Ever since placing running back Antonio Gibson on injured reserve following the torn ACL he had suffered in Week 5 against the Buffalo Bills, the New England Patriots had an open spot on their roster. On Monday, they finally filled it: the team of head coach Mike Vrabel claimed outside linebacker Caleb Murphy off waivers after he was let go by the Los Angeles Chargers over the weekend.
Let’s assess what the move means for the Patriots beyond them filling out their 53-man squad.
Additional edge depth
Led by starters Harold
Landry and K’Lavon Chaisson, the Patriots exited Week 7 with five outside linebackers on their roster plus two more on the practice squad. Adding three-year veteran Murphy to the group gives them an extra layer of depth and experience.
Active roster (6): Harold Landry III (2), K’Lavon Chaisson (44), Keion White (99), Elijah Ponder (91), Anfernee Jennings (33), Caleb Murphy (—)
Practice squad (2): Truman Jones (54), Bradyn Swinson (43)
Where Murphy will land on the depth chart will be seen, but the fact is that the Patriots have gotten inconsistent production out of their depth and rotational options on the edge. Former starter Keion White has been quiet while. playing less than a third of defensive snaps so far; undrafted rookie Elijah Ponder is mostly a special teamer; Anfernee Jennings has missed the last two games after sustaining an ankle injury and is a rather one-dimensional player mostly used on early downs.
Murphy, on the other hand, offers both a background in the kicking game as well as plenty of…
Pass rush experience
You might not know it given his NFL production so far — one half-sack and six total quarterback pressures in 14 career games — but Murphy entered the league off an impressive college career as a pass rusher. Starting out at Grand Valley State (the alma mater of former Patriots Pro Bowler Matthew Judon), where he notched one sack in eight games over a two-year period, he transferred to Ferris State in 2020.
Once with the Bulldogs, his career took off and he became the most disruptive Division II defender in the country between 2021 and 2022. In those two seasons, he registered a combined 40 sacks and 60.5 tackles for loss.
Murphy did all that despite lacking an outstanding athletic profile: his 5.08 Relative Athletic Score had him ranked only 806th out of 1,636 defensive ends between 1987 to 2023; the 6-foot-3, 254-pounder had solid baseline traits all around but lacked any truly defining skills entering the league.
And yet, the former rookie free agent managed to find a job — first with the Tennessee Titans and later the Chargers — and on occasion flash his potential as a contributor on the defensive side of the ball.
Given the uncertain state of the Patriots’ edge, particularly with the trade deadline on the horizon, Murphy at least provides another card for the team to play. That is true on defense, and possibly even more so on special teams.
Special teams help
The aforementioned Elijah Ponder might be the single player most directly impacted by Murphy’s addition. The UDFA served as a third or fourth edge each of the last three weeks, seeing part-time action on defense while playing considerable snaps in the kicking game: since Week 5, he played 16.4% of defensive snaps and 58.1% on special teams.
Unless a player like Keion White or Anfernee Jennings ends up on the trade block, Murphy’s past as a kicking game performer suggests that he might just end up pushing Ponder back onto the weekly inactives list. The 25-year-old, after all, has superior experience and versatility in the game’s third phase.
Joining the Patriots with a total of 335 career special teams snaps on his résumé, Murphy has lined up on five different units through the years. This year alone — he played six games for the Chargers before being waived — he saw action on kickoff return, kickoff coverage, punt return, punt coverage and field goal/extra point block.
As a result, he might be a plug-and-play pickup for the Patriots.
Marginal cap impact
As a waiver claim, Murphy will arrive in New England with a contract in hand: with the exception of a signing bonus — which his original pact did not have to begin with — his entire remaining deal did transfer from the Chargers to the Patriots upon him getting picked up off waivers.
What does this mean? Murphy signed a one-year futures pact with the Chargers during the offseason at a value of $1.03 million — the minimum amount for a player of his experience. With the season already seven weeks deep, not all of that sum will move over to the Patriots; only $629,444 remain on the balance sheet.
That number, which includes no guarantees, simultaneously works as his salary and his salary cap number. Murphy is scheduled to become a restricted free agent after the season.
