Patriots Mock Draft 3.0: New England Trades Back Into First Round

What are the New England Patriots going to do with the No. 4 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft? We will try and answer that question in this five-part mock draft series — with our next scenario getting a bit bold.

Mock Draft 1.0 | Mock Draft 2.0

The Patriots are in “wait and see” mode when it comes to the 2025 NFL Draft.

Who will be available? Should they be proactive and make a trade? Have they already settled on a specific player?

We have been cycling through all the options currently being presented at One Patriot Place, doing our best to answer the questions above. New England might not be lucky enough to have a generational talent fall into its lap, though, and might not like the value of filling its last need at No. 4 — which brings us to a bold choice.

The New England Patriots make two trades, select tight end Tyler Warren with No. 7 pick and offensive tackle Josh Simmons with the No. 26 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft.

We got funky with this one, so you’ll have to be patient while we take care of some admin.

Miami’s Cam Ward, Colorado’s Travis Hunter and Penn State’s Abdul Carter are increasingly looking like they’ll be off the board by the time New England makes its selection at No. 4. LSU’s Will Campbell wouldn’t be a bad consolation in that scenario, but we already took him in the last go around so it made sense to move into a different direction — an entirely different direction.

The Patriots would be silly not to entertain this trade, as they pick up extra value based on every trade chart known to man. The New York Jets were able to move up and draft Colorado’s Shedeur Sanders by giving up their second-round pick, which allowed us to get creative and trade back into the first round to address a gigantic need after swinging for the fences at No. 7.

Tyler Warren is perhaps the best offensive player in this draft class, with the skillset to become a matchup nightmare for opposing defenses. Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels knows a thing or two about maximizing the strengths of similar prospects and could get the most out of a player who would immediately become a difference-maker for Drake Maye. You can’t just ignore left tackle, though, which is why we moved back into the first round for Simmons. New England would be taking a bit of a gamble on his health, but outside of a mid-season injury, there’s nothing we don’t like about the guy.

We made picks and trades across all seven rounds, filling in the gaps to round out the roster. You can find the full results via ESPN’s Mock Draft Simulator, and our reasoning, below:

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We didn’t even realize it at the moment, but we ended up with four guys from the same school in one mock draft.

Oops!

TreVeyon Henderson, Seth McLaughlin and Ty Hamilton are worthy picks, though, with the former having the talent to either fill a classic third-down role in the backfield or take on part of the workload from Rhamondre Stevenson. Hamilton being our lone defensive pick makes sense, as his scheme versatility would allow him to contribute early on. You can never have too much depth on the lines. McLaughlin is someone we talked about last week, but his inclusion essentially serves as a high-floor backup plan behind the likes of Garrett Bradbury and Cole Strange.

Ozzy Trapilo is another prospect we’ve targeted in the past, and although we highly doubt he lasts this far into the draft, you can’t beat grabbing a potential spot-starter in the third round.

Kyle Williams and Nick Nash will come in and compete for spots in the receiver room, with the former serving as a potential upgrade over the likes of Kayshon Boutte and Javon Baker. Nash was a prolific college receiver who has experience playing quarterback, giving him the exact profile we’ve seen find success under McDaniels. It’s a flier worth taking.

Ryan Fitzgerald? The Patriots need a kicker, and that’s about as in-depth an explanation you’ll get out of us when it comes to special teamers.

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