Patriots first-round pick has a blunt message for social media critics

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Patriots first-round pick has a blunt message for social media critics

Chris Mason · MassLive

Wed, Jan 14, 2026 ·

2 min read

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FOXBOROUGH — Will Campbell is striving for perfection.

The Patriots rookie tackle knows when he doesn’t attain it, and has a message for naysayers that feel the need to weigh in, too.

“Honestly, I don’t give a (expletive) what anyone says,” Campbell said in the Patriots locker room on Wednesday. “It’s easy to type behind a Twitter account that is fake. I hold myself to the highest expectation of anybody. I want to be perfect.”

Against the Chargers last week, Campbell surrendered a third-quarter strip sack to veteran edge rusher Odafe Oweh , but the Patriots still went on to win the game, 16-3.

“Obviously, I didn’t pitch a shutout,” Campbell said. “I had two or three plays that I wish I could have back. But that’s $300 million in defensive ends and I’ve got a ton of respect for those dudes. It’s going to be like that every week in the playoffs.

“Like Coach (Mike) Vrabel said, you’ve gotta be willing to spill a little blood and violence. You’ve just gotta hope you don’t spill more than they do. That’s the name of the game.”

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Still just 22 years old, Campbell is doing his best to have a short memory when mistakes do happen. He’s trying to acknowledge them, correct them, then move on.

“It’s my job. It’s what they pay me to do.” Campbell said. “I can look at it and be like, ‘Yeah, I wish I had two plays back last week,’ but that’s wasting energy towards this week. Somebody told me that and it’s very true. I can’t be worrying about last week, because quite frankly, the second after it happened, it doesn’t (mean expletive) anymore. There’s not anything I can do about it, the people in the stands can do about it, you just have to move on and keep playing. You let can’t one play turn into 10.”

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