New England Patriots: Predicting the top three wide receivers in 2024
Let's look an entire season ahead to predict the top three wide receivers on the New England Patriots in the 2024 season. It's never too early to look ahead to the future! In all honesty, this position has given the Pats fits for years, and in the Tom Brady era, New England simply never needed elite wide receivers.
Now, that's catching up to them and it's clear that the roster is needing a boost at wide receiver. The Patriots two most notable additions to the WR room this offseason include free agent addition JuJu Smith-Schuster and late round draft pick in 2023, Kayshon Boutte.
Smith-Schuster is likely going to takeover the WR1 role for the Patriots, but will that stay the same in the future? What will the Pats' WR room look like in the 2024 season?
New England Patriots: Predicting the top three wide receivers in 2024
Mike Evans (2024 free agent)
Mike Evans is a free agent at the end of the 2023 season and has spent his entire career playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, winning a Super Bowl in 2020 with Tom Brady. Evans has been in the NFL since 2014 and has had at least 1,000 yards in each of his first nine seasons.
He's a record-setting, future Hall of Fame wide receiver and is only 30 years old next offseason. He's 6'5", 220 pounds and can do just about everything you ask of him. Evans is going to chase the money and the Patriots will open up their checkbooks to land in him free agency next year.
Kayshon Boutte
Kayshon Boutte was a top 2023 NFL Draft prospect but fell all the way to the sixth-round, where the Patriots nabbed him up. He was stellar in his true freshman season in 2020 after Ja'Marr Chase and Terrace Marshall Jr opted out.
However, his sophomore and junior years weren't nearly as good which likely hurt his draft stock. I think by his second year in the NFL, the talented wide receiver is going to be the WR2 for the Patriots.
Boutte is likely going to shock a bunch this year and will likely contribute quite a bit in the 2023 season, paving the way for 2024.
JuJu Smith-Schuster
In 2024, Smith-Schuster will be entering his second year under contract with the Patriots. He's been up and down for most of his career but does have true WR1 upside.
He had 1,426 yards in his second season in the NFL, but then proceeded to have four straight years of under 1,000 yards. His yardage totals since that stellar 2018 season were 5523, 831, 129, and 933.
He also averaged less than 10 yards per reception in 2020 and 2021, but did have a nice bounce-back year in 2022 with 78 catches for 933 yards with the Kansas City Chiefs.
Smith-Schuster is a solid WR2. That's who he is. He'll be entering his age-28 season in 2024, so he's still got quite a bit of good football left.