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The Patriots assistant coaches were available to the media on Monday afternoon and there were at least two of them who were quite happy with the events of the offseason.
Tight ends coach Brian Daboll and wide receivers coach Chad O'Shea saw their respective positions bolstered greatly through both free agency and the draft. The influx of talent put smiles on both of their faces as they answered questions about their newest pupils.
"We're real excited about the players we've added," O'Shea said. "We've added some real quality players and it's always good as a position coach to have players. I have a lot of respect for the players we currently have in our room who were with us last year but they're also excited to work with different teammates and they've been great to welcome the free agents Nate Washington and Chris Hogan and they've worked really work with them and we're excited to have those guys."
The Patriots also added wideouts Malcolm Mitchell in the fourth round and Devin Lucien in the seventh. O'Shea was quite impressed with Mitchell when the Georgia product visited Foxborough during the pre-draft process.
"We had a chance to have Malcolm in here on a visit, which we were very impressed with him on the visit," O'Shea added. "He came in here and really presented himself very well both as a person and what he can do mentally within our offense. He has a lot to learn when he gets here but so do a lot of other guys but we feel confident that he'll have the ability to learn that information."
[wysifield-embeddedaudio|eid="434831"|type="embeddedaudio"|view_mode="full"]Daboll may have been even more fortunate than O'Shea, if not in terms of quantity but for quality. The Patriots added Martellus Bennett and Clay Harbor via free agency, the former creating many opportunities to do damage with Rob Gronkowski in two-tight end sets.
"He's a hard-working guy, professional and I'm glad we have him," Daboll said of Bennett. "Watching them as a guy on another team, what they're asked to do and how they're coached to do it is not necessarily always the same as how you do it when you get to a new spot. That's always a challenge. Get them in here, teach them how we do things as a team and it's our job after that to see how they fit after they're out there on the field. So, we have a lot of work to get done in a short amount of time here and that's what these OTAs will be for.
So, is Daboll like the rest of Patriots fans, dreaming of various ways to use Bennett with Gronkowski to form an unstoppable duo?
"That all comes to fruition after you get out there on the field practicing and you kind of see what the strengths are of each player," he said. "Obviously we know Rob but then you add knew guys, whether it's Clay or Martellus, and see what they do well in terms of your offense and that's how you develop your team."
One thing Daboll won't be concerned about it getting everyone involved.
"I learned a long time ago you only play with one ball," he said with a smile. "So, you do whatever you can do to help the team win."
