I know, he is a tight end, but the statistics tell the story. I admit I have been with the chorus of people who were very happy we got Brandon Lloyd, but due to concerns about his speed and ability to separate still feel strongly we need to find a #1 WR that is an elite deep threat to pair with Lloyd at least in time for Brady to have 3-4 years to put it to use with his amazing talents and I have faith we will. However, in the meantime the numbers tell the story, Rob Gronkowski is our most prodigious deep threat with Brandon Lloyd enhancing our deep receiving event radius/area. This is unconventional for a lot of reasons, but so is our offense in the first place. Meaning, generally the WR core of a team provides the primary receiving weapons with TEs expanding the capabilities whereas ours is built TE heavy. Nothing wrong with that and I think rather then just going away from WRs BB is looking to build an advanced and well rounded team and is doing it piece by piece. So additional WRs in the future will be additional building blocks not necessarily a move away from TEs, etc. Maybe BB sees TEs as the foundation and you build an amazing one then find another WR to add building an amazing overall machine/team. Imagine an elite 07 version of Moss teamed with Lloyd and the TEs, Welker, etc. With Vereen or Ahern you could go from 5 receiver sets to 4s with one RB without changing personnel and it would be ALMOST impossible to cover.

Notice Rob Gronkowski in the Rams game and that nearly all his catches were over 20 yards and some over 30. The large hands and length which gives him a larger catch radius are both keys to a deep threat. So, for all those(including myself who liked Lloyd but feels we still need more in the WR department, he has no backup really)saying we need a deep threat. We have one! Its Gronk!

Lloyd is averaging 11.8 yards per catch this year. His longest reception was 27 yards. I believe Lloyd will grow along with Brady and this will increase and a bigger sample size will help, but Gronk is also still growing and has been injured so it flows both ways.

Gronk on the other hand is averaging 13.5 yards per catch and was doing 14.7 last year. His longest reception this year was 41 yards and 52 last year. So this further explains why Gronk being injured hurt us so much in the superbowl. Many pointed to Gronk but more in the sense that he is hard to cover and the mismatches, and while thats true I believe the long ball element he brings was just as important to all that.