{"id":193056,"date":"2025-07-09T08:17:14","date_gmt":"2025-07-09T08:17:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/193056\/"},"modified":"2025-07-09T08:17:14","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T08:17:14","slug":"patriots-playmakers-ranked-among-nfls-worst-by-espn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/193056\/","title":{"rendered":"Patriots Playmakers Ranked Among NFL’s Worst By ESPN"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New England Patriots finished the 2024 season ranked 30th in scoring (17.0 points per game) and despite a new head coach, offensive coordinator and No. 1 wide receiver, ESPN.com senior NFL writer Bill Barnwell is expecting much of the same in 2025.<\/p>\n

Barnwell released his ranking<\/a> for each team\u2019s group of running backs, tight ends and wide receivers, and placed New England\u2019s set of playmakers 30th in the NFL heading into the campaign.<\/p>\n

Barnwell had the Patriots\u2019 unit ranked 31st at this time last year and 26th in 2023. The only two teams ranked worse than New England as training camp approaches are the Tennessee Titans and Carolina Panthers.<\/p>\n

Under new head coach Mike Vrabel and offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, the Patriots projected depth chart<\/a> includes starting running back Rhamondre Stevenson, tight end Hunter Henry and Stefon Diggs, DeMario Douglas and Kyle Williams making up the starting group of wideouts in three-wide sets.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you believe in\u00a0Stefon Diggs? ESPN\u2019s\u00a0receiver score\u00a0does, with the tracking metric placing the then-Texans wideout third among all wideouts before he\u00a0tore his ACL\u00a0in midseason. At 31, it seems risky to project Diggs to immediately\u00a0return to that form, let alone his peak years with\u00a0Josh Allen\u00a0in Buffalo, but even a limited version of him would comfortably be the\u00a0best wideout\u00a0on the\u00a0New England roster,\u201d Barnwell wrote.<\/p>\n

Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n

Diggs was New England\u2019s marquee offseason addition, signing a three-year, $69 million contract with a guaranteed $26 million. The 31-year-old made four straight Pro Bowls from 2020-23 with the Buffalo Bills, but was limited to eight games in his lone season with the Houston Texans before tearing his right ACL in October.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThere isn\u2019t really a Plan B as the lead receiver without Diggs in the mix.\u00a0Mack Hollins\u00a0and\u00a0Pop Douglas\u00a0are complementary players. Rookie third-rounder\u00a0Kyle Williams\u00a0will offer some much-needed speed, but he\u2019s not entering the league as a\u00a0complete receiver\u00a0who can win at all levels,\u201d Barnwell wrote. \u201c\u2026 Running back\u00a0Rhamondre Stevenson\u00a0has struggled with efficiency in a lead role over the past two seasons. You can understand that amid dismal offensive line play, but he also fumbled a whopping seven times on 240 touches last season, a figure the Patriots can\u2019t afford to live with again.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Patriots open up training camp<\/a> for rookies on July 19, with veterans reporting on July 22.<\/p>\n

Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The New England Patriots finished the 2024 season ranked 30th in scoring (17.0 points per game) and despite…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193057,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2050],"tags":[7354,7,290,1056,1167,249,2326,2094,6,208,4120,531],"class_list":{"0":"post-193056","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-england-patriots","8":"tag-demario-douglas","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-hunter-henry","11":"tag-kyle-williams","12":"tag-new-england","13":"tag-new-england-patriots","14":"tag-newengland","15":"tag-newenglandpatriots","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-patriots","18":"tag-rhamondre-stevenson","19":"tag-stefon-diggs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114822293061853960","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193056"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193056\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}