Patriots Fanatic

Well, I didn’t quite expect that. With the Pats’ first two picks (the latter moving up in a trade), they took RB Laurence Mahoney and WR Chad Jackson. I don’t follow college ball, so I can’t comment on the quality of the players and whether they are likely to be good value for where they were picked, but at least at first I have to say I was surprised. Given how old the LB corps is, I thought for sure they’d take a LB or someone they felt they could convert to LB. And maybe a CB, too.

But no! A RB and a WR. However, when you think about it, you can’t complain too much about taking people at those positions. Dillon is 32. Falk is 30. Pass is pushing 30. They have to start getting younger there. As for the flankers, there’s Branch, Caldwell, Troy Brown, and Bethel Johnson. Troy has been great for this team, but he’s on his last legs. Bethel is a failed experiment. It appears the only thing he knows how to do is run a flag, post, or go. If it doesn’t involve running mostly straight down the field, he can’t do it. And that’s even before we get into his numerous healthy scratches for having bad practices or for disciplinary reasons. Especially if the Pats can pick up one more decent WR, I can’t see Bethel on the team this year.

Is this it for Pass, too? Will the Patriots really keep four RBs? Then again, maybe they’ll cut Klecko (especially if they don’t think he can do it at LB) and use Pass as a fullback instead of playing games with Klecko, Seymour (don’t EVER do that again) and various OLmen.

ESPN’s Michael Smith was on WEEI today saying that the Pats are in the thick of the Jevon Walker hunt. I’d imagine they’d have to trade away a pretty high draft choice to pull that off. And Walker’s coming off ACL surgery. Well, we’ll find out soon enough with the draft this weekend.

Football Outsiders has the news.

The guys from Football Outsiders have a very interesting article out on the importance of footwork to offensive linemen. Check it out!

Here’s the latest AFC East analysis from Football Outsiders (a great site that should be on every football fan’s list of sites to regularly visit).

When the details of the extension came out, I was surprised there wasn’t more front-loading, given the cap space the Pats have this year. I figured they’d want to use some of that up now when the had the room, preserving future flexibility. But I had forgotten about the “can’t have two raises in a year” rule.

Not surprisingly, the Patriots didn’t forget about that rule and ESPN has reported that the $18.66mil option bonus is broken into two pieces — a $6.66mil piece that can be paid anytime between 5 August 2006 and next March and a $12mil piece due next March. I think it’s fair to say that the $6.66mil will be paid on 5 August , thereby moving a decent chunk of the contract onto this year’s cap.

Here’s an interesting exchange from today’s press conference (via Reiss’s blog):

Do you like Bill Belichick?

“I don’t care who it is or what’s going on, I think, just to be real honest, I don’t care if we’re brothers, sometimes you fight but at the end of the day you still love each other. I don’t love Coach Belichick like I love my kids and my wife, but at the same time I think there’s definitely a level of respect I have for him, when you look at his track record, he’s the winningest coach in the last four years. That speaks for itself. Myself, I’m like a sponge and I know he has a lot of knowledge and wisdom on a lot of issues as far as football is concerned that can help me out. He’s coached a lot of great players. He’s always pushed me to go to higher levels and that’s something that I definitely respect and would like to grow with as well.”

Mind you, I don’t really care that Seymour doesn’t “like” BB — that he respects him and will execute his game plans is good enough. But I do admit that I’d love to know what the players think of him. My guess is that they don’t really like him much at all (let’s be honest — between Holley’s book, Halberstam’s book, and the evidence we’ve seen, BB is probably not the most fun guy to be around), but like Seymour, they like that he can put them in position to win.

UPDATE:
Apparently Reiss’s transcript left out the opening three words: “Why wouldn’t I?” Unlike some commenters, I don’t think that changes the meaning of the rest of Seymour’s answer.

Though the contract can’t officially be signed until August because of NFL rules that a contract can’t be adjusted more than once in 12 months, ESPN reports the Pats and Seymour have reached a long-term deal. According to Reiss, the Patriots have confirmed the ESPN story.

UPDATE:
The rule is apparently that a player can’t get a raise more than once in twelve months. So the contract can be executed immediately, and in fact (according to ESPN) is expected to be executed later this week, though the big money can’t kick in until later.

Martin Grammatica????

And Tebucky “How many of my own guys can I knock off the tackle” Jones?

I might have to start seriously wondering about Bill and Scott after this.

Sunday, Sept. 10 – vs. Bills, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Sept. 17 – at Jets, 4:15 p.m.
Sunday, Sept. 24 – vs. Broncos, 8:15 p.m.
Sunday, Oct. 1 – at Bengals, 4:15 p.m.
Sunday, Oct. 8 – vs. Dolphins, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Oct. 15 – BYE
Sunday, Oct. 22 – at Bills, 1 p.m.
Monday, Oct. 30 – at Vikings, 8:30 p.m.
Sunday, Nov. 5 – vs. Colts, 8:15 p.m.
Sunday, Nov. 12 – vs. Jets, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Nov. 19 – at Packers, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Nov. 26 – vs. Bears, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 3 – vs. Lions, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 10 – at Dolphins, 1 p.m.
Sunday. Dec. 17 – vs. Texans, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 24 – at Jaguars, 1 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 31 – at Titans, 1 p.m.

Weeks 10-17 (except for the Christmas Eve week) are subject to being switched to NBC’s Sunday night game on twelve days notice.