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As the New England Patriots open Mandatory Minicamp, an insider shared three position battles to watch.
The New England Patriots are set to begin Mandatory Minicamp on Tuesday, June 9th. This will end the voluntary portion of the offseason, and head coach Mike Vrabel is expecting to have his team at full strength.
Getting everyone in for Minicamp is another major step in deciding the roster for this upcoming season, both who is going to win a job and who makes the roster more generally speaking. The Patriots have no shortage of roster battles to navigate, too.
Insider on Three Key New England Patriots Roster Battles
Spoiler alert, the New England Patriots aren’t navigating a quarterback battle this offseason. That job is Drake Maye’s for the foreseeable future. Still, there are several key roster battles to keep an eye on, and Ethan Hurwitz of Sports Illustrated recently broke those down.
That starts with the third running back slot. It’s a position of note on the offense where the Patriots have their primary rotation sorted out, but there are legitimate depth questions.
“We know that Rhamondre Stevenson and TreVeyon Henderson will be the 1A and 1B in the backfield,” Hurwitz wrote. “Who joins them? Entering camp, it felt like Terrell Jennings or Lan Larison — the two returners from last season — would be the favorites. Larison has impressed to this point in OTAs, but the Patriots brought in Jam Miller (Alabama) and Myles Montgomery (UCF) as rookies. The job is far from filled, but the team has several options to choose from.”
After that, Hurwitz considered slot receiver. The wide receiver room has obviously gotten a facelift this offseason, but that doesn’t mean everything is sorted just yet for the Patriots.
“Josh McDaniels has historically thrived with a slot receiver in his offense. The two realistic options for this year’s team are DeMario Douglas and Efton Chism III. Both players found the end zone for the Patriots last season and fit the mold as a productive player in the offense. But considering the team went out and got A.J. Brown in a trade, there’s less spots to go around in the receiver room. If Chism can make waves in the kick returning game, he could get a leg up.”
Wrapping up the Patriots position battles, Hurwitz considered the defense. There, New England’s secondary looks strong, but not without its own questions at nickel.
“Behind Christian Gonzalez, Carlton Davis and Marcus Jones, the rest of the cornerback room remains a mystery. Wake Forest rookie Karon Prunty will certainly make the team, but who is behind him? Maybe it’s free agent signing Kindle Vildor, who’s worked with the starting defense this spring. Could it Kobee Minor, last year’s Mr. Irrelevant who got run on the 53-man roster in 2025? Could it be an undrafted rookie, like Channing Canada (TCU) or Kenneth Harris (Oklahoma State)? We’ll find out who sticks soon enough.”
FPI Super Bowl Odds Disrespect Patriots
As the defending AFC Champions, the New England Patriots are generally considered a threat to return to the Super Bowl in 2026. Despite that, ESPN’s predictive model FPI has serious concerns about New England and gives them a middle of the pack chance of winning it all.
Per FPI, the Patriots have just a 2.7% chance to win the Super Bowl in 2026. That’s 14th-best in the NFL, or middle of the pack. Those are also the 8th-best in the AFC. Meanwhile, the Buffalo Bills actually have the second-best odds to win the Super Bowl, at 10.7%.
This is the first time in FPI’s history that a team who played in the Super Bowl is outside the Top 10 rankings in the preseason the next year. It’s a ranking that reflects what FPI likely thinks of last year’s schedule, but also seemingly fails to take into account offseason additions for the Patriots.
Dan Morrison After graduating from UMass in 2019, Dan Morrison quickly began a career in sports journalism and digital media. That has seen him work both as a contributing writer at several publications, as well as spending time on the National News Desk at On3. During that time, he has spent the majority of his time covering football, both at the college and NFL levels. Currently residing in Central Florida, his focus with Heavy is on the NFL. More about Dan Morrison
