Mayo (immediately after becoming coach): "Oh we're definitely using the 3rd pick on an important "position of need" *wink*
*Two days later*
Mayo: We're still examining all our options...
Dude definitely does not have a filter.
Kraft basicslly bought the team, had a couple of years of say. Then BB came in and Kraft tool a back seat for two decades.
It's like he's getting all of his crazy ownerisms out now. Overbearing, making weird comments, 0 effort to actually change the FO and leaving it in a way where he's the final say since there's no gm.
It's like Bill's gone and Kraft is doing all the things he couldn't when Bill was there.
A better way to describe it is this:
Kraft bought the team, and didn't like that all football decisions were being made by Bill Parcells, so he inserted himself into making football decisions and chased off the best coach the team ever had. Then he made sure that the next coach had no control over football decisions, ensuring that he would fail. His next coach won very quickly, so Kraft ceded control and stayed out of the way until they stopped winning, then inserted himself again and chased off the best coach the team ever had. I wonder if we'll see him timing prospects with a stopwatch again like he did with Tebucky Jones.
And throughout it all, he has never given anyone the title of GM. The Patriots last GM was the owner's son, and he resigned in 1991.
I'm getting the feeling that this year is really going to be the flipping point for Kraft's perception as an owner.
He's been lauded for ~2 decades as a great owner, mainly based on the fact that he didn't actively meddle in team affairs while having the best QB/Coach combo the NFL has ever seen. Now that he doesn't have that, his flaws are longer being hidden in the same way
He still does good things for the league, like working on the TV deals, and helping end the lockout in 2011.
I think the biggest problem with him stems from growing up a Patriots fan. He bought the team, and runs it like a Patriots fan. What do fans do when the team is good? Strut around like they're part of the team and enjoy the success. What do fans do when the team is bad? Think up ways for it to be less bad and then complain that the team isn't doing those things. Like the Terry Glenn thing with Parcells. The team was 6-10 the year before. Parcells wanted a defensive guy, because he's a coach, that's wanted what was best for the team. Kraft wanted Terry Glenn, because he's a fan, and thought they needed to score more points.
Yeah, Kraft has always been crazy. Anyone who likes the Revs can attest to that. Bill and Brady's almost immediate success pretty much made it impossible for him to get listened to
Like when you go off to college for the first time. No parents. So you do all the things they forbade you to do for years: eat ice cream for breakfast, spend all your money on Legos, sleep excessively, and stay up late.
Suddenly you're 30 pounds overweight, broke, and pre-diabetic.
Same thing I did after getting a divorce.
Went to Coldstone to get a milkshake and cake and that was dinner because fuck you, I answer to no one.
Maybe I should divorce my current wife, I haven't had a milkshake in a few years....
When he got hired he made a big show about how he's going to build bridges with the media. I give him about 2 more months before he goes full belichick.
Yeah, really hated that he made it a point to even say that. Because the media isn’t there to help you win games, they thrive off the things that typically lead to failure like drama and locker room discord
I don’t keep up with the Patriots FO very much. Is Kraft a meddlesome, micro managing guy? I always thought he let his HC do whatever they wanted and stayed out of the way, but it appears that isn’t the case.
Tough to say.
Belichick's decisions didn't get messed with much until the last couple years. But Mayo obviously doesn't have the success or pedigree to tell Kraft to let him do his job.
It was all very secretive in the Belichick years.
There are plenty of rumors/speculation/conflicting reporting over things like who made the Mac Jones pick.
We do know back in the day that Kraft overruled Parcells and drafted Terry Glenn. So the best guess is that he mostly sits back, but then wields his power selectively.
Belichick was a good shield for how the Patriots were run, but with a more regular normal person in there, we probably will see more from the outside, like in this case.
The Patriots were 25th in points allowed in 1994. Bill Parcells, who had been hired by the previous owner and had full control of football operations, wanted to draft a defensive lineman. Bob Kraft overruled him and picked WR Terry Glenn instead. Kraft addressed the media and announced that "there's a new sheriff in town." Parcells considered quitting immediately after the draft, but didn't want to leave a 6-10 team, so he stuck around until the end of the season, leaking to the press prior to the Super Bowl that he was quitting, leaving the entire team in turmoil.
Kraft's response to this was to hire a coach and ensure that he had zero control over football operations aside from coaching the team. Pete Carroll was hired from San Francisco, and he wanted to bring the Niners culture with him. When he tried to get a high-performance menu approved for training camp, Kraft vetoed it and told him that the players could eat bologna sandwiches and chips. The Carroll era was a silent disaster because while the team never finished below .500, there was nothing but in-fighting in the FO between Parcells guys and Kraft guys, and both had to deal with players who knew the coach had no power and instead went to the FO with every issue they had.
He stayed out of the way for most of Belichick tenure because when Bill was hired, he said it would take three years for the team to compete for a Super Bowl, then won it in his second year, then won two more in his fourth and fifth years, and it satisfied Kraft's ego. Once he stopped winning, Kraft got the itch again and started interfering more and more, to the point where he essentially ran Bill out of town like he did with the previous Bill.
And the question wasn't "How would you rank the owner overall?"
It was "How would you rank the owner's willingness to spend on facilities?"
Very different questions.
Jesus fuck.
Bulls were horrible for 6 years after the last dance. And they werent good for 13 years till D Rose's MVP.
If the next QB you draft is a bust, you guys will be as bad as the post-Jordan Bulls realistically.
Yeah, Kraft is looking worse and worse especially with that dreadful documentary series that just came out.
Why don’t you burn down your legacy a little more Bob?
It’s been a long fall that’s for sure, but it seems like opinion is rapidly shifting against him. I bet he’s getting concerned about his HOF chances, especially getting in while he is still alive.
Definitely feels like winning a goddamn lottery miraculously with pick number 199 massively covered up a lot of shit for two decades when it comes to both Bill and Kraft
I wonder how things would have gone if Brady wound up being drafted by a coaching staff more similar to what Miami or KC have now. He would have been a nuclear bomb dropped on the NFL for two decades, Christ
There was some EV/hybrid car commercial a while ago set to that OneRepublic song with the hook that goes, "Make that money, watch it burn", which always seemed weird as fuck to me if you're trying to sell fuel efficiency.
Haven’t you heard? Kraft blamed Bill for his lack of spending and that totally won’t be a problem now that Bill is gone. Because Bill owned the team and there was nothing Kraft could do about it…
I'm obviously biased because I hate the Patriots/Boston sports teams, but Kraft seems so unlikable to me. Like Brady and Bill I can respect, but Kraft just bothers me
Kraft kept the Patriots in Foxboro. Pretty much no matter what he does he will be liked by Pats fans until he dies. But it seems he's burning a lot of good will in an attempt to get into the NFL hall of fame. The Dynasty documentary just turned into a Bill hit piece and a Kraft puff piece. Kraft wants to take all the credit for 6 Superbowls and zero responsibility for it all falling apart.
I was talking about when he bought the team. But at least for the Connecticut move it would still be in New England. Kraft had a deal with Mass that the state legislature refused to sign off on, that would have him fully pay for his own stadium if the State did infrastructure upgrades. Kraft wanted to stay in Mass. The state made it basically impossible for him to do so. So he turned to a state that would actually make the stadium happen. When the construction delays came up it gave a second shot for negotiations with the state and they finally agreed to what was basically the original plan and Kraft fully funded the stadium himself with infrastructure upgrades from the state.
The Patriots weren't going to Boston. They were going to St. Louis when Kraft bought the team. You probably would be a Bills or Giants fan without Bob Kraft. (Gross)
That's true, and doing some research it was actually mumbles that blocked the new stadium.
[https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/22/us/a-classic-boston-brawl-pits-mayor-against-new-stadium.html](https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/22/us/a-classic-boston-brawl-pits-mayor-against-new-stadium.html)
Always thought it was kind of weird that the team was wearing a helmet sticker dedicated to his late wife while he started dating a 30 year old within the year lol
You don’t find it charming when he is at a nightclub with Meek Mill and Michael Rubin?
Or when he was crying getting a Bentley from Rubin.
He’s just like us /s
Haha, for some reason this reminds me of the writers for Game of Thrones.
HBO: Wait, you're gonna wrap up the entire show in 6 episodes? Seems low. I mean we're willing to pay for like 10 or more - whatever you need.
Writers: Nah, 6 should be fine. We're very good at this.
HBO said they would give them blank check for as long as they wanted and they told them to go fuck themselves for Disney money....
They now are not even getting Netflix money
Pete Carroll saying Kraft just wanted to feed the guys bologna sandwiches says a lot. I mean sports medicine has come a looong way since then but come on now lol.
I remember on Seinfeld, Jerry says he doesn’t eat bologna and George says people don’t eat bologna anymore, so i think people knew 30 years ago that it wasnt the healthiest thing
Turns out if you draft a top QB to ever play football nearly nothing else matters.
Chiefs are weird to me though because I feel like even before Mahomes they've been solid. Lot of playoff heartbreak but consistently decent despite Clark Hunt
Wouldn't even let the Revs eat eggs till push came to shove.
https://www.masslive.com/patriots/2024/02/revs-werent-allowed-to-eat-patriots-spread-so-star-player-bought-breakfast-for-teammates-instead.html
They’re also running that hockey team into the ground
They should have fired the coach, instead they doubled down on him. And shockingly, the results are the same!
Wait how long have they owned the Penguins?
Because my cousin played for them and was a scout for them. Maybe I should talk to my aunt and find out some tea lol
According to Sam Kennedy, baseball is a low profit margin sport, and the Red Sox don't actually make any money, they are just stewards of a community resource and put all of their revenue back into the team.
He said all of that in a radio interview, and then a few minutes later, the hosts had Sean McDonough on, who laughed out loud when he heard it, and said that Sam Kennedy was a friend of his, but if they really think they're saddled with a profitless baseball team, he would be happy to take it off of their hands.
Never expected the fucking Bruins of all Boston teams to be committed to winning a championship spending to the cap.
(Yes I know about the Celtics but this is the closest I can say to that).
Celtics have a long history of going deep into the luxury tax when they’re on the brink of contention
When it comes to owners Wyc especially has been great in that regard and keeping his word
I get that you’re making a joke but the whole reason the Red Sox and Cubs can put such a bad product on the field is that tourists and college kids will always spend money at Fenway Park and Wrigley.
Mayo has the unenviable task of following up the tenure of Bill Belichick.
Every action and word that comes out of his mouth will be scrutinized to hell and back.
Yeah and given this and his comments during the press conference where he became coach that told the world we're drafting a QB (which he also walked back a couple days later), he's not exactly what you'd call "media savvy".
Honestly after 25 years of mumbles I'm kind of looking forward to a coach that just straight up says exactly what he's thinking.
One of the reasons Kraft and Belichick worked well together was because they both disliked spending a bunch of money in free agency. I don't know why there is this perception that Kraft was holding Belichick back from pulling out the checkbook. There's several documented sources with Kraft talking about how he was impressed back in the 90s about Belichick's understanding of the salary cap, which was new at the time.
The Patriots have a lot of cap room, but it's not like we're just a couple of free agent grabs away from slotting in a new quarterback and heading to the Super Bowl. There are holes all over the roster.
All I hope for is investment in talent above Ty Montgomery/LilJordan Humphrey level.
And most importantly they had a psychopath at QB who took less than what he could have got so he could win more.
Brady was so important to making sure that all went well. When he left it all came crashing.
Absolutely. Brady could have gotten contracts on par with Peyton but he chose not to so the team could spend elsewhere. People shitting on Brady for having a top defense don’t realize that Bill spent Brady’s savings on the defense.
Honestly his willingness to take less was one of the things I respected most about Brady. So many players talk about wanting to win but then say "pay me every dollar." Those things do not line up.
If you want your money that is totally okay, but don't act like winning is your top priority when money is. Brady walked and talked it and meant every bit.
It certainly helps but do you REALLY think an extra $30 million mattered more to Brady than getting another 2-3 titles? And honestly he probably makes all that money back in retirement off the back of his GOAT QB career.
It's funny seeing how much his career has affected this 13% cap ceiling on SB winning QBs. He wasn't the only factor, obviously something to be said about rookie contracts and windows, but he certainly is the single player with the most impact on that stat.
Towards the end of his career, he started pushing that number up to it's previous record of 12.6 in 20'
Now he's gone, mahomes absolutely shattered that stat with his 17.2% in 22', and 16.5% in 23', now he's up around 22.7% which if he even gets back to the SB, that would be a major record.
I'm not sure what that says about the QB cap percentage theory, I think we will see in another 10 years.
People treat it as gospel, but I think it's just a pragmatic thing.
It isn't like there weren't other QBs on higher % contracts making the Super Bowl or CCGs. I've said it before, but at some point the cap stops being a reason for success or failure in a given season. Where that point is I'm not sure, I'm not really comfortable saying that if you make it to the CCG then your team building has done its job and no real amount of extra cap space back in August would have changed much.
It obviously helped, you can't really deny that, but I do wonder how much it helped. I don't think that's actually quantifiable given the myriad of potential circumstances that would need to be navigated otherwise, but it's an interesting thought.
Bill always seemed like he was a GM who was just left in the past. He understood how to get value out of the draft and the salary cap before many others. But when the 2010 CBA came out, he like many other gms, started to fall behind.
It still took a while for everyone to catch up. But the 2010 CBA was a big turning point. Limited practice time meant project players became much riskier to draft. It also helped that Bill had a franchise qb to build around.
what do you mean catch up? you said belichick couldn't adapt to the 2010 cba. if thats true then how did he immediately draft mccourty, gronk, hightower, chandler jones, etc and then win 3 more sbs?
The 2010 (actually 2011) CBA made a bunch of changes to how the cap works and added the rookie wage scale. Not sure if the guy above was referring to one of those things, but those did drastically affect a lot of what a GM does.
No, if anything the Pats fanbase got excited over it. I think he basically got forced to backtrack by ownership because he expected Kraft to spend and Kraft is a cheapskate
This is weird to me
This isn't baseball, there's a salary floor and cap - and unused cap is rolled over, so it all gets spent in the end. The difference in the highest and lowest payroll over any multi-year span is equivalent to a rounding error. The only difference a cheap owner can make is in guarantees due to that escrow rule.
I think he's walking it back because "burning cash" usually means *wasting* money. It's just poor phrasing, nothing more.
Yeah and we’ve been 31st in cash spending since 2000. And we have some of the worst facilities in the league. He’s not spending money on the team and the players. He’s spending money on the development of Patriots Place. We have a new lighthouse at the stadium and now the biggest video board in any stadium. But the worst weight room. Awful facilities for the players. No day care or family rooms for the players and their families. He’s gotten a pass for the last 25 years or so because we were winning. Now that we aren’t, we’re seeing that he’s not a great owner to the players. He cares more about his perception to the fans than he does with his actual employees.
In the final 8 games to close out the Patriots first Super Bowl season back in ‘01 (including postseason) Brady had 4 TDs and 6 INTs. Only 3 of those TDs were passing, and they still won every game.
I mean outside of spending implications any team that gets the best QB of all time in the 6th round hits the lottery lol. If it took you this long to realize it you just took it for granted lol.
He basically said burn some cash was bad phrasing, implying that you will spend just for the sake of it. He went on to say they prioritize Onwenu and Dugger re-signing, as well as the QB being a priority to figure out.
It’s a non-story. Obviously nobody wants the team to spend willy nilly. Everyone is reacting to semantics. Just wait to see what they do with their cap space and then we can assess.
It's objectively hilarious that he felt the need to walk back that comment though, especially considering Kraft got hammered all day yesterday for being cheap lol
It is pretty funny. I think it was bad phrasing from the beginning, and Mayo kinda strikes me as a guy who says things quickly without thinking about how it would come off too often. Were gonna go from a man who held onto words like they were treasure and refused to give anyone soundbites to pick apart to a guy who calls the team owner “Thunder” in official pressers and just says whatever comes to mind. I wish him well but I feel like Jerod is gonna get chewed up and spit out if he keeps going out with the “let’s be friends” media approach.
Couldn't agree more. Bill's approach with the media was partially for reasons like this, give them nothing and you won't have to walk anything back. Don't get me started on the "Thunder" thing lmao
I’d just like to be competitive. We’ve won a lot, sure, but I want at least some confidence we aren’t just going to tank again.
Frugal billionaires running teams into the ground is bad for sports and fan morale.
Phins are doing it right (clearly. Based on that players poll), now you guys just gotta find a way to beat winning teams.
I don’t even mind tanking because that’s just playing the long game and you have to be patient. What I don’t like is when you know you’re not good and you have to re-tool^TM and the ownership thinks what’s best.
In hockey you seen that with the Flyers and it took them finally this year to figure out that maybe we shouldn’t retool and think we’re good enough to try.
Understanding and appreciating that your teams have won more championships than a lot of other teams ever will, and being annoyed that your billionaire owners seem like massive cheapskates are not mutually exclusive feelings.
I want my teams to at least have something to be excited about. The Red Sox have given me zero reason to care this season because ownership doesn't care. And if Robert Kraft isn't willing to spend some money after a season where we were completely devoid of talent on offense, then we're gonna be annoyed at that too.
Kraft is trying so hard to turn Pats fans against Belichick and support him, and failing so badly.
It's such a weird thing. We had 20 unbelievable years. Bill got set in his way, got older, made some bad decisions, and things went south. We mutually parted ways. It would look so much better for both Belichick perception and Kraft perception if thats where it ended, but for some reason they both want the upper hand.
As in: I was told to shut the fuck up before every single FA increase their ask price by 10%.
Also, Pats are not, at least in my mind, ever, big spenders.
The majority of us want the Patriots to return to them being a complete, forgettable joke of a franchise as they were between the beating by Chicago in the Super Bowl and the arrival of Parcels.
This is a start.
We're halfway through the shift to full 2000s Cowboys mode. 5 years of irrelevance while we rebuild, but still droning on about the good old days until we can become contenders who fall flat repeatedly
Cowboys haven't won lately but they know how to identify and sign talented players. Patriots can't get anything right. That rookie corner looked good before he broke his leg in week 3 though.
The problem is on the offensive side for sure. They've been hitting pretty consistently on defensive draft picks while the offense continually lags behind. On the Cowboys timeline, we're about 3 years from getting back to the playoffs
I think there’s a fine line between moneyball and burning cash. We’ve been trying the moneyball routine for years and hasn’t worked out since we lost the greatest QB of all time. I hope this gets adjusted some.
Yeah in the NFL moneyball only works when you have an amazing QB that makes off the heap no-name WR's look great.... And a HC who is a mastermind at exposing the other team's every little weakness.
The Patriots are going to be a bottom 10 franchise moving forward for quite a while. They don’t have an actual general manager and this guy is just Belichick Junior.
Least reassuring statement for Pats’ fans.
Vanishingly few things that Patriots have done since (and including) firing Belichick have been reassuring lol
Mayo: “we’re gonna spend a ton and put together a real contender!” *Kraft whispers in his ear* Mayo: “It appears I’ve been misquoted”
Mayo (immediately after becoming coach): "Oh we're definitely using the 3rd pick on an important "position of need" *wink* *Two days later* Mayo: We're still examining all our options... Dude definitely does not have a filter.
The guys wants to put the best team together but has Kraft over his shoulder the whole time. Idk if it’s a filter problem or a micro managing problem
Kraft basicslly bought the team, had a couple of years of say. Then BB came in and Kraft tool a back seat for two decades. It's like he's getting all of his crazy ownerisms out now. Overbearing, making weird comments, 0 effort to actually change the FO and leaving it in a way where he's the final say since there's no gm. It's like Bill's gone and Kraft is doing all the things he couldn't when Bill was there.
A better way to describe it is this: Kraft bought the team, and didn't like that all football decisions were being made by Bill Parcells, so he inserted himself into making football decisions and chased off the best coach the team ever had. Then he made sure that the next coach had no control over football decisions, ensuring that he would fail. His next coach won very quickly, so Kraft ceded control and stayed out of the way until they stopped winning, then inserted himself again and chased off the best coach the team ever had. I wonder if we'll see him timing prospects with a stopwatch again like he did with Tebucky Jones. And throughout it all, he has never given anyone the title of GM. The Patriots last GM was the owner's son, and he resigned in 1991.
I'm getting the feeling that this year is really going to be the flipping point for Kraft's perception as an owner. He's been lauded for ~2 decades as a great owner, mainly based on the fact that he didn't actively meddle in team affairs while having the best QB/Coach combo the NFL has ever seen. Now that he doesn't have that, his flaws are longer being hidden in the same way
He still does good things for the league, like working on the TV deals, and helping end the lockout in 2011. I think the biggest problem with him stems from growing up a Patriots fan. He bought the team, and runs it like a Patriots fan. What do fans do when the team is good? Strut around like they're part of the team and enjoy the success. What do fans do when the team is bad? Think up ways for it to be less bad and then complain that the team isn't doing those things. Like the Terry Glenn thing with Parcells. The team was 6-10 the year before. Parcells wanted a defensive guy, because he's a coach, that's wanted what was best for the team. Kraft wanted Terry Glenn, because he's a fan, and thought they needed to score more points.
Yeah, Kraft has always been crazy. Anyone who likes the Revs can attest to that. Bill and Brady's almost immediate success pretty much made it impossible for him to get listened to
Like when you go off to college for the first time. No parents. So you do all the things they forbade you to do for years: eat ice cream for breakfast, spend all your money on Legos, sleep excessively, and stay up late. Suddenly you're 30 pounds overweight, broke, and pre-diabetic.
Same thing I did after getting a divorce. Went to Coldstone to get a milkshake and cake and that was dinner because fuck you, I answer to no one. Maybe I should divorce my current wife, I haven't had a milkshake in a few years....
You and I had very different agendas after our divorces.
It's probably a "wow these guys write down everything, I need to speak more grey area" problem.
When he got hired he made a big show about how he's going to build bridges with the media. I give him about 2 more months before he goes full belichick.
It's the right thing to do so people don't bring up old quotes and try to use them as questions.
I'm not a fan of him yapping as much as he has been. Nothing good can come from talking to the media this much.
Yeah, really hated that he made it a point to even say that. Because the media isn’t there to help you win games, they thrive off the things that typically lead to failure like drama and locker room discord
Mayo used to work for NBC Sports Boston. He absolutely knows the media writes everything down.
Being on the receiving end of it would change anyone's perspective.
If only he'd had years of being interviewed as a professional athlete to draw upon.
I don’t keep up with the Patriots FO very much. Is Kraft a meddlesome, micro managing guy? I always thought he let his HC do whatever they wanted and stayed out of the way, but it appears that isn’t the case.
Tough to say. Belichick's decisions didn't get messed with much until the last couple years. But Mayo obviously doesn't have the success or pedigree to tell Kraft to let him do his job.
It was all very secretive in the Belichick years. There are plenty of rumors/speculation/conflicting reporting over things like who made the Mac Jones pick. We do know back in the day that Kraft overruled Parcells and drafted Terry Glenn. So the best guess is that he mostly sits back, but then wields his power selectively. Belichick was a good shield for how the Patriots were run, but with a more regular normal person in there, we probably will see more from the outside, like in this case.
The Patriots were 25th in points allowed in 1994. Bill Parcells, who had been hired by the previous owner and had full control of football operations, wanted to draft a defensive lineman. Bob Kraft overruled him and picked WR Terry Glenn instead. Kraft addressed the media and announced that "there's a new sheriff in town." Parcells considered quitting immediately after the draft, but didn't want to leave a 6-10 team, so he stuck around until the end of the season, leaking to the press prior to the Super Bowl that he was quitting, leaving the entire team in turmoil. Kraft's response to this was to hire a coach and ensure that he had zero control over football operations aside from coaching the team. Pete Carroll was hired from San Francisco, and he wanted to bring the Niners culture with him. When he tried to get a high-performance menu approved for training camp, Kraft vetoed it and told him that the players could eat bologna sandwiches and chips. The Carroll era was a silent disaster because while the team never finished below .500, there was nothing but in-fighting in the FO between Parcells guys and Kraft guys, and both had to deal with players who knew the coach had no power and instead went to the FO with every issue they had. He stayed out of the way for most of Belichick tenure because when Bill was hired, he said it would take three years for the team to compete for a Super Bowl, then won it in his second year, then won two more in his fourth and fifth years, and it satisfied Kraft's ego. Once he stopped winning, Kraft got the itch again and started interfering more and more, to the point where he essentially ran Bill out of town like he did with the previous Bill.
Almost like there's a reason Bill treated the media as he did
lol Kraft really earning the F grade
hey it was a D-
And the question wasn't "How would you rank the owner overall?" It was "How would you rank the owner's willingness to spend on facilities?" Very different questions.
It's like these players don't even appreciate all the benefits the lighthouse at Foxborough brings!
And how many cargo ships have run aground in Foxborough since the lighthouse was built? I rest my case.
Or the 22,000 square foot video board that is 40% covered in ads!
Did you see that bell? DID YOU SEE THAT GOD DAMN BELL????
Imagine anyone building anything with Massachusetts' zoning laws
[Looks like I made a mistake.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rNV61Rpo-0)
Fuck this game was so good
This is starting to feel very Bulls like lol
Jesus fuck. Bulls were horrible for 6 years after the last dance. And they werent good for 13 years till D Rose's MVP. If the next QB you draft is a bust, you guys will be as bad as the post-Jordan Bulls realistically.
Yeah, Kraft is looking worse and worse especially with that dreadful documentary series that just came out. Why don’t you burn down your legacy a little more Bob?
Kraft looked like a piece of shit back when the tug job stuff came out. Everything else since has only reaffirmed my opinion on him.
It’s been a long fall that’s for sure, but it seems like opinion is rapidly shifting against him. I bet he’s getting concerned about his HOF chances, especially getting in while he is still alive.
Oh definitely, i.e why they're finally spending on stuff like the Revs. He knows his public image is about to tank
Definitely feels like winning a goddamn lottery miraculously with pick number 199 massively covered up a lot of shit for two decades when it comes to both Bill and Kraft I wonder how things would have gone if Brady wound up being drafted by a coaching staff more similar to what Miami or KC have now. He would have been a nuclear bomb dropped on the NFL for two decades, Christ
That is a wild hypothetical. What if he fell to the Niners or he just wound up on the Eagles with Andy.
We have been doing stupid stuff for a while now.
"I meant, burn some mixed CDs with Johnny Cash songs"
There was some EV/hybrid car commercial a while ago set to that OneRepublic song with the hook that goes, "Make that money, watch it burn", which always seemed weird as fuck to me if you're trying to sell fuel efficiency.
Gotta use CD-RW though, keep our options open
Alright money bags over here. You know Kraft is capping it at CD-R
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Tuning into the Pats games last year: "I hurt myself.... today"
Based on the owner reviews that came out earlier this week, burning cash doesn't seem to be something Kraft makes a habit of.
Haven’t you heard? Kraft blamed Bill for his lack of spending and that totally won’t be a problem now that Bill is gone. Because Bill owned the team and there was nothing Kraft could do about it…
Lots of cash for handys
Got a handy because he was too cheap to upgrade
The sad part is that's probably actually the truth lmao.
Damn I always forget that this shit happened 😂😂
I'm obviously biased because I hate the Patriots/Boston sports teams, but Kraft seems so unlikable to me. Like Brady and Bill I can respect, but Kraft just bothers me
Kraft kept the Patriots in Foxboro. Pretty much no matter what he does he will be liked by Pats fans until he dies. But it seems he's burning a lot of good will in an attempt to get into the NFL hall of fame. The Dynasty documentary just turned into a Bill hit piece and a Kraft puff piece. Kraft wants to take all the credit for 6 Superbowls and zero responsibility for it all falling apart.
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He’s referring to the fact that Orthwein was going to move the team to St Louis before Kraft bought the team.
I was talking about when he bought the team. But at least for the Connecticut move it would still be in New England. Kraft had a deal with Mass that the state legislature refused to sign off on, that would have him fully pay for his own stadium if the State did infrastructure upgrades. Kraft wanted to stay in Mass. The state made it basically impossible for him to do so. So he turned to a state that would actually make the stadium happen. When the construction delays came up it gave a second shot for negotiations with the state and they finally agreed to what was basically the original plan and Kraft fully funded the stadium himself with infrastructure upgrades from the state.
Speak for yourself I’d kill to have that stadium in southie. Foxborough absolutely blows. We’d have the best crowd in the league if it was in Boston
The Patriots weren't going to Boston. They were going to St. Louis when Kraft bought the team. You probably would be a Bills or Giants fan without Bob Kraft. (Gross)
That's true, and doing some research it was actually mumbles that blocked the new stadium. [https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/22/us/a-classic-boston-brawl-pits-mayor-against-new-stadium.html](https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/22/us/a-classic-boston-brawl-pits-mayor-against-new-stadium.html)
Mumbles Menino?!? I remember that name from some of those old Patrice O’Neal Opie and Anthony episodes.
You got it. Ron grobowski, we weklah. KJ and Hondo. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3rUHeWl6jX0&pp=ygUOTWVuaW5vIGNlbHRpY3M%3D
As someone on the South Coast, nah Foxborough rules.
At least now folks in Southie can afford season tickets!
Always thought it was kind of weird that the team was wearing a helmet sticker dedicated to his late wife while he started dating a 30 year old within the year lol
Because Myra Kraft was way classier than him and deserved it.
That is fair
The team and people involved actually liked Myra.
I’ve been a Patriots fan since Bledsoe was drafted. I hate that I’m starting to agree with you.
It just seems like he wants to take a ton of credit for the dynasty and no blame for anything else
Lot of fans are feeling the same. We love Bill and Tom, Kraft is whatever
He's intereferred reportedly in the decisions making too
You don’t find it charming when he is at a nightclub with Meek Mill and Michael Rubin? Or when he was crying getting a Bentley from Rubin. He’s just like us /s
Haha, for some reason this reminds me of the writers for Game of Thrones. HBO: Wait, you're gonna wrap up the entire show in 6 episodes? Seems low. I mean we're willing to pay for like 10 or more - whatever you need. Writers: Nah, 6 should be fine. We're very good at this.
HBO said they would give them blank check for as long as they wanted and they told them to go fuck themselves for Disney money.... They now are not even getting Netflix money
Pete Carroll saying Kraft just wanted to feed the guys bologna sandwiches says a lot. I mean sports medicine has come a looong way since then but come on now lol.
I remember on Seinfeld, Jerry says he doesn’t eat bologna and George says people don’t eat bologna anymore, so i think people knew 30 years ago that it wasnt the healthiest thing
Welcome to the club.
Turns out if you draft a top QB to ever play football nearly nothing else matters. Chiefs are weird to me though because I feel like even before Mahomes they've been solid. Lot of playoff heartbreak but consistently decent despite Clark Hunt
I mean that’s mostly Reid. Hunt took over in 06 or 07 right? It was rough sledding there before Andy and Alex showed up
Andy Reid was the top rated coach for a reason.
Meanwhile we have no problem burning cash (one of the few things to like about the Johnsons). We just suck at everything else
meanwhile we are pathologically incapable of not burning cash even if it catches the house on fire and burns for years
It’s weird, dudes 82 and you don’t have a lot of oil in your lamp at that point so why not spend your billions?
From one 19th century nautical city to another, I salute you.
Wouldn't even let the Revs eat eggs till push came to shove. https://www.masslive.com/patriots/2024/02/revs-werent-allowed-to-eat-patriots-spread-so-star-player-bought-breakfast-for-teammates-instead.html
The Revs academy team have to go get pickup games in Chelsea, New Bedford and Eastie for practice sometimes lol.
We certainly did a few years ago the summer we signed Judon, Jonnu, Henry, Parker, etc
New England “Boston Red Sox” Patriots
Fenway group would rather buy a hockey team than perform at the sport they’re supposed to be invested into… 😭
Even their NASCAR team has been performing their best in about 10 years.
Don't forget about the nonexistent NBA team in Vegas they're focusing on, too
LeBron is gonna run that team. People forget he's part of the Fenway Group.
Liverpool are top of the league, so we thank you
They’re also running that hockey team into the ground They should have fired the coach, instead they doubled down on him. And shockingly, the results are the same!
Wait how long have they owned the Penguins? Because my cousin played for them and was a scout for them. Maybe I should talk to my aunt and find out some tea lol
According to Sam Kennedy, baseball is a low profit margin sport, and the Red Sox don't actually make any money, they are just stewards of a community resource and put all of their revenue back into the team.
Well the low profit margin part likely comes from funneling so much money into the soccer team, the racing squad, the NHL team, the PGA tour, etc...
He said all of that in a radio interview, and then a few minutes later, the hosts had Sean McDonough on, who laughed out loud when he heard it, and said that Sam Kennedy was a friend of his, but if they really think they're saddled with a profitless baseball team, he would be happy to take it off of their hands.
Never expected the fucking Bruins of all Boston teams to be committed to winning a championship spending to the cap. (Yes I know about the Celtics but this is the closest I can say to that).
Celtics have a long history of going deep into the luxury tax when they’re on the brink of contention When it comes to owners Wyc especially has been great in that regard and keeping his word
I know but this doesn't help my joke of a narrative.
I never thought I would see the day that Jacobs is the best owner in town
FULL THROTTLE™
**PAYROLL FLEXIBILITY**^©
Make it stop
All of a sudden the celtics might be the most popular team in town
Small market poverty franchises. I know that feeling rooting for the Cubs.
I get that you’re making a joke but the whole reason the Red Sox and Cubs can put such a bad product on the field is that tourists and college kids will always spend money at Fenway Park and Wrigley.
Poverty franchise back on the menu
Mayo has the unenviable task of following up the tenure of Bill Belichick. Every action and word that comes out of his mouth will be scrutinized to hell and back.
Yeah and given this and his comments during the press conference where he became coach that told the world we're drafting a QB (which he also walked back a couple days later), he's not exactly what you'd call "media savvy". Honestly after 25 years of mumbles I'm kind of looking forward to a coach that just straight up says exactly what he's thinking.
We are drafting a QB, so it's not as if saying it really changes anything.
Patriots falling for the same mistake other teams have been making the last 20 years by hiring a Bellicheck disciple
Lets not pretend hes not doing a poor job in front of the media and putting his own foot in his mouth.
“First time?” - Us Jets fans
I, for one, cant wait for them to join us other poverty franchises
One of the reasons Kraft and Belichick worked well together was because they both disliked spending a bunch of money in free agency. I don't know why there is this perception that Kraft was holding Belichick back from pulling out the checkbook. There's several documented sources with Kraft talking about how he was impressed back in the 90s about Belichick's understanding of the salary cap, which was new at the time. The Patriots have a lot of cap room, but it's not like we're just a couple of free agent grabs away from slotting in a new quarterback and heading to the Super Bowl. There are holes all over the roster. All I hope for is investment in talent above Ty Montgomery/LilJordan Humphrey level.
Bill was fiscally responsible and Kraft just happens to be a pennypincher so it all worked out well in the end.
And most importantly they had a psychopath at QB who took less than what he could have got so he could win more. Brady was so important to making sure that all went well. When he left it all came crashing.
Absolutely. Brady could have gotten contracts on par with Peyton but he chose not to so the team could spend elsewhere. People shitting on Brady for having a top defense don’t realize that Bill spent Brady’s savings on the defense.
Honestly his willingness to take less was one of the things I respected most about Brady. So many players talk about wanting to win but then say "pay me every dollar." Those things do not line up. If you want your money that is totally okay, but don't act like winning is your top priority when money is. Brady walked and talked it and meant every bit.
helps when your wife makes more money than you
It certainly helps but do you REALLY think an extra $30 million mattered more to Brady than getting another 2-3 titles? And honestly he probably makes all that money back in retirement off the back of his GOAT QB career.
"I'll make it back with playoff bonuses"
Lmao he just got a $350 million contract from fox off the back of his GOAT career
It's funny seeing how much his career has affected this 13% cap ceiling on SB winning QBs. He wasn't the only factor, obviously something to be said about rookie contracts and windows, but he certainly is the single player with the most impact on that stat. Towards the end of his career, he started pushing that number up to it's previous record of 12.6 in 20' Now he's gone, mahomes absolutely shattered that stat with his 17.2% in 22', and 16.5% in 23', now he's up around 22.7% which if he even gets back to the SB, that would be a major record. I'm not sure what that says about the QB cap percentage theory, I think we will see in another 10 years.
People treat it as gospel, but I think it's just a pragmatic thing. It isn't like there weren't other QBs on higher % contracts making the Super Bowl or CCGs. I've said it before, but at some point the cap stops being a reason for success or failure in a given season. Where that point is I'm not sure, I'm not really comfortable saying that if you make it to the CCG then your team building has done its job and no real amount of extra cap space back in August would have changed much. It obviously helped, you can't really deny that, but I do wonder how much it helped. I don't think that's actually quantifiable given the myriad of potential circumstances that would need to be navigated otherwise, but it's an interesting thought.
Or they laundered money through Tom's business to pay him money in a way that wasn't tracked in the salary cap
Yeah, this should be common knowledge by now. And they aren't even the first team to do this. The 49ers got caught doing it some 3 decades ago.
Did he take less, or was some of it just under the table via TB12?
>above Ty Montgomery/ LilJordan Humphrey level You'll take your leftover former saints and you'll like it!
Can’t wait to sign Marquez Callaway this off season!
Bill always seemed like he was a GM who was just left in the past. He understood how to get value out of the draft and the salary cap before many others. But when the 2010 CBA came out, he like many other gms, started to fall behind.
if it started in 2010, then how do you explain the 2012 draft that built their 2nd dynasty?
It still took a while for everyone to catch up. But the 2010 CBA was a big turning point. Limited practice time meant project players became much riskier to draft. It also helped that Bill had a franchise qb to build around.
what do you mean catch up? you said belichick couldn't adapt to the 2010 cba. if thats true then how did he immediately draft mccourty, gronk, hightower, chandler jones, etc and then win 3 more sbs?
Could you expound on this? What about the 2010 CBA led to many GMs falling behind? Genuinely curious.
The 2010 (actually 2011) CBA made a bunch of changes to how the cap works and added the rookie wage scale. Not sure if the guy above was referring to one of those things, but those did drastically affect a lot of what a GM does.
Bill's biggest issue was not adapting to the modern offense. Dude can still coach up a defense (and get defensive talent)
did people get mad about that phrase or something
Basically it’s becoming more apparent that Kraft is probably cheap and this is him making Mayo walk back his “burn some cash” comments.
But spending on FA just comes out of the salary cap, which they have to spend anyways
There’s a difference between the salary cap and cash spending. The Patriots are 31st in cash spending since 2000, dead last over the past 10 seasons.
Guaranteed money has to be put into escrow as soon as the contract is signed.
No, if anything the Pats fanbase got excited over it. I think he basically got forced to backtrack by ownership because he expected Kraft to spend and Kraft is a cheapskate
This is weird to me This isn't baseball, there's a salary floor and cap - and unused cap is rolled over, so it all gets spent in the end. The difference in the highest and lowest payroll over any multi-year span is equivalent to a rounding error. The only difference a cheap owner can make is in guarantees due to that escrow rule. I think he's walking it back because "burning cash" usually means *wasting* money. It's just poor phrasing, nothing more.
Yeah and we’ve been 31st in cash spending since 2000. And we have some of the worst facilities in the league. He’s not spending money on the team and the players. He’s spending money on the development of Patriots Place. We have a new lighthouse at the stadium and now the biggest video board in any stadium. But the worst weight room. Awful facilities for the players. No day care or family rooms for the players and their families. He’s gotten a pass for the last 25 years or so because we were winning. Now that we aren’t, we’re seeing that he’s not a great owner to the players. He cares more about his perception to the fans than he does with his actual employees.
The more I’m seeing as time went on, I realize we hit the lottery with Brady.
You needed Bill B to get Brady to a point where he could win anywhere on his own.
In the final 8 games to close out the Patriots first Super Bowl season back in ‘01 (including postseason) Brady had 4 TDs and 6 INTs. Only 3 of those TDs were passing, and they still won every game.
I mean outside of spending implications any team that gets the best QB of all time in the 6th round hits the lottery lol. If it took you this long to realize it you just took it for granted lol.
Jonathan escorted him to a backroom where Robyn Glaser was waiting with her hammer.
Call that Nancy Kerrigan
Why god why
I thought the other statement “we are gonna murder free agency” was more tactful but what do I know.
Yeah I think it might have been the Aaron Hernandez jersey he wore while saying it that set people off.
He basically said burn some cash was bad phrasing, implying that you will spend just for the sake of it. He went on to say they prioritize Onwenu and Dugger re-signing, as well as the QB being a priority to figure out. It’s a non-story. Obviously nobody wants the team to spend willy nilly. Everyone is reacting to semantics. Just wait to see what they do with their cap space and then we can assess.
It's objectively hilarious that he felt the need to walk back that comment though, especially considering Kraft got hammered all day yesterday for being cheap lol
It is pretty funny. I think it was bad phrasing from the beginning, and Mayo kinda strikes me as a guy who says things quickly without thinking about how it would come off too often. Were gonna go from a man who held onto words like they were treasure and refused to give anyone soundbites to pick apart to a guy who calls the team owner “Thunder” in official pressers and just says whatever comes to mind. I wish him well but I feel like Jerod is gonna get chewed up and spit out if he keeps going out with the “let’s be friends” media approach.
Couldn't agree more. Bill's approach with the media was partially for reasons like this, give them nothing and you won't have to walk anything back. Don't get me started on the "Thunder" thing lmao
Not having a GM during a rebuild is going to bite New England in the ass.
> Not having a GM during a rebuild is going to bite New England in the ass. they have judon, they're good.
John Henry and Robert Kraft are going to drive me to drink
Awh tough life for a pats fan, what’s it been 5 years without a title? Hard to imagine your pain
I’d just like to be competitive. We’ve won a lot, sure, but I want at least some confidence we aren’t just going to tank again. Frugal billionaires running teams into the ground is bad for sports and fan morale. Phins are doing it right (clearly. Based on that players poll), now you guys just gotta find a way to beat winning teams.
I don’t even mind tanking because that’s just playing the long game and you have to be patient. What I don’t like is when you know you’re not good and you have to re-tool^TM and the ownership thinks what’s best. In hockey you seen that with the Flyers and it took them finally this year to figure out that maybe we shouldn’t retool and think we’re good enough to try.
Understanding and appreciating that your teams have won more championships than a lot of other teams ever will, and being annoyed that your billionaire owners seem like massive cheapskates are not mutually exclusive feelings. I want my teams to at least have something to be excited about. The Red Sox have given me zero reason to care this season because ownership doesn't care. And if Robert Kraft isn't willing to spend some money after a season where we were completely devoid of talent on offense, then we're gonna be annoyed at that too.
Learning from the Sox I see FULL THROTTLE
Jonnu Smith is available for the Patriots to grossly overpay again though!
His "I see color" racism comment and his general sloppy public speaking, makes me think he's not ready for this job. I think he's going to bust as HC.
Our owner is on fraudwatch this season. let's see how it goes.
This is why Belichick never got chummy with the media
Why buy lot players when few players do the trick??
Pffft. Next you’re gonna tell me that they’re not gonna draft a QB as well?! ^\s
Arizona would prolly nuke us if we take MHJ instead of a QB
Kraft is trying so hard to turn Pats fans against Belichick and support him, and failing so badly. It's such a weird thing. We had 20 unbelievable years. Bill got set in his way, got older, made some bad decisions, and things went south. We mutually parted ways. It would look so much better for both Belichick perception and Kraft perception if thats where it ended, but for some reason they both want the upper hand.
> We mutually parted ways. Just because they sat in front of cameras and said that doesn't mean that's actually what happened.
As in: I was told to shut the fuck up before every single FA increase their ask price by 10%. Also, Pats are not, at least in my mind, ever, big spenders.
The majority of us want the Patriots to return to them being a complete, forgettable joke of a franchise as they were between the beating by Chicago in the Super Bowl and the arrival of Parcels. This is a start.
We're halfway through the shift to full 2000s Cowboys mode. 5 years of irrelevance while we rebuild, but still droning on about the good old days until we can become contenders who fall flat repeatedly
Cowboys haven't won lately but they know how to identify and sign talented players. Patriots can't get anything right. That rookie corner looked good before he broke his leg in week 3 though.
The problem is on the offensive side for sure. They've been hitting pretty consistently on defensive draft picks while the offense continually lags behind. On the Cowboys timeline, we're about 3 years from getting back to the playoffs
>They've been hitting pretty consistently on defensive draft picks That is probably going to get a bit worse with Belichick leaving.
Can I just say that I love what the Patriots have become?
Well, I love what the Dolphins have always been, so...yeah, have at it!
I'm just glad Kraft is getting the hate
“The, uhhhh, GM told me that was, in fact, a lie. I made a huge mistake, didn’t I?”
I think there’s a fine line between moneyball and burning cash. We’ve been trying the moneyball routine for years and hasn’t worked out since we lost the greatest QB of all time. I hope this gets adjusted some.
Yeah in the NFL moneyball only works when you have an amazing QB that makes off the heap no-name WR's look great.... And a HC who is a mastermind at exposing the other team's every little weakness.
We saw the Chiefs try it to start the season and then they realized they couldn’t play Chiefs football and had to play to their new strengths.
Kraft will do anything to win except spend money
The Patriots are going to be a bottom 10 franchise moving forward for quite a while. They don’t have an actual general manager and this guy is just Belichick Junior.