10 Things We Learned Last Night

NFL. In no particular order, here are the 10 things we learned from the Patriots in last night’s preseason game, a 27-20 win over the New York Giants:

1. The race for the No. 48 through the No. 53 roster spots remains open. There were small hints here and there last night of some movement, but for the most part, no clear favorites emerged in the muddled race for the final spots on the New England roster. Those players who were on the fringes were happy with the chances they got last night, as well as the rest of the preseason. “We’ve gone out and worked really hard,” said quarterback Matt Gutierrez, who threw his first touchdown pass of the preseason, but is probably a lock for the practice squad. “Now, it’s up to the coaches and the decision makers to do their jobs.”

2. Oscar Lua’s injury could have implications for those players on the bubble on cutdown day. The rookie inside linebacker went down with what the Patriots said was a leg injury early in the game. The USC product limped to the sidelines, and could end up on injured reserve. His absence could complicate the cutdown process, as the Patriots are looking to go from 76 to 54 (there’s still the Asante Samuel roster exemption, at least for now) this weekend. But an injury can make things considerably more complicated. “When there is a degree of uncertainty and you have to make a guesstimate and just go on partial information, then that’s what you have to do,” Head Coach Bill Belichick said when asked about the potential of an injury right before a designated cutdown day. “That’s certainly not the ideal situation. You’d like for it to be more complete.” Inside linebacker Eric Alexander played well last night, finishing with a team-high 13 tackles and 1/2 a sack. Alexander’s performance last night, combined with Lua’s absence, could prove beneficial to the Louisiana State product, who appeared to be on the bubble for a roster spot prior to last night’s game. “I don’t know what happened to him, but he’s a great player and I was kind of sad to see him leave the game,” Alexander said of Lua. “Hopefully, he’ll be OK. … I believe he’ll be OK. He’s a good linebacker. I think he’ll do well in this league.”

3. He won’t get the sort of run that Logan Mankins got as a rookie, but based on his performance in the preseason, defensive back Brandon Meriweather will see plenty of time this year with the Patriots. Meriweather put the wraps on a successful preseason last night, playing well into the fourth quarter for the fourth consecutive preseason game and looking comfortable. He finished last night with nine tackles, including a nice stop on a third-and-goal situation where he (and Alexander and defensive back Mel Mitchell) met Giants running back Brandon Jacobs at the point of attack and turned him away. Meriweather started at free safety — he had been playing a lot of corner thus far in the preseason — and his versatility will likely come into play at some time this season. “There were a couple of plays that looked like he might have been a little out of position on, but I think that’s true of everybody,” said Belichick. “We’ll take a look at the whole body of work rather than just try to go on one or two plays.” Meriweather did appear to suffer an injury late in the game — he got his legs tied up with linebacker Chad Brown on a tackle and limped to the sidelines. He was not made available to the media after the game for comment.

4. Heading into the regular season, Matt Cassel is the No. 2 quarterback. Even if this seems like an obvious statement now, it wasn’t so obvious after the first two weeks of the preseason, where the USC product struggled mightily at times. However, he finished last night 10-for-14 for 99 yards, and certainly looked comfortable under center, as comfortable as he looked all preseason. He made several nice throws, engineering a 13-play, 87-yard drive that culminated with a one-yard touchdown run by Heath Evans. And, as the Globe’s Mike Reiss noted on his blog, Cassel smartly hurried the No. 2 offense to the line to draw a 12-men-on-the-field penalty against the Giants. “You always strive to be the best you can be, and with the reps that I had in preseason, I feel like I’ve made tremendous strides from where I was, from even last year,” he said afterward. “Going into the season, I feel comfortable with where I’m at in the offense. Looking forward, there are a lot of things I need to work on and get better at, and I’ll continue to do that.”

5. It looks like Bill Belichick will open the year with his sixth different starting punter since the beginning of the 2000 season. There’s always plenty of turnover at the punter position, but for a franchise that prides itself on stability, it’s a puzzling element to Belichick’s overall team-building process. But as it stands right now, Chris Hanson will open the season as New England’s No. 1 punter. (Lee Johnson, Ken Walter, Josh Miller, Todd Sauerbrun and Brooks Barnard have all started at punter since the start of the 2000 season.) Hanson had a good night, dropping two of his four punts inside the 20, including one in the first half that was downed at the three, and averaging 35 yards a kick on the night. “I thought it was OK,” Belichick said afterward. “I’ve seen a lot worse, put it that way.”

6. Heath Evans gets our award as the preseason iron man. Evans was the only guy on offense to line up behind all four quarterbacks, and played well into the second half in all four preseason games. He wasn’t surprised he got so many snaps. “I don’t think it was a shock,” he said. “I think there’s a lot that’s asked of me, and I need those reps to be able to perform at a high level when those things are asked. So whether it’s running the ball or carrying the ball or blocking or special teams, I need those reps, because every week it’s different.”

7. The New England starters really didn’t take this one too seriously. Other than Evans, New England rolled out backups on both offense and defense to start last night’s game. (The first sign for many that this wasn’t going to be a whole lot of heavy lifting for the starters came when you got a glimpse of linebacker Tedy Bruschi, who appeared to be wearing sneakers when he came out for the coin toss.) There was a positive to come out of it — the first series of the night featured New England’s No. 2 defense against New York’s No. 1 offense. Getting a chance to see the backups against an opposing set of starters was illuminating for the coaching staff, and a great experience for the players. “I think we held up,” said linebacker Pierre Woods, who finished with a pair of sacks on the night. “It took them awhile to even score on the goal line. We held up, and everybody played hard. Everybody gave it their all, so all we can do is be proud of what we did.”

8. Bam Childress is likely still on the bubble and Matt Gutierrez is likely bound for the practice squad, but last night they both showed a willingness to try just about anything to make the team. Childress added to his burgeoning legend by lining up at tailback last night, and ended up with 27 rushing yards and 39 receiving yards. Childress, who has also played cornerback with the Patriots, was matter-of-fact about the whole thing after the game. “It was a little different,” he said, “but it was just going out there and reading my blocks and hitting up in there wherever I see a crease or see a hole I just hit it and let my instincts take over.” As for Gutierrez, he saw time on the kickoff team. “I had an idea I might get an opportunity,” he said. “Any opportunity to get on the field is valuable. It’s a chance to help contribute to the team.”

9. Jared Lorenzen is a load. We knew that he was a big dude, but standing next to him in the tunnel underneath the stands, there’s no way he’s the 6-foot-4, 285-pound backup quarterback listed as in the Giants’ media notes — he’s much bigger than that. By our count, he was in the game for 40 snaps, and dropped back just 23 times … but was still somehow sacked seven times. That’s really astounding. Small wonder New York Head Coach Tom Coughlin was succinct in his assessment of the backup QB’s performance. “It wasn’t very good,” he said. “It wasn’t good enough. We had some opportunities and we missed them. But, I expected that we would play better.”

10. No one wants the regular season to start more than the players. While jogging from the field to the locker room after the game, Giants running back Brandon Jacobs stopped a group of reporters in the tunnel underneath the stands and said with a big smile: “The bull [bleep] is now over.” (We’re assuming he was referring to the preseason.) The feeling was the same in the New England locker room, only not as profane. “Me, I’m ready to play the Jets,” said Evans, who had a team-high four preseason touchdowns for Patriots. “We’ll get better this week — I’ll get better this week. But we’re ready for the regular-season to start.”