Will You cheer or Boo Adam Vinatieri When he returns as a Colt on 11/5/06

[Kdo5]

I wont cheer him because what he did was pretty much a huge slap in the face to every Patriots fan out there who idolizes him. I wont boo him knowing how much he did for us, as he was incredible.

But I've said that there was tons of other guys who were huge in those Superbowl years, not just Adam.

 

[T-ShirtDynasty]

I wont cheer him because what he did was pretty much a huge slap in the face to every Patriots fan out there who idolizes him. I wont boo him knowing how much he did for us, as he was incredible.

Then may I recommend booing the holder and long-snapper?

 

[Brady-To-Branch]

If Adam had given the Pats a chance to match Indy's offer, I would have understood, but he did not.

BOOOO!!!

 

[borg]

So let me get this straight... all you hand holding, tree hugging Adam apologists will be cheering as Adam V walks onto the field and is about to attempt to score points against the Patriots. Forget that. I cheer for the players that are on my team only. AV got his cheers after all his big kicks, he got his cheers during all the parades, he got his cheers every game he suited up in a Pats uniform. That's enough love as far as I'm concerned. Face it, AV's priority was squeezing out max dollars and increasing his field goal percentages in an indoor environment...all very UnPatriot like. Cash and stats is what his exit is all about. Frankly, I think AV has made a horrible decision because his status as a regional Icon has been diminished. Maybe he believes he can spin his personna into a national celebrity. We'll see. But in the aftermath of his exit, do you really think Bob Kraft will retire his number now.

 

[5 Rings for Brady!!]

Adam was our kicker and has moved on. I don't think he was that great in playoff games since 2001. I don't mind that he is gone. With so few responsibilities as a kicker has, I am not all that amazed that they don't get worn out in big games like the players who are on the field at physically demanding positions.

Those who want to can cheer for the Colts kicker if it makes them feel 'classy', and then they can say 'Oh, but of course, I don't want him to do well or make his kicks or anything, but I wish him well.'

Others can turn their back or stand on their head or whatever.

I plan on booing anyone in a Colts uniform and don't need to be convinced otherwise.

Like I said, you can be as anal as you wish, but at the end of the day, I'm gonna boo the Colts and anyone who represents their franchise.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

If Adam had given the Pats a chance to match Indy's offer, I would have understood, but he did not.

BOOOO!!!

Do you understand why he could not? That offer was contingent on his not taking it back to another team - if he did it was off the table. The team you expected him to risk the deal altogether for had two years to get an extension with a signing bonus or guaranteed money included done with him. They chose to offer none.

When you let a player get to FA you are making a statement. That is why more often than not that player is gone. You don't want to pay them what they want. You are telling them to test the market and see what's out there either because you believe what they want is not there, or you're unwilling to pay that at all, or maybe in hindsight you will if you are forced to because you now see others will.

The Patriots either misjudged the 2006 PK market (and perhaps the entire 2006 FA market) or they simply didn't want certain players at certain prices. I'm not sure what players are supposed to make of that, but I'd have left too. Givens wanted to be a #1. I don't think that was a rational decision, and I don't think the Pats should have overpaid him as a mid level #1 when he is a good #2 here. Adam wanted to be the highest paid kicker in the league by contract. I happen to think he was worth the couple of hundred thousand a year that paying a pro bowl kicker entailed where Givens would never have been worth a couple of million more in his role here as a WR. Adam also wanted the security of a long term deal. The only security in an NFL contract is in the guaranteed bonus money, because your contractual right to any trumped up salary going forward is not worth the paper it's printed on unless there is a significant cap consequence implicitly insuring it. If he signed with us for no bonus we could have cut him in pre season and not owed him a dime of that BS highest paid kicker salary Jonathan was babbling about.

Kickers can perform well into their late 30's in many instances. Adam wanted the opportunity to do just that. Few OLB can perform well past their mid 30's, and the good ones have made ten times as much as a PK 10+ years into their careers. Willie was overpaid for much of his time here even when his contract was actually reworked. He doesn't need the money, he said that repeatedly. Yet he left for an opportunity to extend his career with a team willing to overpay him once again, and by about double, rather than finish it out where it began. And played the nobody called me don't blame me card to boot. Yet no one plans to boo Willie because his only offer came from Cleveland instead of Indianapolis. Don't kid yourself, if it was Indy or Pittsburgh or the JETS or Miami offering Willie that cash, he's still gone.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

Adam was our kicker and has moved on. I don't think he was that great in playoff games since 2001. I don't mind that he is gone. With so few responsibilities as a kicker has, I am not all that amazed that they don't get worn out in big games like the players who are on the field at physically demanding positions.

Well as I surmised earlier, no point arguing rationally with anyone whose fallback is to spew jibberish like this.

 

[mgteich]

I suppose you guys would also boo McGinist.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

So let me get this straight... all you hand holding, tree hugging Adam apologists will be cheering as Adam V walks onto the field and is about to attempt to score points against the Patriots. Forget that. I cheer for the players that are on my team only. AV got his cheers after all his big kicks, he got his cheers during all the parades, he got his cheers every game he suited up in a Pats uniform. That's enough love as far as I'm concerned. Face it, AV's priority was squeezing out max dollars and increasing his field goal percentages in an indoor environment...all very UnPatriot like. Cash and stats is what his exit is all about.

So whose isn't?

Frankly, I think AV has made a horrible decision because his status as a regional Icon has been diminished. Maybe he believes he can spin his personna into a national celebrity. We'll see. But in the aftermath of his exit, do you really think Bob Kraft will retire his number now.

Yup. If retiring numbers is a path this team continues to persue, Adam will be one of the handful who gets that honor - which should be reserved for players who played the majority of their career here, won a championship or championsihps here and are elected to the HOF based in large part on what they did while they were here.

 

[5 Rings for Brady!!]

I shouldn't expect much from a condescending sort of guy that has a nametag like 'Mo Lewis Rocks', but you seriously need to get off your intellectual highchair.

Since you are so socially inept that you can't carry on normal discussions with people without misrepresenting their point of view to further your own, there is no way to 'talk' with you in a rational manner.

You deliberately misinterpret every thing I say, and make sure to do it line by line, because there is no room for grey area in your insecure world. It is impossible for you to be wrong on anything or even to acknowledge other points of views on anything, because you are the 'perfect' guy who needs to belittle everyone around you.

It's Mo's way or the highway!

 

[T-ShirtDynasty]

Well as I surmised earlier, no point arguing rationally with anyone whose fallback is to spew jibberish like this.

There's no real point in arguing it rationally anyway, team fanaticism is really kind of an irrational thing in the first place. As always Mo, you make extremely well thought out, very articulate arguments for your point. I see exactly where you're coming from, but when that man takes the field all some of us are ever going to see is the blue horseshoe on the helmet. At that point, the reaction is visceral, not logical. Y'know?

I suppose you guys would also boo McGinist.

Personally, I boo and cheer for the team, not the player. While I greatly dislike the Dolts, I'm pretty emotionally unattached to the Browns... I wouldn't boo simply because, ehhhh they're the Browns.

 

[5 Rings for Brady!!]

Or, as I like to say, 'Get off your intellectual highchair'.

 

[Brady-To-Branch]

Do you understand why he could not? That offer was contingent on his not taking it back to another team - if he did it was off the table. The team you expected him to risk the deal altogether for had two years to get an extension with a signing bonus or guaranteed money included done with him. They chose to offer none.

Fair enough. But he did leave his team in a huff after spurning every offer from the Pats since the end of 2004. Goodbye Adam.

When you let a player get to FA you are making a statement. That is why more often than not that player is gone. You don't want to pay them what they want. You are telling them to test the market and see what's out there either because you believe what they want is not there, or you're unwilling to pay that at all, or maybe in hindsight you will if you are forced to because you now see others will.

The only statement was the one that Adam made by rejecting every offer from the Pats. The team was willing to continue making him the highest paid kicker, but Adam wanted more. If any team misjudged the FA market it was Indy. Had the Pats tagged him, they would be paying Adam over $1.5mil more than the #2 kicker. The Colts not only overpaid Adam, but they are
"rewarding" him for what he had done for New England. That Indy was crazy enough to play an aging kicker who's coming off a mediocre 2005 season, is their problem.

The Patriots either misjudged the 2006 PK market (and perhaps the entire 2006 FA market) or they simply didn't want certain players at certain prices. I'm not sure what players are supposed to make of that, but I'd have left too. Givens wanted to be a #1. I don't think that was a rational decision, and I don't think the Pats should have overpaid him as a mid level #1 when he is a good #2 here. Adam wanted to be the highest paid kicker in the league by contract. I happen to think he was worth the couple of hundred thousand a year that paying a pro bowl kicker entailed where Givens would never have been worth a couple of million more in his role here as a WR. Adam also wanted the security of a long term deal. The only security in an NFL contract is in the guaranteed bonus money, because your contractual right to any trumped up salary going forward is not worth the paper it's printed on unless there is a significant cap consequence implicitly insuring it. If he signed with us for no bonus we could have cut him in pre season and not owed him a dime of that BS highest paid kicker salary Jonathan was babbling about.

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=747

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=746

Kickers can perform well into their late 30's in many instances. Adam wanted the opportunity to do just that. Few OLB can perform well past their mid 30's, and the good ones have made ten times as much as a PK 10+ years into their careers. Willie was overpaid for much of his time here even when his contract was actually reworked. He doesn't need the money, he said that repeatedly. Yet he left for an opportunity to extend his career with a team willing to overpay him once again, and by about double, rather than finish it out where it began. And played the nobody called me don't blame me card to boot. Yet no one plans to boo Willie because his only offer came from Cleveland instead of Indianapolis. Don't kid yourself, if it was Indy or Pittsburgh or the JETS or Miami offering Willie that cash, he's still gone.

As for Willie, the Pats cut him. Had he gone to Indy I wouldn't have cared. He was a class act that was willing to restructure his contract more than once for the team. Actually, I don't really care about Adam either. Since the the Pats did reward him with a 3-year guaranteed contract after the 2001 season, I don't think the team mistreated him at all. Adam got greedy and left. He's no better than Ty Law or Lawyer Milloy. When his contract expired after the 2004 season, the Pats were forced to tag him. After a weak 2005 season, Adam wanted to be paid as if his performance equaled that of 2001. Never mind that he missed 2 makable FGs (31 & 38 yards) in SB 38, thus putting himself into that last second FG situation.

A kicker is only as good as his next kick. When you throw a ton of money at a kicker, you're taking a gamble on every big kick.

"Clutch" is never a solid indicator for future performance. The problem with the "clutch" argument is that to be clutch, you need 2 things: opportunity and success. It is safe to assume there's an existence of "clutch" kickers who never had that special opportunity. It's like when ESPN asked Billy Beane if Derek Jeter is "clutch". Beane's response was that Jeter is a very good player who's played in a lot of postseason games. In Vinatieri's case, he gone 2-2 in GW SB FG attempts. That's a sample size of two. Only two other kickers in SB history ever had that same type of opportunity: Jim O'Brien and Scott Norwood. Therefore, the odds of any kicker to duplicate what Adam Vinatieri has done is highly unlikely, since that kind of opportunity presents itself in very rare fashion.

 

[CTPatsFan]

F 'im.

10 characters.

 

[belichickaholic]

Adam made a decision based upon what he felt like was best for his family. For this he should be booed? I'm sure he cares about the fans. He's been treated like royalty here. I'm sure it was a very hard decision for him.

In another time, he would have been able to finish his career here, but that time no longer exists. This is the salary cap NFL and it's hard to deal with from a fan point of view.

We want to hold on to our heroes.

But he made a decision that was best for his family just like Tom would have if we didn't pay him what he thought he was worth. And just like Willie did when he went to Cleveland.

He's a victim of circumstance really, and it's sad.

Am I an apologist? I'm a Fan. Are my children apologists? They're Fans.

It's hard to explain to your children. why their favorite player has left. My son has a number 4 jersey in his closet. But he also has a 24 jersey and a 55 jersey and a 12 jersey!

Players move on, but there will always be new jerseys

 

[5 Rings for Brady!!]

It may have been the toughest half hour of his life!

 

[MoLewisrocks]

Fair enough. But he did leave his team in a huff after spurning every offer from the Pats since the end of 2004. Goodbye Adam.

Any details on all those offers he spurned - no I didn't think so... He left in the quietest huff I've ever seen.

The only statement was the one that Adam made by rejecting every offer from the Pats. The team was willing to continue making him the highest paid kicker, but Adam wanted more. If any team misjudged the FA market it was Indy. Had the Pats tagged him, they would be paying Adam over $1.5mil more than the #2 kicker. The Colts not only overpaid Adam, but they are
"rewarding" him for what he had done for New England. That Indy was crazy enough to play an aging kicker who's coming off a mediocre 2005 season, is their problem.

Apparently you still can't grasp the difference between the player with the highest salary or even the highest cap hit and the actually highest paid player. Adam wasn't the highest paid player last year or the year before that, because a couple of kickers signed new deals late in the each year and got both their salary from their existing contract and a huge signing bonus in the $3M range. They were the highest paid kickers in the league by contract and by take home at the end of each season. Not Adam. I don't think Adam's ever gotten a 7 figure bonus from the Pats. And he wouldn't have been highest paid this season even if we tagged him because Green Bay's former kicker signed with the Vikings a week before Adam signed with the Colts and he got a $3M signing bonus in addition to his six figure salary on a 5 year $10M deal. Not to mention Vanderjerk who got a $2.5M signing bonus plus salary on his 3 year $6M deal from Dallas - a week after Adam signed. Indy signed a long term deal with Adam and he is counting $1.5M on their cap in 2006, though he is taking home $4M+. Vanderjerk was a $2.8M cap hit last season for Indy, not counting the $300K or so for the JAG who handled kickoffs. Adam won't cost Indy that kind of cap hit under this deal until 2009-2010.

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=747

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=746

This was not Kerry's usual fact based work. I think the word emotion in the title did him in. This was his knee jerk reaction to Adam's departure, and the uproar it caused. Kerry may know stats, but he only thinks he knows how the Pat's FO thinks. NFL compensation strategies aren't based on snaps. They are based on position and talent and hereabouts fitting the system. Adam fit a system that was light on offense in favor of defense. How many $1.5M guards score over 100 points a season with consistency? And since Belioli already paid a freakin' kicker 2% of their cap before it went up 20% I guess by CHFF standards that makes them capidiots.

And as for that fans suppositions Edinger and Vanderjerk were in line as replacements....one is still unemployed and the other once again proved to be the anti-Vinatieri and never got a sniff here either. The Pats preferred to take their chances with a raw rookie and a washed out drama queen.

As for Willie, the Pats cut him. Had he gone to Indy I wouldn't have cared. He was a class act that was willing to restructure his contract more than once for the team. Actually, I don't really care about Adam either. Since the the Pats did reward him with a 3-year guaranteed contract after the 2001 season, I don't think the team mistreated him at all. Adam got greedy and left. He's no better than Ty Law or Lawyer Milloy. When his contract expired after the 2004 season, the Pats were forced to tag him. After a weak 2005 season, Adam wanted to be paid as if his performance equaled that of 2001. Never mind that he missed 2 makable FGs (31 & 38 yards) in SB 38, thus putting himself into that last second FG situation.

You do understand that most restructures to not involve players actually losing money - just shifting it around. And Willie was overpaid for most of his career. The Pat's are never forced to do anything - the tag was their choice. They could just as easily have given him a deal in 2005 would have lowered their cap hit on him almost in half, or let him walk. They chose to tag him, not visa versa. And for the last time, he missed one because he slipped on wet paint. The other was blocked. And once again the defense folded in the waning minutes of a Superbowl.

A kicker is only as good as his next kick. When you throw a ton of money at a kicker, you're taking a gamble on every big kick.

When you field a rookie PK or a former bust you're also taking a gamble on every big kick, as well as your season.

"Clutch" is never a solid indicator for future performance. The problem with the "clutch" argument is that to be clutch, you need 2 things: opportunity and success. It is safe to assume there's an existence of "clutch" kickers who never had that special opportunity. It's like when ESPN asked Billy Beane if Derek Jeter is "clutch". Beane's response was that Jeter is a very good player who's played in a lot of postseason games. In Vinatieri's case, he gone 2-2 in GW SB FG attempts. That's a sample size of two. Only two other kickers in SB history ever had that same type of opportunity: Jim O'Brien and Scott Norwood. Therefore, the odds of any kicker to duplicate what Adam Vinatieri has done is highly unlikely, since that kind of opportunity presents itself in very rare fashion.

Quoting Billy Beane on a football board. When was the last time (or the first time) he won anything with his moneyball theories in Oakland. Clutch exists and whether Beane wants to acknowledge it or not is immaterial. Clutch is part of what gets you to those opportunities to kick in a Superbowl. Brady and Vinatieri are clutch, money players. That's why they win championships while Beane's A's simply cannot. Manning and Vanderjerk have also had multiple opportunities to come up clutch and win HFA, advance in the playoffs, win a division. And they just cannot perform in that clutch. Clutch doesn't mean you do it every time, just far more often than not when it counts the most.

 

[PF1996]

Re: Isn't it normal for the visiting team to be booed?

I really don't understand why this is even a question. I wouldn't boo only because it's not something I normally do but if you normally boo members of the opposition team...why should A. Vinetari be off limits? He's a Colt and as another poster said, he was cheered and feted for his accomplishments as a Patriot while he WAS a Patriot. He CHOSE to leave the Patriots, he wasn't a "victim of circumstance" and being booed is a well earned consequence of that choice.

I'm also puzzled that there are people who appear to believe that the Patriots would "let" Vinetari go by supposedly offering him a contract that wasn't "credible" even though those same people simultaneously contend that Vinetari is still a great kicker in his prime with many good years left. Are we to believe then that the Patriots front office is totally clueless? After all, why would the Patriots make an intrinsically unacceptable offer to Vinetari ("a clutch kicker in his prime") at a time when there were FEW acceptable replacements in the draft or free market AND there were several teams in the market for a kicker INCLUDING a rival team? Please don't recycle the "they thought he would accept because of the agent...etc." excuse because Vinetari had demonstrated in both 2004 and 2005 that he wasn't going to accept a deal not to his liking simply because it was offered by the Patriots. So, we are left with two logical choices...that the Patriots didn't want to retain Vinetari (suggests something about his current skills) or that the Patriots made Vinetari a reasonable contract offer which he rejected. Choice 2 seems most likely considering that the Patriots made no move to find another kicker until after Vinetari took the Colts offer.

It's obvious that some people simply do not want to believe that Vinetari wanted to leave the Patriots and chased the money despite the obvious signs. Would anyone else believe Law if he "claimed" to be "representing himself"...yet never once called a successful team that is KNOWN to be very willing to pay the big bucks AND was in need of a player at his position? Does anyone really believe that an individual as egotistical as Polian would NOT believe that HE could convince Vinetari to leave the Patriots? (Ignoring the FACT that Vinetari's failure to sign a long-term deal TWO years in a row clearly indicated that he was NOT inevitably attached to the Patriots). Does anyone really believe that the alleged "take it or leave it deal" the Colts offered was not a BLUFF and that Vinetari (or anyone with a little common sense) wouldn't know that it was a BLUFF? What were the Colts going to do if Vinetari had given the Patriots the opportunity to match...pull the offer and bring back Vanderjacdt. Vinetari obviously intended to leave the Patriots for the Colts and I imagine the reason for the prolonged charade was a combination of wanting to stick it to the Patriots FO while making himself look like a "good guy who was forced to go to the Colts". He certainly seems to have succeeded. I guess the supposed "leak" which revealed that the "Patriots didn't offer any guaranteed money [strangely after guaranteeing his previous contract]" must have come from the Patriots FO

 

[RPCity]

Re: Isn't it normal for the visiting team to be booed?

Personally I dont see it as being much matter either way. I say cheer him when he walks onto the field for introductions as a sign of respect, as Sox fans did for Pedro (he deserves that much at least).

After that, I dont think he'll make much of an impact. The way I envision the next Pats/Colts game to go, the only kick he'll be making is the kickoff to start the game or at the half. They won't be scoring that many points...

 

[JoeSixPat]

Do you understand why he could not? That offer was contingent on his not taking it back to another team - if he did it was off the table.

I never bought that contrived excuse and assumed no one else did either.

This is the NFL. There are rules about teams not talking with agents about players under contract and other anti-tampering rules etc etc etc - but when it comes to money, I think we all know those conversations still take place -quietly.

It's naive to think that Adam was "prevented" from having his agent make a call on the QT to seek a last and best offer from the Patriots.

It's naive to think that if there was the possiblity of more money on the table his agent wouldn't have pushed for it - let alone Adam himself.

Even the absence of that "contingent on not bringing the offer back to the Patriots" aspect of the story for quite a while strikes me as suspicious, as it came out only when Adam V. started taking some heat for not letting the Patriots match.

And in the worst case scenario, if Adam did bring the offer back to the Pats and they matched or bettered the offer - what's the worst thing that happens?

Polian cries foul and looks like a schmuck and Adam V. is even more of a local hero for it and has more money and security to boot?

More likely, if Adam spurned the Colts they'd just keep quiet about the terms of the offer (if there were any such terms) and act like they expected him to return to the Pats all along, but just wanted to drive the price up for a rival.

Bottom line - all things being equal (the money) Adam preferred NOT to return to NE. That was his choice.

The only thing that keeps my anger in check is the knowledge that the ball was in the Patriots court for a very long time, and they also had the option of franchising him again and chose not to - likely misreading the K FA market as you say.