By Tom E. Curran
FOXBORO - The Patriots have scored 1,031 points over the past two regular seasons. In the past three seasons they had a fully-functional Brady, they scored 1,620.
Offense is not a screaming issue for this team. Defense has been.
And the Patriots used the first four picks of the 2012 NFL Draft on transforming their defense to fit the modern NFL.
After taking a 6-5, 266-pound DEOLB named Chandler Jones with the 21st pick, they took a 6-2, 265-pound linebacker named Dont'a Hightower with the 25th pick. On Friday, they used the 48th pick to take Tavon Wilson, a versatile, 6-foot, 205-pound defensive back who can play safety or corner then came back and took another defensive end - Jake Bequette - at 90. And he's 6-5, 274 pounds.
The league, it is changing, said Bill Belichick. Speed is trumping bulk.
"The bigger they are, the slower they run and in that 250 to 275-ish range is where you usually get those times under five seconds (in the 40)," he explained Friday night. "That speed and quickness with a little lower weight in passing situations you need to make those guys a little more active and give them a little more speed. Not that you don't need the inside guys to push and power rush. We have a lotof bug guys on our team but it seems like every year the game's getting a little more spread out for us. We're in nickel defense more and more - over 50 percent last year - and some of the teams in our division - Buffalo, we're pretty much in nickel defense all day against them, that's two games. It's a high percentage of our defense so that's part of the reason we feel like we need that. We're not in our base defense as much as we were in the past."
When you look at the Patriots defense, they are now stocked with guys in the 6-2-and-over, 245-and-over range.
Alphabetically: Bequette, 6-5, 270; Bobby Carpenter, 6-2, 249; Markell Carter, 6-4, 248; Jermaine Cunningham, 6-3, 260; Dane Fletcher, 6-2, 244; Hightower, 6-4, 260; Aaron Lavarias, 6-3, 248; Jerod Mayo, 6-1, 245; Rob Ninkovich, 6-2, 255; Brandon Spikes, 6-2, 250; Trevor Scott, 6-5, 255.
And they seem to be trending toward moving away from the 300-plus pounders. Gerard Warren's 330-pound body won't likely be back. Ron Brace's 330 may not either. Brandon Deaderick, Kyle Love, Myron Pryor and Vince Wilfork will be the steady, anchoring tackles. The 299-pound Jonathan Fanene will be their interior speed guy.
The ends will be guys able to move upfield and get around the edge. Expect a lot of 2-4-5 alignments with Fanene and Wilfork on the field on third down buffeted by the big but mobile linebackers and ends when teams try to spread them out.
It seems an attacking defense geared to put heavier pressure on the pocket is coming.
And three of the four picks the Patriots used in the 2012 draft may be aimed at doing that.
Belichick's ability to read the league and react to it in terms of personnel has been one of his strengths. And his team's defensive weaponry had grown stale.
This draft was aimed at giving it a shot in the arm.