New season. New team.
No NFL team is the exact same one year to the next. Players depart at no agency, retire, are released, move on. New blood has been added to the mix. Even if some crucial pieces stay, NFL teams are shapeshifters, constantly changing one year into the next.
For no franchise is that more evident than the New England Patriots. The Dynasty of Dynasties, Bill Belichick’s team has been through overhauls in the past and continues to dominate the AFC East and the NFL.
The 2019 variant of the Pats must overcome some huge losses. The list of departures of both players and coaches is long:
Patriots Losses 2019 Offseason:
TE Rob Gronkowski
WR Chris Hogan
WR Cordarrelle Patterson
TE Dwayne Allen
T Trent Brown
T LaAdrian Waddle
T Jared Veldheer
DE Trey Flowers
DT Malcolm Brown
DE Adrian Clayborn
CB Eric Rowe
Defensive coordinator Brian Flores
Defensive line coach Brendan Daly
Cornerbacks coach Josh Boyer
Joining NFL Network’s Total Access this week, Patriots linebacker Kyle Van Noy told former New England celebrity Willie McGinnest which the key to replacing all the losses has been the civilization Belichick has instilled in the veterans still with the program.
“Bill does a really good job of the civilization being put with the gamers that have been there for their tenures,” Van Noy said. “Like Patrick Chung, Dont’a Hightower, Devin McCourty, Tom (Brady), they’ve been there for a while, Matthew Slater. Those guys have already been passed on from your creation, the norm. And we are only trying to keep that legacy going.
“When that civilization is set, it doesn’t matter, most of us have the same aim in mind and that’s just to win.”
The Pats have conquer on-field attrition previously. Losing Gronk is enormous, but the assumption is as long as Brady is throwing passes, the Patriots will probably be OK. The larger question includes coaching attrition that we’ve seen from New England the past couple of seasons, particularly on the defensive side of the ball.
Without a defensive coordinator, Belichick is expected to have a heavier role than ordinary in the every-day activity and play-calling this season. Van Noy welcomes the chance to be pushed by the very best coach in NFL history.
“I believe for me, anytime you get to learn from one of the finest ever to do it — to me, he’s the best — to understand from him every day, to have this mindset in your meetings all the time, getting you advice and things you normally do not see, you get in his mind a bit, it’s the very best,” Van Noy said.
Maybe the dynasty will finish 1 day. No one expects it to wreck in 2019, even with this year’s attrition.
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