Rodney Harrison Believes Patriots Should Use Top Pick On This Position

The Patriots could go in several directions with their first-round pick in late-April’s NFL draft, and all would make plenty of sense.

Mac Jones — and New England’s offense as a whole — could improve if the organization brought in a wide receiver with legitimate superstar potential. The Patriots’ secondary also could use a reinforcement or two, especially given the uncertain futures of stalwarts J.C. Jackson and Devin McCourty.

But if you ask former New England safety Rodney Harrison, Bill Belichick and company should take a linebacker with the 21st overall selection in the 2022 draft.

“I just need a young, fast, athletic linebacker that’s an excellent playmaker that can run sideline to sideline,” Harrison recently said Friday on WEEI’s “Merloni & Fauria,” as transcribed by Patriots Wire. “A guy that can play on every single down. A difference-maker. A guy that can blitz. A guy that can drop into coverage.

“You can find that guy in the first and second rounds. But definitely (draft a player) on the defensive side of the ball.”

New England’s aging and slow linebacking corps was exposed down the stretch of the team’s regular season and in the blowout playoff loss to the Buffalo Bills. Two members of that group — Dont’a Hightower and Ja’Whaun Bentley — are impending free agents, so the Patriots very well could need bodies in general to stabilize their depth at the position.

The Patriots have been linked to linebackers in mock drafts over the past month-plus, including Georgia’s Nakobe Dean and Utah’s Devin Lloyd.