Rich Hill

While New England’s interior O-line could look drastically different following his return — starters David Andrews and Joe Thuney are both headed towards unrestricted free agency — anything more than Toran earning a backup role would be a surprise. Even though Chung may no longer be the same dynamic player he was earlier in his career, the 33-year-old could be given an important role in New England’s defensive backfield after opting out of the 2020 season because of family considerations. However, adding him to the mix again might allow the team to make some usage-based changes within the group: having Chung and Phillips as the two box safety options — ideally playing alongside some improved off-the-ball linebacker depth — would allow New England to move Dugger back to more of a free safety role like the one played by McCourty. Despite turning 31 next month, he is still a valuable player in New England’s scheme due to his versatility and experience within the system: the long-time team captain is arguably the most important player in the defensive front seven as well as the central communicator not just up front but for the entire unit (a role that initially went to Bentley last year but was later handed over to Devin McCourty).

Coming off a disappointing 2020 campaign, the New England Patriots are headed into a pivotal offseason: they need to rebuild a roster that went just 7-9 last year and is in need of some major upgrades across the board. He has been with the club ever since, and has made his way from the bottom of the roster, to the practice squad, to the active roster — eventually taking over as New England’s fullback and appearing in a combined 20 games over two seasons. Vitale exercising the Coronavirus opt-out clause before training camp meant that the road was clear for Johnson to serve as New England’s fullback in 2020. Along the way, he also was a regular contributor in the kicking game and played the eighth most snaps on the team in the game’s third phase: Johnson was on the field for 170 out of 397 special teams snaps (42.8%) and saw action on both return teams as well as the punt coverage and place kick protection units.

From there, the leadership of the team decided as great as those conversations were amongst ourselves we wanted to do more.” Participating in a recent video discussion with fellow team captain Matthew Slater and the Patriots’ executive director of community affairs, Andre Tippett, McCourty highlighted how players’ intentions culminated in the creation of the so-called Monday Meetings. A series of hour-long meetings conducted weekly before and during the season, the Monday Meetings allowed players and coaches alike to have a forum to discuss social issues. In January, players, coaches and personnel announced that they would be donating $500,000 to eight local organizations through the Patriots Players Social Justice Fund that was first founded in 2018. While the 2020 season was a disappointing one from an on-field perspective — New England went just 7-9 and finished out of the playoffs for the first time since the 2008 season — and posed challenges due to Covid-19, it also was, as mentioned by Slater, a transformative experience for the Patriots.

With the calendar already having turned to 2021 and the club starting to prepare for the upcoming season, however, the Patriots recently sent a letter to their season ticket holders expressing confidence that fans will be back at Gillette Stadium this fall. The letter also informed fans that the season ticket renewal deadline has been extended from March to June: As we look ahead to the 2021 season, we are very optimistic that we will have fans in the stands and hopeful that we will be able to do so at full capacity. In order to do so in a secure manner, updates to the game-day experience have been announced as part of the letter sent to season ticket holders: [T]he events of the last year have challenged us to rethink various elements of our game day operations. We have made several changes to the fan experience at Gillette Stadium in order to prioritize health, including a permanent move to mobile ticketing and the implementation of cashless payments across all concessions and merchandise locations inside the stadium.