The New England Patriots don't exactly have the most talented roster in the NFL this season, and combine that with the difficult schedule ahead of them, they're projected to be one of the worst teams in the league in 2024.
If the Patriots finish with one of the worst records, they'll secure a high draft pick again and have another opportunity to grab a talented player out of college in next year's draft.
ESPN's Field Yates recently released a very early 2025 mock draft that had the Patriots finishing as the worst team in the league and landing the first overall selection.
However, Yates doesn't have New England making the first pick. Instead, he has them trading down with the New York Giants, who tried to trade for the Patriots' pick this past year.
In this trade, Eliot Wolf and company would acquire the sixth overall pick and a number of other picks or players.
Here's what Yates had to say about his projection of a trade:
"As we know, quarterbacks are almost always gravitating toward the top of the board, as eight of the past 10 first overall picks have been signal-callers. The Patriots just used the No. 3 selection on Drake Maye in April, so chances are they'd be listening on trade offers if they landed the No. 1 pick next year. In this scenario, the Giants come calling for a second straight year and this time get a deal done. This projected trade would involve multiple picks, including New York's No. 6 selection."
With that pick, Yates has the Patriots taking Michigan cornerback Will Johnson.
"I'd say New England is more likely to address offensive tackle than cornerback next spring, but I'm just not convinced enough on the class's second-best left tackle in my early tape study to go that direction and pass up Johnson. To that end, LSU's Will Campbell could certainly enter the mix, but Johnson would provide a mix of need and value. Johnson has lockdown-corner potential in the pros. His size (6-foot-2, 202 pounds), efficient movement skills and physicality scream NFL star, and he would tag-team with Christian Gonzalez to form a lethal duo. Johnson has seven interceptions over two seasons."
The idea of pairing Gonzalez and Johnson is certainly an intriguing one as the Patriots would continue to build up a strong defense with a lot of talent in the back end.
However, New England should be aggressively pursuing offensive tackle and wide receiver next year to surround Maye with as much talent as possible.
Maybe they're able to do that in free agency, but if they don't, they have to do it early in the 2025 NFL draft.
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