A
New England Patriots
The Patriots robbed the room for Mafah. Final grade: A.
by d ·
2025 NFL Draft
· 9 picks
· 7 steals
· 0 reaches
Thirty-one other rooms let Phil Mafah slide, and the Patriots were the ones holding the card at the 219th overall pick. Highway robbery. Little to argue with here, and the A says so.
They robbed the room blind at the table, and it lifts the grade on its own. Leaving edge rusher unaddressed is the roster risk they will have to answer for in the fall.
On the needs board they went 6 of 8, with wide receiver the one that mattered most.
In the end it comes back to Walter Nolen, and a haul good enough to build on right away.
Pick-by-Pick
In the 25th pick they get a pocket-collapsing interior rusher, and a steal at that. The biggest hole, addressed.
A slide stopped in slot 38, with Colston Loveland worth more than the price. One more legitimate question on the roster, answered.
A clean, defensible pick in No. 69 with a little surplus value in Xavier Restrepo. The one spot they could not leave alone, and did not.
Maxwell Hairston at Round 3, Pick 13 is right where the board had him, plain and simple. A minor need, but a need all the same.
The board fumbled Donovan Jackson all the way to pick No. 105, and they scooped it up. It plugs a real leak on the depth chart.
Steal is underselling it; Kevin Winston Jr. at the Round 5 slot is a heist with the alarm still ringing. Top of the wish list, and they did not leave without it.
Phil Mafah at pick 219 is the steal of the weekend, a first-round talent at a bargain-bin price. A real hole, addressed with a reasonable pick.
A safety of that caliber at the 222nd overall pick is the definition of value, full stop. That was the need underlined and circled, and now it is checked off.
Taking Jamon Dumas-Johnson in slot 240 is close to grand larceny; a linebacker that good had no business lasting this long. Depth more than a fix, but depth they can use.