Defense Dominates in Day 2 of Pads at New England Patriots Training Camp

Defense Dominates in Day 2 of Pads at New England Patriots Training Camp

The Patriots are back in pads and it was another scorcher. We’ll break it all down for you. Let’s go. Welcome everybody to the Patriots training campcast. We just got off the field from the Patriots sixth training camp practice and guys, Harold Landry said afterwards he felt like the defense had a good day and I think I would agree with him. How about you, Paul? I would totally agree. thought it was a step forward and I think when you take into consideration that your starting quarterbacks Christian Gonzalez and Carlton Davis aren’t a part of a day where it was almost predominantly passing game in the red zone and I thought the defense got the better of things considering that you’re missing your best player on defense. I I think it was absolutely a step forward for the defense. It’s one of those practices where again if you bottle up like three or four Drake Maze throws and put it on a highlight reel, you’re going to say, “Wow, Drake May looked great at practice.” But overall, I agree with the two of you that there wasn’t a whole lot of passes completed outside of those really nice throws. Coupled to Stfan Diggs, one of Kyle Williams in the bucket. That was a beauty. But overall, a tight red zone, so you’re not going to complete a ton of passes down there most of the time, but I’d agree with you too that the defense controlled the day. Yeah, the difficulty ramped up. Of course, yesterday we’re first and second down in the red zone. Today, they added in third down. A lot of work down there. I mean, a lot of reps for those guys. To me though, Paul, it wasn’t necessarily the pass rush or the pressure. I mean, there certainly were moments where where the pass rush got in on Drake May, but I think he was just a little off today. One of those practices where it felt like even in seven on sevens early on, he was missing some guys and just not a great day from Drake May. He’s been great, I would say, through the start of camp, but was today was a day where it felt like maybe it wasn’t his best. I would totally agree with you. I thought especially in the seven on sevens, I thought he was erratic. I thought he missed some guys. I think he had Hunter Henry in team um you know, heading toward the corner back line uh the end zone. and I think he just overthrew it. Um, and and like Evan said, there are also some plays where he, you know, he I thought he like layered a beautiful throw near the other sideline to booty. Couldn’t have been any more perfect. So, it wasn’t like it was all bad offensively. And because of those personnel uh, you know, absences that we talked about, you had a chance to see some different numbers and names today. DJ James was one of them. You know, I don’t know exactly where he fits into the equation, but we talked a lot about Alex Austin and, you know, Isaiah Balden. Marcelus Dial, I thought, took a step forward yesterday. DJ James was very competitive in coverage today. He’s an undrafted rookie I don’t really know a whole lot about. I think he’s an undrafted rookie. Um, we’ll going to keep my eye on him forward. Yeah, not a lot of wide openen passing windows. I mean, everything was contested as you would expect it to be in the red zone, but even still, again, Harold Landry felt pretty good about how the defense played. Yeah, I would like to see more DJ James as a name that has crept up in one-on- ones and things like that with some pass breakups, but today some couple more in team drills and 11 on 11s against uh, you know, frontline receivers for the Patriots. But on the positive note for the offense outside of some of the highlight throws for Drake May, I just think we have to mention uh the rookie offensive linemen are just really starting to stack some terrific days together. I thought Campbell again was solid today, but Jared Wilson really uh was tremendous, especially in one-on- ones. Shut down Milton Williams and Christian Barmore to go three and 0 in his three reps in one-on- ones. Uh and I just am coming to the conclusion with Wilson. Uh he’s one of your best five in terms of blocking. Now, at center, there’s been some issues with the snaps with both Wilson and Garrett Bradberry, and that battery of quarterback center is a big uh mental load on a rookie. But in general, I just can’t come away from these practices with any other conclusion of Jared Wilson’s one of your best blockers on the offensive line already. Uh so finding a spot for him, whether it’s at Levart or center, I think is a must at this point. So I would just uh I want to correct myself. DJ James, first year player out of Auburn, u not a rookie, not an undrafted rookie. Um I would agree um with the overall assessment and in some of these situations, you know, specifically at center might be working themselves. Jere Bradberry got nicked up a little bit late in this practice. I think he got stepped on. He came out, did not do the conditioning run, so we’ll see if that cost him any practice time moving forward. Um, but the exchange is something to watch. I thought it was Bradberry today. Um, but that has been an issue. Virtually every practice has been at least one snap that ends up on the ground. You got to clean that up. And it’s from under center, too, which is obviously harder for a lot of younger centers, I should mention. like Jared Wilson. Georgia goes under center a little bit more than your traditional college program these days, but still I probably could count maybe 20 times that I saw Jared Wilson snap the ball from under center last year at Georgia. So, uh, most college teams are gun teams predominantly. So, that’s a little bit of an adjustment to a pro style offense to be as under center as the Patriots are going to be. So, it’s something to watch for. might be easier for him to play guard as a rookie because center is a little bit more taxing. But again, he I just thought he looked terrific today. Yeah. So, a couple housekeeping things. Uh Austin Hooper returned. He had started the year on PUP. Good to see him out there. Got some reps, too. Yeah. And full team. Uh and but the headline of course is Carlton Davis has been out. We’ve only really seen him in a walkth through this first week. Now, Christian Gonzalez was out as well, I think. Report Jordan Schultz reporting that hamstring issue a couple weeks. It’s about what we thought. Uh but still it gives an opportunity. You guys talked about some of the younger guys. Now we’ll see tomorrow. We kind of I think we’re going to stick around. Similar kind of practice plan. Is the offense able to punch back a little bit? And I think that’s what we’re setting up for this training camp. It’s been back and forth. I think a lot of these last two practices especially feels like the offense made some plays. Feels like the defense made some plays. Today felt like the defense made the majority of the plays. Now it sets up tomorrow. Can the offense bounce back? Absolutely. I think that even some of the plays the offense did make today were pretty well defended and they had a high level of difficulty to them. Time for the offense to respond. Yeah. What else you looking for, Evan, as we get ready here for another practice? I would just mention, you know, Milton Williams and and Christian Barmore have been main stays there in the middle, but today I thought that sometimes they got handled a little bit and I I just wonder, especially with Milton Williams and Morgan Moses as well on just flipping it over to the offense and defense. Two free agent signings that I’m interested to watch a little bit more and see if maybe they just kind of get a rhythm at some point going in training camp. Morgan Moses, I believe, might have left practice about halfway through, we should early today. So, like I I’m feeling great about the rookie offensive lineman. You know, Bradberry and Moses, the two veterans that they brought in to upgrade this offensive line, maybe moving a little bit in the other direction. So, I’d like to see those two guys bounce back. All right. Well, there’ll be another practice tomorrow in pads. We’ll look forward to that. See if the offense is able to bounce back as we get going here. Wrapping up the main part of the training camp. We’ll get into preseason and joint practices next week. Stick with us throughout camp though. We’ll have these training camp casts after every practice.

Patriots.com writers Mike Dussault, Paul Perillo and Evan Lazar break down the Patriots sixth day of training camp highlighting the defense’s strong performance in the second day of pads, rookie center Jared Wilson shining in drills, the return of Austin Hooper and more.

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