brandon bolden

Good stuff from OT on Bolden. As I’ve said all summer I really like how hard Bolden runs and he also catches the ball pretty well too. He could be a real asset until Shane Vereen returns. Hopefully he’ll continue to get touches and show improvement.

I’ve been a Brandon Bolden fan for a while now and I was excited to see him come through after getting on the field for the first time this season. Always liked how he ran and with 100 yards of offense, I think we’ll be seeing even more of him.

I’ve remained intrigued by Bolden and these two bits from Field Yates’ observations below only reinforce that. He’ll need to make some plays in these next two games.

As they do each day, the Patriots got receiving work in for their running backs. After taking stock of the six backs on the roster, we’d rank them like this in terms of receiving ability: Shane Vereen, Leon Washington, Brandon Bolden, Stevan Ridley, LeGarrette Blount and George Winn. The top four are particularly comfortable handling the football in the receiving game, with Bolden getting the slight edge over Ridley due to route-running ability. Speaking of Bolden, he remains a player of interest for us. He doesn’t have any glaring deficiencies to his game, and we saw in small doses last season that he can be an effective runner. Whether or not he’s shown the coaching staff enough since his suspension in the middle of last season to take carries away from Ridley and others is a big question entering the season. He appears to be behind Blount as things currently stand, but with as much talent as Bolden has, he should have a chance to earn some carries back with a strong rest of his preseason.

It’s really been like trying to get water out of a rock the last couple weeks for Patriots news, especially since we’ve been ignoring the Hernando sitch for the most part. But now as we cross the 4th of July we begin the final countdown to training camp and real football news. Just two more weekends…

Here’s a tidbit we’ve been hitting on this offseason… how big a role will Brandon Bolden play this year?

A question we’ve asked ourselves before and look forward to finding an answer to is: What’s in store for second-year running back Brandon Bolden? The 2012 undrafted rookie was blossoming prior to a Week 6 injury last season, looking very much like a reliable between-the-tackles runner with good contact strength and burst. An injury coupled with a four-game suspension relegated Bolden to a special-teams role upon his return, but, based on ability alone, he has what it takes to resume an offensive job. Both he and Shane Vereen are among the running backs who may be called upon for bigger duties in 2013.