The trade deadline is an unpredictable time in the NFL. Bill Belichick acknowledged that Monday. The Patriots did the unexpected that night, trading Jimmy Garoppolo to the San Francisco 49ers for a 2018 second-round pick.
On Quick Slants, Patriots safety Devin McCourty explained that he has come to expect movement at the trade deadline, but was not expecting Garoppolo to be the one leaving New England.
“I was a little bit shocked,” McCourty said. “You don’t know how it’s going to play out, but I didn’t think Jimmy. He’s been a great teammate. He’s been a leader on the team. From a player standpoint, you’ve got to be happy for him to go out there and be the starting quarterback.”
MORE:
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How good can he be now that he’s expected to be the starting quarterback in the Bay Area?
“I’ll say this, Jimmy is a big part of our improvement as a defense, how well we play on Sundays, how well we do throughout the season because of what we see from him,” he explained. “Jimmy’s going to read the [play] card and he’s going to put his own common sense in there. There’s plenty of times we might say, ‘they don’t do this’ and we play it exact, jump this, do that, then Jimmy throws the ball deep.
New England Patriots
“I think that maturity, him as a player, it’s been cool for us to see him come in as a rookie and just get better and better. I think he’s definitely ready for this challenge.”