After the New England Patriots made the final selection in the 2025 NFL Draft, VP of player personnel Eliot Wolf spoke with the local media to give insight into his team’s newest additions. When it was
his turn to speak about cornerback Kobee Minor, it became clear that the team viewed his competitiveness as a highly valued trait.
Eight months later, that same competitiveness has helped Minor join the Patriots’ 53-man roster. On Thursday, ahead of New England’s regular season finale against the Miami Dolphins, he was promoted from the practice squad.
“Kobee works his tail off. An extreme competitor, which is why I love him,” said Patriots inside linebackers coach and acting defensive coordinator Zak Kuhr.
“He’s on the ‘dirty show,’ on the ‘dirty defense,’ giving the looks. He’s competing. He’s competing with everybody there. You know, Mack [Hollins], [Stefon] Diggs, whatever. He’s not backing down. He brings a decently physical style play at the corner position and he’s just gotten better throughout the year and throughout the weeks. So, I think it’s well deserved.”
Minor was the last player in this year’s draft to hear his name called, joining the Patriots as 2025’s Mr. Irrelevant. The volatile nature of his college career — he spent time at Texas Tech, Indiana and Memphis — likely contributed to almost falling through the cracks on draft day, but New England scooped him up at the 11th hour.
The 23-year-old failed to make it past roster cutdown day, but shortly thereafter found a home on the Patriots practice squad. He has resided there ever since, seeing game action on three separate occasions as a standard elevation.
Minor played 40 total snaps between defense and special teams, registering one tackle. Now part of the active roster, he might get additional opportunities to add to those numbers, and do what he has done going back to his college days: compete.
