New England Patriots jolt the NFL with a sparkling 7-round mock draft

The 2023 NFL season is now officially over. For the New England Patriots, it actually ended sometime in October of 2023 when their terrible off-season chickens came home to roost. After a massive change at Gillette Stadium, including the departure of long-time head Coach and de facto general manager Bill Belichick, it's time to renew, revamp, and reinvigorate the now last-place Patriots.

Who'd have thunk it back in 2018 after the Pats had beaten the LA Rams for their sixth Super Bowl title? Unfortunately, bad decisions by Belichick, sanctioned by owner Robert Kraft, set the Pats on a precipitous slide to the bottom of the AFC East they had dominated for 20 years.

Now there's a new Head Coach in Jerod Mayo, who's had a very nice start to his tenure, and a new GM (in fact, if not in name) in Eliot Wolf, who'll either deliver the players Mayo needs for the Pats' renaissance or not. Whether you agree with Kraft's decision to allow this most important off-season in 25 years to be a "test case" for an untested GM or not, whoever makes the decisions has to get them right, or the whole operation will flop, as Belichick found out after tossing Brady out in 2019.

So, as we approach the key components of the offseason when teams are either built or not, Wolf has to make good decisions in free agency and the all-important NFL draft beginning shortly. The bar was set low by Belichick of late in both categories, so Wolf should be able to better the results of the past four or five years with ease. We'll see.

Here, the topic is the fan-favorite NFL draft, and for the first time in literally decades, the Patriots have a very high pick with which to work, the third overall. Speculation is rife about whether the Patriots should draft one of the top three quarterbacks, a definite positional need, or maybe trade down for more picks, or even trade up to help build a foundation, and perhaps wait until later on to take a quarterback. Whatever they do, a high selection of a QB is essential.

For most years in the past, the Patriots have disappointed mightily in the draft. It was what it was, uninspiring. This year, Wolf has a chance to turn all that on its head. It's a very simple formula of drafting consensus players and not reaching a la Belichick. In addition, you just draft the best players available, only at positions of need on the Patriots. It isn't rocket science, just common sense.

So, with that in mind, here we go with a draft that will rock the NFL to its foundations and set the Pats back on the road back to NFL relevance. The last thing the NFL, not to mention the currently high-flying Kansas City Chiefs, want to see is a reenergized and re-stocked New England Patriots raring to rip through the AFC and the NFL as they did in the past. Draft smart and sign some top free agents, and that's exactly what the Patriots will set the stage to do. So, "Let's Go!" and see just how Wolf might make that happen.

Note: Thanks to profootballnetwork.com for the use of their mock draft simulator.

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