Hindsight Is 20/20: Grading the New England Patriots’ 2009 Offseason

March 26, 2010   ·   Erik Frenz   ·   Jump to comments

People always say that it's impossible to tell how a team performs in the offseason through trades, free agency, and the draft until the season's over.
2010 is no different, so there's no purpose in discussing that now.
Instead, let's take a look back a year at the New England Patriots' offseason moves in 2009 and see how they did.
 
Trade: D
The Patriots traded away Richard Seymour for the Raiders' first-round pick in 2011. They'll finally reap the benefit of that trade next year, but they sorely missed the pass rush he provided in 2008 and the veteran leadership he's provided for a long time.
They'd hoped that there would be some gas left in the 31-year-old tank of Derrick Burgess, but he didn't translate well as an outside linebacker in the 3-4 scheme, and they only got five sacks in 14 games out of the former pass-rush monster.
The Patriots felt they could afford to waste a 2010 third-round draft pick on Tampa Bay tight end Alex Smith, but ha...

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