Kraft gives update on Wolf’s status as pivotal Patriots offseason begins originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
One of the biggest questions surrounding the New England Patriots after they fired head coach Jerod Mayo on Sunday is whether executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf will return or also be let go.
It sounds like Wolf is safe, at least for now.
Speaking at a press conference Monday afternoon, Patriots owner Robert Kraft said Wolf and team executive Alonzo Highsmith “will be involved” in the team’s search for a new head coach.
When asked if that means Wolf and his staff are going to continue on, or whether the team’s coaching hire impact the front office, Kraft replied, “We are looking for people working together and they will be staying on.”
Wolf and director of player personnel Matt Groh have been in the front office for a few years now, and in that time a case could be made that the roster has gotten worse and worse. The primary reason for that decline has been poor drafts.
The Patriots appear to have hit a home run with quarterback Drake Maye, but the rest of the team’s 2024 draft class underwhelmed this past season. It’s a worrying trend that must be reversed if this franchise is going to climb out of its rebuild in the near future.
“I think that the department evolved a lot and a lot of things were changed,” Kraft said. “We changed our grading system this year and have done things — our drafts have not been good for a while, and if you want to compete long term and be good in this league, you’ve got to have good drafts because those rookie contracts allow you to go out and get the people you need to surround people for.
“Looks like we lucked out. We maybe have two quarterbacks, but I think we’ll hopefully see a big improvement this year.”
Whether it’s Wolf or someone else, the person leading the Patriots front office will have the most salary cap space (around $131 million, per OverTheCap) of any team in the league this offseason. But if the Patriots have to spend a lot of money buying out coaches and/or hiring new ones, will that impact how much the team spends on acquiring players this offseason?
“The answer is no,” Kraft said. “We’ve always had a situation where we spend to the cap, and if we go over — we have never told any coach or limited the spending. The only thing we’ve said is if you exceed the cap, we’d like to see it leveled out over three years so that we never get way out of hand. But spending to the cap or above the cap is not — we want to win. That’s our priority first.”
It’s no secret the upcoming offseason represents one of the most important periods in the franchise’s history.
Even though the Patriots’ roster needs major improvements, it is possible to finish with a bad record and then compete for a playoff spot the following campaign. The Washington Commanders this season and the Houston Texans in 2023 are recent examples.
But that kind of quick turnaround would require the Patriots to hit home runs in both free agency and the 2025 draft, and given Wolf and Groh’s recent lack of success in those areas, it’s hard to believe this go-around will be much different.
