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ESPN Staff Writer- Mike Reiss is an NFL reporter at ESPN and covers the New England Patriots. Reiss has covered the Patriots since 1997 and joined ESPN in 2009. In 2019, he was named Massachusetts Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sports Media Association. You can follow Reiss on Twitter at @MikeReiss.
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ESPN Insider- Field Yates is a fantasy football expert and NFL draft analyst for ESPN. You can find him on Fantasy Football Now on Sunday mornings and regularly on NFL Live throughout the week, as well as the Fantasy Focus and First Draft podcasts. A graduate of Wesleyan University (CT) and native of Weston, Mass., Yates has previous experience interning with the New England Patriots on both their coaching and scouting staffs.
The makeup of a team evolves on a daily basis, especially during training camp. One injury can significantly alter the picture.
So we acknowledge that making a projection on the Patriots' final 53-man roster at this time is worthy of a false-start penalty. Too early. Way too early.
But there is value in going through the exercise of envisioning how the final roster might look, in part because it highlights where depth might be thin and also where some of the big position battles will unfold. It also spotlights the challenging decision of protecting a promising young player who has upside versus a veteran player who could help more in the short term.
With this as the backdrop, here is ESPNBoston.com's roster projection, 1.0: