to that, Mac is not only cheap next year as he still is on his rookie deal, with his play over the last two seasons he is not in a position to demand an expensive contract, allowing us to sign a lot of good players in Free Agency if we so desire.
A point that should also be mentioned is that the Defense is likely to need a partial overhaul in the 2025 Draft. It’s probably going to be fine next year, but it’ll need upgrades and replacements the year after that. This would coincide with the Draft in which we would have to pick the majority of the supporting cast for whatever rookie QB we’d pick this year, stretching our picks extremely thin and making it likely that we’ll have to either half-ass both or be forced to focus on one of the two needs.
Maybe we can have a mature discussion.
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So I agree that maybe a QB at 3 is not the move but a QB had to be taken in the 2nd or late first if you don’t get Maye or Williams.
a rookie QB is not going to solve all the problems immediately.
I am going to be so sick of this strawman by draft day.
You pose an interesting question; not sure why you had include the nonsense about Mac magically becoming good.
What happens if the Patriots end up with the 3rd overall pick AND both Maye and Williams are gone?
Seems as Harrison Jr is the real deal, but WR is the last piece in my rebuild, so I would turn right to draft him into more selections.
I probably look to trade down to the 7-10 range and make five picks in the top 50.
Probably hope for Alt in the first and JJ McCarthy in the second.
For all the talk about how good our Defense has been the last three weeks, I’d point out that we’ve face three terrible teams. The point being we need help on both sides of the ball.
I wanted to cover my bases. None of us can predict the future, I mean who thought that we’d have a Mr. Irrelevant be the starter for one of the top teams in the league?
lol. I love Mac, I really hope he has a long career one way or the other. Week 3 I was 100% in on giving him another year. It is over for him in NE now. He needs 2-3 years as a backup to recover the confidence loss. Everyone knew Darnold was done when he started seeing ghosts. This is no different. He’s lost the locker room, the coaching staff clearly only plays him because their other options are worse, and the fans have turned on him. He needs a fresh start out of the spotlight and expectations. Maybe some day he can be Geno Smith, but he will have to go the Geno route to get there.
I would love seeing them build up that line and begin to create a dynamic receiving core. If that means MHJ and linemen for the 1st few rounds then I’m all for it. Someone like MHJ will open up the field regardless of who the qb is. That will help the run game by default and I could easily see this team settling in to a run first, solid defense team. Not ideal overall but I’d rather they take that path and maybe try for a veteran qb than take another high variance qb and go through three years of madness
Please. Just stop talking. I don’t know how many more posts suggesting we waste ONE MORE YEAR I can take.
I’m fine not drafting one since this rebuild is realistically going to take 2-3 years, however you better be damn sure you have trust in your scouts and they tell you that Maye/Williams have flaws and wont be franchise cornerstone type players. If we trade back and one of the ones we passed on becomes the next Josh Allen or Pat Mahomes it would be unforgiveable.
If it was me I’d take whichever QB was available for us. If we were picking 3 and Maye/Williams are both gone i’d either draft MHjr or try and trade back.
I think at some point OBrien, Bill and the Krafts will have to sit down this offseason and talk about what to do with Mac. He’s cheap next year. I think it makes perfect sense, regardless of what you do in the draft/FA to have him here in camp competing.
Mac is mentally broken but there is a good QB in there somewhere. We saw it against the Bills this year. We saw it a few times last season. These last two games have been absolute rock bottom for the kid. His confidence is gone, his mechanics are toast and he’s playing like a guy who knows he’ll be benched for making a mistake.
Do the Pats think they can work with him over the summer and get him back into proper form? After his rookie year I confidently thought if you got Mac some real weapons at WR and continued to develop him he could be a top-10 guy. It would be a hell of a reclamation project, and may involve McDaniels coming back as a QB coach or something, but if they feel like it can be done then doing what you said makes sense - draft MHJ/Fashanu, sign Higgins/Pittman, draft OT in the second, RB in the 3rd etc. Go all in on the offense and give Mac a functional high powered offense around him.
All that said, I think the kid is cooked. He may be able to go elsewhere and with a fresh slate turn his career around. But these last two weeks have been indefensible (as it’s been most of the year). If we are sitting there staring at Maye, you have to make that pick.