It was notable to me that Tom Brady mentioned veteran receiver Danny Amendola first when assessing where the Patriots go from here, without Julian Edelman. Brady has a similar level of trust with Amendola, as was evidenced in Super Bowl LI.
The Patriots have managed Amendola's playing time carefully in recent years -- hoping to keep him healthy for the long haul -- with the 2016 season a good example of it.
Through the first 12 games of 2016, Amendola had averaged 22.1 offensive snaps per game. That ranked behind Edelman (57.2 percent), Chris Hogan (49.3) and Malcolm Mitchell (29.9).
The Pats are still going to monitor Amendola's workload. This writer feels 40-50 percent of the snaps are a realistic range. The story added in 2015, Amendola played 51.5 percent of the snaps and totaled a line of 65-648-3. The writer went on to say getting Mitchell healthy to fill some of the void is the team's best-case scenario at this point.
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