Pats Pulpit
The veteran safety is back after a seven-game absence.
The New England Patriots defense received an unexpected boost on Monday. As was announced by the NFL, safety Jabrill Peppers has been reinstated to the team’s active roster after missing the last seven games on the commissioner’s exempt list.
While his legal situation following an October arrest remains unresolved, Peppers is therefore back with the team and permitted to participate in all football activities. What does that mean for the club, though? Let’s assess the move.
Before his legal issues began, Peppers had been a mainstay in the New England secondary. Playing 241 defensive snaps over the first four weeks of the season, he was on the field for 94 percent of reps.
It remains to be seen how quickly the 29-year-old will return to those levels of participation, but his mere presence improves the safety room as a whole. Peppers is an experienced, starter-level player with a knack for the football, who was voted a team captain back in September; having him on the roster makes it a better and deeper one.
In total, New England now has seven safeties signed between its active roster and practice squad:
53-man roster (6): Kyle Dugger (23), Marte Mapu (15), Jaylinn Hawkins (21), Dell Pettus (24), Brenden Schooler (41), Jabrill Peppers (5)
Practice squad (1): Mark Perry (34)
With Peppers back on the 53-man roster, the Patriots have their nominal top four safeties available for the first time all year. How the group consisting of Peppers, Kyle Dugger, Marte Mapu and Jaylinn Hawkins will be used — and what role backups Dell Pettus and Brenden Schooler will play — remains to be seen.
Peppers was voted one of six team captains before the start of the regular season. Shortly thereafter, Ja’Whaun Bentley and David Andrews were lost for the year with injury — prompting the Patriots to name Kyle Dugger and Hunter Henry as replacement captains.
When Peppers was sent to the commissioner’s exempt list, meanwhile, his spot among the captains was left open. Does that mean he will don the “C” patch again once returning to the field? That is a question for head coach Jerod Mayo and the other captains — Dugger, Henry, Jacoby Brissett, Deatrich Wise Jr. and Joe Cardona — to answer.
After a series of transactions last week, the Patriots were left with only 52 of their 53 roster spots occupied heading into their Week 12 game against the Miami Dolphins. That final spot remaining open until Peppers’ activation means that no follow-up move was necessary to move him from the exempt list to the active roster.
Of course, this also means that the Patriots will have to open up a spot if they plan to activate offensive lineman Cole Strange. The former first-round draft pick returned to practice last Wednesday, opening the 21-day window for him to return from the physically unable...
