{"id":216949,"date":"2026-04-03T02:57:25","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T02:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/216949\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T02:57:25","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T02:57:25","slug":"front-office-connection-could-make-this-miami-player-patriots-draft-target","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/216949\/","title":{"rendered":"Front Office Connection Could Make This Miami Player Patriots Draft Target"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New England Patriots<\/a> could be looking for pass rushers in the NFL Draft after recording just 35 regular-season sacks last season. Could they target University of Miami defensive lineman\u00a0Akheem Mesidor?<\/p>\n

Mesidor has a connection to the Patriots via\u00a0Patriots personnel executive Alonzo Highsmith. Highsmith was the Miami Hurricanes’ General Manager of Football Operations when Mesidor transferred to the university. MassLive’s Mark Daniels noted<\/a> the Patriots connection and tabbed Mesidor as a potential draft target because of it.<\/p>\n

“A talented edge rusher, Mesidor is an older prospect who\u2019ll turn 25 next month,” wrote Daniels. “He has solid size at 6-foot-3, 259 pounds and plays with a high motor. Mesidor was very productive in college, making 12.5 sacks and forcing four fumbles last season. He earned All-ACC first-team honors. Mesidor met with the Patriots at the Combine.”<\/p>\n

He has already met with the team, and at least one person in the building has experience with him. On top of that, he produced last season on a team that played in the National Championship.<\/p>\n

The Patriots lost K’Lavon Chaisson in free agency and signed Dre-Mont Jones to help replace him. They had similar numbers last season, so the pass rush still needs an upgrade.<\/p>\n

Even though Mike Vrabel does not think the team should draft for need, they need a pass rusher who can impact games consistently. Mesidor could end up being that player.<\/p>\n

More NFL:\u00a0Final Patriots Unrestricted Free Agent Reportedly Meets With AFC South Squad<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The New England Patriots could be looking for pass rushers in the NFL Draft after recording just 35…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":216950,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124],"class_list":["post-216949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216949"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216949\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}