FOXBOROUGH – Sirius XM NFL Radio broadcast live from Patriots training camp on Sunday, with co-hosts Pat Kirwan and Tim Ryan interviewing owner Robert Kraft, coach Bill Belichick, defensive ends Rob Ninkovich and Chandler Jones and safety Adrian Wilson.
For the hard-core follower, it was great radio, both from an interview perspective but also to hear Kirwan and Ryan share their thoughts after watching practice.
Here are some of the leftover soundbites from Belichick:
On backup QB Ryan Mallett: “Ryan’s improved every year. This is his third season and we’ve seen a lot of progress from him in this spring and thus far in training camp as well. It looks like he’s very focused, ready to go, his throwing mechanics and techniques are good. His accuracy is good. He reads defenses and coverages. I think he’s continued to make a jump forward in his progression as a football player. I feel like we have three guys really at the quarterback position that when they play are going to be able to be effective for the team. We’ll see how all that works out. All three guys have done that.”
On free-agent signee Danny Amendola at WR: “He’s a very good receiver. He has a good skill set. He can play outside, play inside. He can run after the catch, has returned kicks. Has good ball skills. Good concentration. Tough kid. We’re excited to have him and we’ll see how it all fits together. I know the quarterbacks are gaining a lot of confidence in his route-running and catching ability.”
Belichick on rookie WR Josh Boyce (fourth round, Texas Christian): “He really didn’t do anything in the spring. He was still rehabbing his foot. He trained hard in the offseason, came in, and was ready to go at the beginning of training camp with the rookies. So he’s had a really good full week going back to last Sunday, which was the first day [rookies] were in. He’s had a good week, made a lot of progress. He has a long way to go, but I’m excited to work with him, too. He definitely can run.”
Belichick on the interior DL as a group: “We have a couple of very experienced players that are obviously very good players in [starters] Tommy Kelly and Vince Wilfork. Then we have some younger guys after that and we’ll just have to see how that group comes along with Marcus Forston and Cory Grissom and Joe Vellano … They’re all young, they’re all working hard, they all have good strength, they all run fairly well. We’ll just see how they develop; it’s a position that in the past we’ve had a lot of guys that aren’t real high draft choices play a lot of football for us.”