Report: Patriots’ Rookie Demoted After Nightmarish Debut

September 20, 2021

New England Patriots rookie Rhamondre Stevenson has been demoted after his poor start to the season. He seems to be in head coach Bill Belichick’s dog house. The Patriots had a very good showing in week two of the NFL season. They were able to take out a poor Jets team, holding them to only 6 points for the whole game. The defense definitely came to play.

But Stevenson has not been a shining part of the Patriot’s offense. He has failed to do much of anything in the first two weeks of the NFL. season. He is now on the inactives list.

Patriots inactives: RB Rhamondre Stevenson, CB Shaun Wade, TE Devin Asiasi, OLB Ronnie Perkins, OT Trent Brown, OLB Kyle Van Noy.

The Patriots only need to list 6 players as inactive, with the roster at 52 players.
— Mike Reiss (@MikeReiss) September 19, 2021

Patriots running back coach Ivan Fears has had some tough words for his running backs after some ball security issues in week 1. He especially had words for Stevenson.

“He has to learn no matter when the ball comes out, even though you may think you’re down, the evidence doesn’t always back you. You have to hand the ball to the ref. That should be your goal.”

Report: Patriots’ Rookie Demoted After Nightmarish Debut

But Belichick was pleased with the team’s performance overall.

“Proud of our football team today. I thought these guys came back and really worked hard all week. I thought we made some improvement from what we did last week. Still, obviously, have a way to go, a lot of things we can do better,” Belichick said following the 25-6 win. “But I thought we did a lot of things better than we did last week. We just gotta keep grinding, keep working, keep stringing these days and weeks together and keep improving our football team. Had a lot of guys step up. Got some turnover opportunities, took advantage of those.

“Wilson made some pretty impressive throws — that kid’s gonna be a good player — he is a good player. Had a couple big plays offensively. Damien’s run was obviously a big one. Was good to get the ball in the end zone there. … Overall, probably just gotta do a little better job taking care of our scoring opportunities. Nick (Folk) did a good job. (Wind) was kinda swirling out there. Not the easiest day kick. He banged through a lot of big kicks there.”