Patriots Predicted to Leave Pair of Wasted Jerod Mayo Draft Picks Off Roster

After New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft fired legendary, six-time Super Bowl winning head coach Bill Belichick after the 2023 season, he quickly hired longtime assistant and former Patriots linebacker Jerod Mayo.

But Mayo’s legacy, if it can be called that, is quickly being erased by new head coach Mike Vrabel, who is now predicted by one Patriots analyst to cut two of Mayo’s top five draft picks after just one season.

Kraft was so enthusiastic about Mayo that he revealed that he had selected the 2008 defensive rookie of the year to succeed Belichick five years earlier. In other words, soon after Belichick’s Patriots won their sixth Super Bowl in early 2019, Kraft was already planning to fire him and hire Mayo.

“I’ve been running businesses for more than 50 years, and in my experience, the most successful leadership transitions happen when we’re privileged to develop talent from within,” Kraft explained after the hiring of Mayo. “That allows us to create a succession plan that allows the candidate to better prepare for the opportunity when he arrives.”

Mayo’s Draft as Disappointing as His Season

It didn’t exactly work out that way. The 2024 Patriots went 4-13 — the same record that got Belichick fired after 2023 — and Mayo, too, was given the axe.

Even the 2024 draft, the first and last inn which Mayo as head coach would help oversee, was an unqualified bust — at least after the no-brainer No. 3 overall pick of quarterback Drake Maye — and according to the prediction by SB Nation Pats Pulpit correspondent Brian Hines, it’s about to look even worse.

The Patriots 2024 second-round pick, and the second of their two fourth-round picks will not survive Vrabel’s final cutdown of the 2025 roster to 53 players, Hines predicts.

The 2024 second-round pick went to wide receiver Ja’Lynn Polk, who caught 69 passes for 1,159 yards and nine touchdowns in his final collegiate season at Washington.

Polk didn’t come anywhere close to that kind of production in his rookie season with the Patriots. He was targeted only 33 times, catching just 12 of those passes for a paltry 87 yards — though he did mix tow touchdowns in there. Still, it was mostly useless first season as a pro.

“Ja’Lynn Polk continues to be one of the most impressive side-field players I’ve ever seen,” quipped longtime NBC Sports Boston Patriots insider Tom E. Curran, on his Thursday Patriots Talk podcast. “Love Ja’Lynn Polk from May to August.”

Polk had shoulder surgery after the season, and that limited his participation in OTA and minicamp practices over the past few weeks, leaving Vrabel no chance to evaluate whether he has improved after his dismal debut season.

In the fourth round, Mayo’s Patriots took Javon Baker out of Central Florida where he led the Big 12 with 1,139 receiving yards.

Fourth-Round Pick Proved Useless in 2024

But Baker was basically a nonentity for the Patriots in 2024, catching only one of four passes thrown his way, in the 11 games he played.

Hines sees the 2024 Patriots wide receiver corps consisting of free agent signing Stefon Diggs, veteran Kendrick Bourne, 2025 fourth-round pick Kyle Williams, another free agent in Mack Hollins, undrafted free agent rookie Efton Chism III, and 2023 Belichick draft picks Kayshon Boutte, DeMario Douglas.

There’s simply no room for Baker in that crowded receiver’s room. And not Polk either, unless an injury opens up a spot, Hines said.

Even without those two, Patriots insider Phil Perry, also of the Patriots Talk podcast, remains pessimistic about the New England receivers.

“You’ve got a top five pick at quarterback in his second year now,” Perry said on the podcast. “You can’t year over year — and they obviously tried to improve the thing more than they did — but you just can’t continuously go into seasons with among the worst receiver groups in football.”