Greg Bedard: 3 up and 3 down from Patriots preseason

Greg Bedard of BostonSportsJournal.com joined Felger and Mazz on Tuesday. During his time of the show, Bedard gave his 3 up and 3 down from the New England Patriots preseason and training camp!

Greg Bedard: Overall for the preseason and what I saw out there, I thought J.J. Taylor had the best pre-season out of the guys who played this preseason, I thought he looks like he's ready to be the third down back for this team or at least give them an option. I thought he was fantastic in the last two preseason games and really opened up my eyes as far as pass protection and things like that.

Greg Bedard: I'm going to group all the rookies into this. I could separate Christian Gonzalez and Keion White and Marte Mapu of what we've seen, but just in general, I think that the rookie class has looked really good from top to bottom. I mean, from Christian Gonzalez at cornerback to Isaiah Bolden before the injury, he showed well this summer. You had the kicker and the punter and I think even the interior guys. I would say Jake Andrews came along. Mafi was probably the best of the bunch. Sow definitely struggled a tackle. He's probably not a tackle right now. He might be in time, but I thought the rookie class showed really well this whole summer.

Greg Bedard: So this is going to be a little bit odd, but I'm going to say Bill Belichick the coach this Patriots preseason. And this is the reason: I think that getting Billy O'Brien back here has allowed Belichick to get back to his best self. He obviously has turned over the defense basically to Steve Belichick and Jerod Mayo. When Bill is at practice he spends a lot of time with the offense but not doing a whole lot. I think moving Joe judge over the special teams, I think that helped. And I just think Bill's been able to get back to what he needs to do for this team, which is just think crap up and throw situations of people and get the team prepared instead of last year, he was just he was underwater the whole year with the whole offense from the get go that I think it really hurt the rest of the team.

Greg Bedard: Number one down is just the offensive line overall. They never one day got to practice together. I mean it's no way to go into a season, especially with the schedule that they have coming up. So, you know, not having any offensive line, you can understand, like alright well, Onwenu's coming back, Cole Strange was a little bit bad luck, I guess, but just going through a whole summer and offseason without the offensive starting offensive line practicing together, I don't think I've ever seen that before.

Greg Bedard: The 2022 draft class, who I think once Zappe played well everybody thought it was the greatest draft class like ever. Cole Strange hasn't been on the field but I think he'll be fine. Tyquan Thornton...not on the field. Marcus Jones didn't really show well at corner this summer. Jack Jones. Pierre Strong gone for nothing. Kevin Harris is probably gone. Sam Roberts could make the team won't have much of a role. Chasson Hynes gone. Andrew Stueber If he's not gone already, he will be gone. I mean, that was a rough class one year out.

Greg Bedard: Zappe. And look, I haven't been his biggest supporter, but he won me over last year to the point where like, now you know you have a good solid back up and occasional spot starter. But now after the summer and the last preseason game, I'm even rethinking that. Like I don't know if he's a fit for this offense. I think that they are looking for other options as sort of a veteran backup quarterback. Probably not with the waiver wire or trade or anything, but I think they're on the lookout.

Greg Bedard of BostonSportsJournal.com joined the Felger and Mazz program on Tuesday. While on, Bedard did his weekly “10 Questions” segment following the end of the NFL preseason and training camps.

10. What do you make of Jerry Jones not telling Dak OR Mike McCarthy he was trading for Trey Lance before pulling off the deal?

Greg Bedard: Not much. It's just Jerry saying "I own and manage this team and you play and coach and I don't have to tell you anything".

9. The Pittsburgh Steelers over/under 8.5 wins. Who will score more points this year: Pittsburgh or New England? Who will be ranked higher at QB: Kenny Pickett or Mac Jones?

Greg Bedard: Over on the wins. Barely. Probably 9-8. I think that the Patriots are going to score more points. Look I like Kenny Pickett, I like some of their weapons, I like their offense, but man their offensive coordinator. That Matt Canada system even though the Patriots are probably going to have to run that in week one against the Eagles because they can't block anybody, it's horrible. But I do like Pickett I think he's going to be higher rated than Mac Jones slightly this year.

8. The Green Bay Packers over/under 7.5 wins. Who will score more points this year: the Packers or New England? Who will be ranked higher at QB: Jordan Love or Mac Jones?

Greg Bedard: Packers go over and the Packers score more points. They're playing a worse division and have an easier schedule. But I have Mac over over Jordan Love because I think they're going to rely a lot on their running game in Aaron Jones and AJ Dillon.

7. With the news this week that the Arizona Cardinals have released QB Colt McCoy (who has gone 3-3 as a fill-in starter the past two years) and will go with either rookie Clayton Tune or Joshua Dobbs to start the year -- I ask: should the NFL institute a draft lottery or some other form of anti-taking measure?

Greg Bedard: I say no because I just think that in this league compared to any other, one singular player isn't going to really turn around anybody's fortunes quickly. I mean, you could say quarterback, but Patrick Mahomes went what like 10th or 12th in his draft? And you know also the NFL draft is such a crap show that it's more important to try to to get parity in the league and I think this helps.

6. Any thoughts on another preseason game - this time Miami-Jacksonville last week - getting cancelled?

Greg Bedard: You're only going to see it more and more because Bill set the trend. People saw that Belichick said it was okay now, unfortunately it happened with another serious injury, but you know, if that was a regular season game, neither of those games would have been postponed. So I think you're going to continue to see it.

5. Who was the biggest toolbag of the NFL preseason?

Greg Bedard: I would say the NFL owners for making people pay full price for that product.

4. We all agree that the preseason -- and NFL traning camps for that mattter -- have become relatively useless. If you were commissioner of sports, what would you do to change it?

Greg Bedard: I'm giving in a little bit on this. I am. If teams decide to do joint practices before a preseason game, they have to be in the stadium on television. And say they open up one, it's open to if you bought tickets to the game, you also get admission to that practice. Something along those lines.

3. Do you have any insight into what the Tom Brady ceremony will entail in the opener? Again, if you were in charge, what would be your itinerary/format for the event? Statue? Jersey retirement? What?

Greg Bedard: I don't know anything. I don't give two craps about the Brady pregame ceremony. Give him a statue and let them talk at halftime. Whatever. Now, I was there when Dan Marino retired. They did a whole night at the stadium like Hootie and the Blowfish was there and they played a concert. They sold the place out. It was fun. I went it was fun. They should do something like that with Brady.

2. What should Belichick receive when his day comes?

Greg Bedard: Belichick statue like the Vince Lombardi one outside Lambeau Field.

1.Should the 16-0 banner go back up inside Gillette? Thoughts on the banner in the first place?

Greg Bedard: A banner to failure. It's like something that would hang up at the Colts Stadium.

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