Before the NFL season kicks off, NESN.com will highlight the hidden Patriots: players in New England who have fallen under the radar for some reason. Next: Dalton Keene, tight end.
New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick pointed out that Dalton Keene faced an uphill battle to play playing time as a rookie after being selected as the tight end in the third round of the 2020 NFL draft.
And that was before Keene suffered a neck injury before the season and a knee injury halfway through the campaign.
Keene, 21, played just 140 shots as a rookie in six games. He ended the 2020 season with three catches for 16 yards with a whisper.
“I mean, when you see Dalton play, you just do not see a lot of things we do,” Belichick said in April last year. ‘The Virginia Tech offense didn’t really translate too much into a New England Patriot offense. This is also not uncommon with other players. It is what it is. I think the things you saw were his blocking, his attempt to block, his toughness, the ability to play with the ball in his hands, and certainly the intent of the offense to get him the ball was impressive . They did a lot of things to get the ball to him somehow: give it to him, throw it to him, place him in different places so he can run with it or catch and run with it. This is what you saw.
‘I’ve already talked to him about it being a big transition for him in terms of learning our system, because I’ll say in more detail and more specifically about many tasks, especially in the passing game, learning how to get close to block. Again, he shows a lot of ability to do this in size, speed and so on. Only he did not do much of it. He played quite a bit in the backfield, not as a fullback, but kind of off the ball, sometimes a fullback, but not really behind the fullback, but in the backfield, off the line. A little different place than we would normally use. He is a smart kid. He is athletic. He is strong. He’s tough. I see no reason why he can not or does not want to make the adjustments in time. We will work on that. ”
“On time.” Be patient.
Of Keene’s 140 offensive snaps, 102 were spent at the end of the lane, 26 in the slot, nine wide and three in the backfield per PFF. It’s still unclear where Keene will end up playing in the NFL, though he’s likely to be a tight end. The Patriots may also choose to turn him into an athletic, full-back fullback, in the form of San Francisco 49ers veteran blocker Kyle Juszczyk.
Keene, who is a 10th overall position at the bottom of the third round with a compensating choice, is far from the first newcomer to struggle as a rookie outside the gate. Among 29 tightheads set up in the third or fourth round over the past five years, 14 have registered less than 100 meters in their rookie season and 22 less than 200 meters.
As Belichick mentioned, Keene had to adapt to a very different offense that came from Virginia Tech. He also did not have the benefit of traditional OTAs and mini-camps and participated in a cut-off training camp without pre-season. Keene missed the first two weeks of the season with a neck injury and later spent time on an injured reserve with a knee injury. The intention here is not to make excuses for Keene, and there is certainly no guarantee that he will break out in 2021, but there are at least a number of obvious reasons for his fight as a rookie beyond talent shortages.
Keene is one of the four fixed points on the Patriots’ current 90s, where he joins Devin Asiasi, the third-round pick in 2020, and veterans Ryan Izzo and Matt LaCosse. The Patriots also have fullback Danny Vitale on their 90s. Starting fullback Jakob Johnson, an exclusive rights agent, is also likely to return.
The Patriots’ tight end pieces yielded just 254 yards in 2020, which could cause the team to look outside the list for more help. Even if the Patriots do not draft a player like Kyle Pitts, sign a free agent like Hunter Henry or trade for a tight end like Evan Engram, they will have to see more production out of position, with LaCosse returning from his opt- out and Asiasi and Keene take supposed second-year leaps.
It is a risk to simply assume that Keene will significantly improve his production in year 2, but if he does, it will also allow the Patriots to spend a salary branch or other capital in other needs than they are on their Choose 2020 choice.
There is a lot to like about Keene from his time with the Hokies despite his lack of raw production. He was a natural ball carrier and impressed with a 4.71-second 40-yard line, 7.07-second three-cone drill, 4.19-second short shuttle, 34-inch vertical jump and 10-foot, 5-inch wide jump. one of the most athletic endings during last winter’s NFL Scouting Combine.
If Keene’s athletics can contribute to more production in year 2 and beyond, the Patriots could have an exciting player in the third round. But it is also reasonable to doubt Keene given his lack of scores in 2020.
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