Will Josh Gordon be ready to go this week for Patriots?

Over the last week, it appears Josh Gordon has gone from a potentially low-risk, high-reward luxury item to someone the Patriots’ offense needs sooner rather than later.

The new wide receiver, who was a scratch from Sunday’s night’s game against the Lions (he’s been dogged by a hamstring), was spotted on the sidelines during the contest, a 26-10 loss for New England. It was another game where the Patriots’ wide receivers failed to make a serious impact. As a result, as New England continues to cross days off the calendar while it waits for Julian Edelman to return, the possibility of Gordon in the lineup for the Patriots has gone from possibility to inevitability.

On Monday afternoon, I asked Bill Belichick how close Gordon came to playing against the Lions.


“Yeah, I don't know,” Belichick said of Gordon, who warmed up on the field before the game before being deactivated. “We'll just take it day-by-day and see how it goes. There are a number of factors involved here. When he feels like he's ready, and we feel like he's ready and there's sufficient opportunity to back that up then we'll see about making him active. We just didn't feel like we were at that point (Sunday) night.”

If he’s healthy, Gordon could provide a boost for a receiving corps that has struggled to put up numbers through the first three games of the year. Overall, the Patriots’ receivers have accounted for 24 catches and 230 yards and three touchdowns. For some sort of context, Brandin Cooks — who was shipped to the Rams by New England this offseason — has 19 catches for 336 yards by himself through the first three games of the year.

Offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels wouldn’t speculate as to Gordon’s potential impact with the Patriots, but he did sound a positive note when it came to his ability to pick up the offense.

“I think he’s learning,” McDaniels said of the 6-foot-3, 225-pound Gordon. “You know, look, it’s not easy to come in in the middle of the week and try to pick everything up immediately.

“But, he’s doing a really good job of working hard at that and trying to get himself caught up so that he knows what to do when he’s out there and can do it at a dependable level. I think he’s really doing a good job of that, and then we’ll see as he progresses this week, if he gets any closer to being able to be active.”

McDaniels — who took a sizable portion of the blame for the offensive inadequacies in Sunday’s loss to the Lions — was asked if there was any thought given to the idea that the offense might be too complicated. Should things be streamlined a bit to help new guys like Gordon get up-to-speed in the offense faster?

“I think we’re always trying to figure out what the right things are to do with the team that we have each season,” McDaniels said. “We’re not averse to trying new things. We certainly have done that in the past and continue to do that. We’ve also played pretty good offense here and we have a way of doing things. We don’t always start the season exactly where we want to be. We want to try to improve and make progress each week.

“I’m not worried at all about Josh’s ability to pick up our system. He’s already demonstrated an ability to do that. I think he’ll be fine, and the guys we have are doing the same thing. They’re working hard each week and we have enough variance in our system to tweak it based on the opponent that we play — and that’s our job.”