Cyrus Jones Injury Impact to Patriots
After tonight's 40-38 loss to the Giants, the New England Patriots have concluded preseason play with 2 days to go before rosters have to be cut down to 53 players. The biggest impact play of the night was the gruesome non-contact injury to the right knee of 2016 2nd round pick CB Cyrus Jones. Reports have indicated Jones tore his ACL making this a season-ending injury. There is an MRI scheduled ftomorrow to confirm.
The injury to Edelman and now Jones leaves New England very thin at depth for punt returners. Currently on the roster Danny Amendola, Patrick Chung, and Brandin Cooks all have NFL experience returning punts. However, given injury concerns especially with Amendola, consider the Patriots to look at other options.
Internally, there has been some speculation for roster bubble RB DJ Foster to take on this role. Other options used tonight were undrafted CB Will Likely and WR Devin Lucien with mixed results. Lucien did have a strong night catching 5 of 7 targeted passes for 96 yards and one of Jacoby Brissett's 4 TD passes on the night. Finally, given his dynamic skill set and existing depth at RB, Dion Lewis could be an intruiging option. However, Lewis has no prior NFL experience at the position so it would only be a prospective long shot.
Given Belicheck's philosophy for his team's to have strong Special Teams play with an emphasis on ball control. The Patriots could look for outside options in Free Agency or the trade market.
Current FA options with Punt Return experience include Devin Hester and Eddie Royal. But they both appear to be at the end of the road in their careers. Hester playing for the Seahawks last year averaged only 7.2yds per return. He has also not scored a punt return touchdown since the 2014 season. Royal while he did score a return touchdown last year was cut from the Bears for extreme ineffectiveness. This coming from a team that now features Kevin White and Kendall's Wright as their top 2 Wide Receivers.
In the potential trade market the best option is former Patriot Brandon Tate now with Buffalo. With a 1 year contract of $900k, he would be a cost effective solution. Last year Tate averaged 11.6 yards per return good enough for 4th in the league. Clearly a specialist at this point Tate would not be expected to contribute much in the offense for WR depth.
It will be interesting to see what Bill Belicheck and Co does with the roster after the unfortunate injury to Cyrus Jones tonight.