Today's Dose of Optimism - Secondary

Despite the fact that Brees seemingly had his way with the Patriot's secondary yesterday, I still have high hopes for this group. Chung, from multiple angles, appeared to be the best defensive player on the field for the Pats yesterday, which is a phenomenal sign. If he can stay healthy this year (missed 8 games last year, and played with a cast on for others) that will do wonders to shore up the back of the secondary. Not much has been said about McCourty this preseason, and I am not sure if that is a good or bad thing, but I think we would be hearing more if he was getting burned every practice, so I am leaning more towards good. Arrington has looked solid and it seems every day I hear something good about Dowling. Greg Bedard used a good term the other day, "stacking success," which is exactly what Dowling has to do. He has to continue to bring it every day to prove his consistency to the coaches and his teammates. One little nugget I picked up in a column by Field Yates of EPN Boston was something about Tavon Wilson. He said that he has noticed that Wilson has an uncanny ability to time the snap and blitz. It seems that while we have talented players, we have lacked a Rodney Harrison type in recent years who can time the snap perfectly and get back into the backfield in a hurry. Many people though he was a reach, but maybe Belichick and co. took extra notice of his football acumen where others brushed it off. This rookie class looks to be fairly impressive again, and after the 06-08 drafts, the last 4 drafts appear to be shaping up pretty nicely.