It seems rather likely the Patriots will be drafting a quarterback in the NFL Draft next week, but it is unclear exactly where.
According to Pro Football Network's Tony Pauline, the Patriots have had "numerous video conferences" with James Madison quarterback Ben DiNucci.
"The Pittsburgh transfer was not graded by scouts entering the season despite his terrific junior campaign," Pauline wrote. "DiNucci followed that up with a senior year that included 3,441 yards passing and 29 touchdowns as well as a completion percentage of 71 percent. For some reason, DiNucci was snubbed from all the postseason All-Star events. He has had numerous video conferences with the New England Patriots, Carolina Panthers, and Chicago Bears."
If drafted, DiNucci would be a late-round pick.
Bill Belichick addressed the quarterbacks class as a whole when speaking on a conference call Monday.
"I think similar to most years," he said. "There’s quite a range of players and some of the systems that they play in in college are different, either than what we run or what traditional NFL systems would look like, and some are more closely schematically to that. Each guy has his own set of skills; he has his own circumstances. Some players have played well over a sustained period of time; some players have had an exceptional year in the past year or two – maybe 2019, in some cases 2018 – and then for whatever the reasons were, the two years didn’t quite match up.
"But, that’s I’d say about the way it always is. There are always a variety of things you have to try to put together and look at, but certainly there’s a lot of interesting players and guys who have really good arms, can really throw the ball and some very athletic players, some players that have won a lot of games and have shown their competitiveness and instinctiveness. So, interesting group and probably one that has decent depth to it."
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