Patriots Fanatic

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.

There have been some reports buzzing around that Kraft “personally intervened” in the Troy Brown negotiations to make sure that Brown re-signed with the team.

I really hope that didn’t happen.

Those of you who have been fans since 2001 and here nothing but glowing praise of Kraft (unless you make the mistake of reading Wrong Borges and Nick Cafardo) might not realize that fandom had many doubts about Kraft all through the 1990s. When he bought the team he seemed a lot like a Mini-Me to Jerry Jones’s Dr. Evil. Kraft was seen with a stopwatch timing players at camp, he was constantly glad-handing fans around the stadium on game days and looked like he might turn into a meddler, a la Jones or Steinbrenner. Then there was l’affaire Parcells and the long decay of the Carroll years, where it was clear that any player with a grudge or a whine could jump the chain of command and go to Kraft. Not good.

And now we have these reports. On one hand it could be nothing. No matter how much you like Troy Brown, you have to concede he’s a player at the end of the line. So this isn’t like the owner’s intervention determining the future of the team. On the other hand, if players begin to feel that they can evade Belichick and Pioli and get things into Kraft’s hands, that’s a very bad precedent given the system that Belichick and Pioli have put in place. If Kraft makes a lie of Belichick’s pledges to his players that everyone gets treated the same, it could get nasty, especially when the inevitable stinker season comes along.

So lets all hope those reports are wrong.

Then we were saved by the Arrival of Bill and the concomitant act of Kraft essentially agreeing to butt out of football operations. And as far as we can tell, he’s stuck to it, even as fan favorites and his own favorite player (Bledsoe) were released or traded.

So, Vinatieri’s a Colt.

Then you’ll have to pardon me for saying that I hope he shanks every FG he attempts this year, and I want him to get his bell rung when Indianapolis plays in Foxboro in the upcoming season. And I’ll be out there booing every time he steps onto the field.

Yes, I’m thankful for the kicks he’s made over the years. And if Bill “Intercepting Manning should be against the rules” Polian wants to overpay for him, you can’t really blame him for going. But he chose to join the enemy — he’s a member of the enemy now and that’s how I’m treating him. And I think he has to knock Curtis Martin off the top of the Traitor’s List.

While it is true that there’s no way the Pats should have matched the poison pill deal that the Jet offerted to Martin, the Pats shouldn’t have let it get to that. Martin was clearly a tremendous bargain and the team should have re-negotiated his contract (or at least attempted to) instead of letting him get to free agency. “How is that different than Vinatieri?”, you may say. For starters, Vinatieri has been the top-paid kicker the league and the offer from the Pats that he rejected would have kept him there. So this isn’t the case of a team refusing to up the salary of the player who is worth far, far more than his contract.

To be fair to Vinatieri, he did take the high road and said all the right things at his Indy press conference — refusing to take whacks at the Patriots even though it has been widely reported (even before free agency began) that he wanted out of New England and had been incensed over his pay, over how negotiations have been handled both this year and in the past, and over the use/non-use of the franchise tag on him.

So, I’m sorry. I’ll thank you for what you did here, but I am not wishing you good luck going forward. Good health? Sure. But after that, I hope you have horrible seasons to come. You could have gone to a different team, but you went to the Colts. You’re dead to me now.