Patriots miss out on perfect Ja'Whaun Bentley replacement ahead of Jets matchup

The 2024 NFL season has been rough for the entire league regarding injuries, with countless players landing on injured reserve lists after just Week 2. The Patriots had been fortunate not to suffer the same fate until the news about Ja'Whaun Bentley's injury from last Sunday's Seahawks game was announced earlier this week.

The linebacker left the matchup with a shoulder injury, and it didn't take long for the team to declare him out for the remainder. It was reported the following morning that there was optimism about Bentley's injury not being serious, only for that to dramatically change eight hours later.

Instead of an injury that the Patriots believed he would be able to play through starting in Week 3 against the Jets on Thursday, it was revealed Bentley tore his pec and will miss the rest of the 2024 season. It is a massive blow to their defense, especially in their effort to stop the run, and the roster has very little depth to make up for the loss.

It will require guys like Raekwon McMillan and Jahlani Tavai to step up and fill the void, as the schedule will only get much tougher. But if that wasn't enough, the team had a perfect free agent option to consider whose familiarity with the system would've made for a great addition, only to miss out on the opportunity of him signing to another team's practice squad on Tuesday afternoon.

The Patriots blew their chance to reunite with the perfect defensive line fixer in the wake of Ja'Whaun Bentley's injury

As one of the handful of Patriots who were not re-signed at the start of free agency earlier this year, tenured defensive tackle Lawrence Guy remained unsigned through the first two weeks of the season and would have been the right player for the job after the devastating news about Bentley's injury.

Guy had been a player many believed the Patriots should have brought back for most of the offseason, even if just as a depth piece, and now that one of their star run-stoppers is going to miss the rest of the season, it seemed like now was the time to do it.

Unfortunately, the Bengals beat them to it and signed Guy to their team on Tuesday, as they also have several injuries on their defensive line.

Maybe the players on their 53-man roster and/or practice squad will be enough to make up for Bentley's loss, but this doesn't provide much confidence in the need to stop the run for the rest of the season.

Missing out on signing a player like Guy is a big loss, and their options are much more limited now that he's out of the picture. It's an issue that probably won't be addressed until after their Thursday Night matchup with the Jets, but it needs to be prioritized in the ten days after that leading up to their game with the 49ers.

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