Mike Reiss' Quick Hits today
The first round of the 2024 NFL draft kicks off on Thursday. What are the Patriots planning to do at No. 3 overall?
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3. 'X' receiver: Wolf shared insight Thursday on what type of receiver he believes the team doesn't yet have when he said, "Do we have players that on a 3x1 [alignment] can beat the backside coverage every single time? I'm not sure we have that just yet."
5. They said it: "Definitely a lot of things to like -- the technique and the fact he's won a lot of football games -- but if I'm drafting someone in the top five, I want to know I can trust him to win games with his right arm. We never saw the pressure on him to make throw after throw after throw, week after week, to carry his football team. You will have to do that in the National Football League. So that is a huge question for me ... I don't think I'd take him in the top five." -- Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner, on Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy, during a Friday appearance on ESPN's "Get Up"
6. Belichick's insight: Bill Belichick's appearance as
a guest analyst on "The Pat McAfee Show Draft Spectacular" -- airing the opening night of the draft on YouTube and ESPN+ -- figures to be compelling. Belichick's 32-minute appearance on
McAfee's show Wednesday included insightful discussion for those invested in the quality of the NFL's on-field product, specifically with how Belichick envisions the NFL's
new kickoff rules impacting play and roster building.
"It looks like it is going to include another 1,500 plays in the game, leaguewide, that we didn't have in the last couple years, so I think there's more opportunity for players to play on special teams than there had been when 90% of the kickoffs are going out of the end zone," Belichick said. "I think that might affect the bottom part of the roster.
"And because there is really no running involved -- the kicking team is already down there, the return team is already set up -- there will be more of an emphasis on size players than speed ... I do think that because everybody is spread across the field, if these returners hit a little bit of space, they're gone because it's going to be a lot harder to overlap than it was in the past."
7. Eyes on TEs: The Patriots quietly brought free agent tight ends
Brycen Hopkins (Rams),
Sean McKeon (Cowboys) and
Mitchell Wilcox (Bengals) in for workouts late last week, which could reflect the desire to add another layer to the depth chart of Henry,
Austin Hooper and
La'Michael Pettway.
The team enters the second phase of its voluntary offseason program this week -- expanding from exclusively strength and conditioning work to on-field individual football drills, among other things -- so the timing might make sense to make a move now.
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