The rare exploding knee. Yet to see one in the wild.
Hope you’re wrong! I’d note that Breer didn’t even really report the thing on JuJu’s knee he just said it in a hyperbolic way during a segment on the Pats receivers.
Hope I am too!
I'm getting back into academics/teaching soon, and this is the type of content I need.
Maybe the writer who said JuJu’s knee could explode at any moment, actually meant that there’s literally a ticking time bomb in there, and if he runs any faster than a 4.7, it will blow up.
I thought Montgomery had a lot more burst than JuJu.
If Myers were with the Pats, he would have tossed a game losing lateral before getting concussed. And Kendrik Bourne scored 2 TD yesterday.
Bourne actually took Meyers position. Juju looks fine. It’s been one game.
Meyers is in the concussion protocol again. I absolutely loved him but that lateral business...
Here's Meyers' career scoring:
Until he fumbles at the goal line and his career immediately plummets into an unrecoverable disaster, he can only WISH he was the new N'Keal.
I recall Amendola being in the same boat when he was signed, quickly injured and replaced by Edelman. That worked okay.
I think he was signed to fill a role that is very prominent in BOB's offense, yes. If they had expectations of him being a traditional WR1 or not it's hard to tell, but I think they brought him in under the assumption that he'd be a high volume receiver and an integral part of what they wanted to do on offense. The money he got isn't trivial for what the Pats usually spend at receiver and he for all intents and purposes in both role and contract replaced a guy that was their number one option in the passing game for the past three seasons.
I’m not sure. JuJu was signed to replace Meyers. If they had instead re-signed Meyers, and Douglas and Boutte had done what they’ve done, would Meyers be seeing the limitations JuJu saw Sunday?
Clearly worth wondering. They paid JuJu to be a 90 percent of snaps plus guy and aren't getting that.
It's what we heard all throughout camp too. "He's out there a lot, he's catching a lot of short passes, but he doesn't look athletic or explosive" was the tone of the coverage and he lived up to it Week 1. I feel like there's a chance they believed he was still recovering from the injury but this is actually just who he is now.
I don't think this is it. The Patriots historically haven't used rookie receivers much, not even the ones they drafted at the top of the draft. Late in the 4th quarter of a close game and your highest paid receiver is on the bench watching 6th rounders get snaps? No way they're happy with that, no matter how promising the young guys are.
That's certainly possible and it would suck. Fortunately this might be an acquisition that might not hurt too too much-- there's a chance that Boutte and Douglas might be a lot better than we had expected and the reemergence of Bourne is also nice. But definitely not looking like a great pickup at this point.
Yeah, if the young guys develop into very good players this would not only not be an issue but probably a blessing as they get more playing time early. But that's a big if.
More the new Agholor. PFF had JJSS ranked as the #2 available WR, behind Old Friend Jakobi Meyers. We had money to spend with Agholor coming off the books. Agholor was 2 years/$22M, and got the whole boat. JJSS got 3 years/25.5M, $16M of which is guaranteed, and very front-loaded. His dead cap is such that he'll likely only be here for 2 years, after which he's likely gone with $2M in dead cap left. It was a decent risk for a vet in the position, but really, I think it shows a lot more about the strength of the draft class AND the other FAs (like Gesicki).
The difference here is that Jakobi was a known quantity inside the system who was proven to work in the role JuJu is now being asked to fill. If it were two guys from outside the organization, then it's a coin flip because who knows about acclimation and picking up the offense and developing chemisty. I could see going with the cheaper external option if you had a cap issue. I could see going with an external option at the same price if you believed there was greater upside. But to take away a receiver who your QB trusted and who knew how to operate in your system (or really under two systems since he went from Josh to the clowns last year, even if that system is now changing again under BoB) - that's something that requires more thought.
Man, no passing offense in the history of football that racked up 4500 yards has a distribution like that one. Your top 2-3 guys get most of the targets and yards. If Schuster has 50 catches for 500 yards that's a really disappointing season, full stop.
Yeah, and my point is...let's say that JuJu had 90 receptions for 1,100 yards - that's a "normal" year for a WR1. That means that 40 receptions and 600 yards have to be taken from the other guys (assuming a 4,500 yard passing season for Mac). And that would result in a lot of caterwauling about how big of a bust a bunch of other guys on the team are. Like they threw for 316 yards the other day and here was the distribution:
I didn't have to search long to find a contrary example, the 2022 Chargers. Herbert racked up over 4700 yards passing. Mike Williams is right in line with the Bourne projection in catches and yards:
I don't think anyone would call Montgomery, Douglass, Bourne, or Boutte busts in that case, because the capital invested in them equates to the level of production you are getting. When you spend a second-round pick on a receiver and he puts up 20 catches, that is a poor decision in a number of possible ways. You either a) picked the wrong player at the position, b) could have gotten that production later in the draft (see Boutte/Douglas this year), and c) as a corollary to b, could have beefed up your team elsewhere using that pick while still getting that kind of production later in the draft.
His list had 8 guys over 350 yards. Even this Chargers distribution is more concentrated.
I'd argue it wouldn't be fine production considering they got more than that yearly from Jakobi Meyers and he got signed for similar money.
How about 7 guys over 348 yards, and an 8th in the 300 yards neighborhood? I give you the 2021 Las Vegas Raiders! 4,804 yards from Derek Carr, spread quite nicely amongst a fairly disparate crew:
Okay, I'm convinced that was less of an aberration as I previously thought. I stand corrected.
No worries at all - it was an interesting team stat to examine. Yards are a weird counting stat that rely on a team not turning the ball over or bogging down in the red zone. After week 1, the Pats have good passing yardage, but those week 1 TOs were backbreakers, with and some red zone problems to boot, hence the loss.
