Preseason opener a loss for Wynn
The Patriots stormed back to win their exhibition opener against the Redskins, 26-17, Thursday night, but the final score of the game is one of the least meaningful aspects of preseason football.
Contrary to a regular season or playoff game, when the journey takes a back seat to the end result, preseason football is all about the process — how individual players performed, who stood out, who did (or did not) make significant contributions and even who was on the field at any given moment.
To that end, it has to be a concern that offensive tackle Isaiah Wynn, the Pats’ top draft pick last spring, did not play one snap.
Since teams don’t have to file an injury report for preseason games, it’s unclear if Wynn’s absence was due to his health or performance in training camp. Wynn missed OTAs earlier in the offseason as he recovered from shoulder surgery, the result of an injury he suffered during his senior year at Georgia, but he’s been a full go in camp so far.
Bill Belichick only hinted at the subject in his morning conference call yesterday.
“Not everybody was able to participate last night, but the ones that did I think all had a pretty fair number of plays. So, we’ll just continue to let that play out and see how it goes,” he said. “There’s definitely a lot of opportunity overall at that position and we have a lot of players that I think are pretty close in the competition, both inside and outside, and we tried to give everybody a good look last night, as we have through camp.”
Wynn was expected to help replace longtime left tackle Nate Solder, who signed a free agent deal with the New York Giants. But it’s been veteran tackle Trent Brown, acquired from the San Francisco 49ers in exchange for a third-round pick in the 2018 draft, who’s taken starting reps on Tom Brady’s blind side throughout camp.
Brown started the game at left tackle Thursday night, but Wynn, who has essentially been the second stringer at the position so far, did not come in to replace him. Instead it was Matt Tobin, a former walk-on at Iowa and undrafted free agent who spent four seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles and last year with the Seattle Seahawks.
It was a solid night for the offensive line overall. The Pats allowed just one sack on 28 dropbacks and paved the way for the running backs to carry the ball 40 times for 140 yards and three touchdowns.
“Certainly our offensive line had a chance to come off on the ball and do some run-blocking,” Belichick said after the game. “That will help us in the evaluation of those players and also give us something to build on schematically from some corrections that we need to make or some things that we did well.”
After sitting on the sidelines for the entire game, Wynn will not be part of those evaluations this week, and he’ll have to wait until at least Thursday against the Eagles for a chance to prove himself in live action.