Today in Patriots History
Stephen Starring gets ****faced,
makes an ass out of himself
June 4, 1988:
WR
Stephen Starring is arrested for indecent exposure at a
John Elway charity golf event in Colorado.
He was later fined $500 and ordered to undergo a mental health evaluation.
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) _ Stephan Starring, a reserve wide receiver for the New England Patriots, was arrested following an indecent-exposure incident involving two women hotel employees, authorities said.
apnews.com
Wide receiver Stephen Starring of the New England Patriots has been convicted by an Arapahoe County Court jury on two counts of indecent exposure.
www.latimes.com
Starring was arrested after allegedly exposing himself to two women at an Aurora hotel while attending a golf tournament to raise funds for the John Elway Foundation.
June 4, 1996:
Sign free agent TE
Ryan McGrath, a second year player from SW Louisiana
SMITHFIELD -- One week into twice-a-day workouts, Patriots coach Bill Parcells admittedly already is mulling which 53 of the 77 players in camp he will keep. "I've been fooling around with the make…
www.southcoasttoday.com
June 4, 2009:
The Patriots today added a familiar face to the backfield, signing running back Patrick Pass, who spent seven seasons in New England from 2000-2006. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The 31-year-old Pass has been out of football since 2007, when he suited up for one game with the Giants, and...
www.boston.com
The Patriots today added a familiar face to the backfield, signing running back Patrick Pass, who spent seven seasons in New England from 2000-2006. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
While with the Patriots, Pass played in 78 regular season games and 10 playoff games, starting at fullback in Super Bowl 39 against the Eagles and appearing in each of the team’s two other Super Bowl victories. Pass has 1,096 career yards from scrimmage (526 yards rushing, 570 yards passing) and has scored four touchdowns.
The Patriots today also released defensive lineman Kenny Smith, linebacker Angelo Craig, running back Omar Cuff, and safety Marcus McClinton.
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. (AP) — Running back Patrick Pass is returning to the New England Patriots. The team said Thursday that it has signed a contract with Pass, who won three Super Bowls in seven seaso…
www.fosters.com
Pass appeared in one game with the New York Giants in 2007 and was out of football in 2008. He's a longshot to make a Patriots roster that includes running backs Laurence Maroney, Kevin Faulk, Fred Taylor, Sammy Morris and BenJarvus Green-Ellis.
- Smith was a DT from Alabama and 3rd round pick by New Orleans in 2001; he played in 30 games for the Saints from 2001-03. Smith was part of the Pats training camp in 2007, was re-signed before spending 2008 on injured reserve.
- Craig was a DE who had been a 2008 7th round draft pick by the Bengals, from the University of Cincinnati. He was on the Pats practice squad for the last month of the '08 season, and later spent parts of two seasons in the CFL.
- Cuff went undrafted in 2008. The RB from Delaware was originally signed by the Titans, and then was on the practice squads for the Browns, Chiefs, Buccaneers and Patriots.
- McClinton was a free safety from Kentucky with some red flags: he missed five games due to three separate injuries for the Wildcats as a junior in 2007.
- Pass was released just a week later, and retired from pro football. In 2020 he resurfaced as head coach of the Massachusetts Pirates, an Indoor Football League team playing in Lowell.
June 4, 2010:
Patriots sign OL Thomas Welch -- Patriots.com
Welch, an offensive lineman from Vanderbilt, was selected by the Patriots in the seventh round of the 2010 NFL Draft with the 208th selection overall. He was selected with the first of four seventh round picks by the Patriots.
At 6-7, 310-pounds, he was a two-year starter that saw action at both tackle positions. He began his college career as a tight end before moving to tackle following his redshirt season.
Seventh-round pick Welch inks a four-year deal.
www.boston.com
Welch will battle for a job in training camp with a crowded group at tackle. There are three players there who started for long stretches in 2009 (Matt Light, Nick Kaczur, Sebastian Vollmer), and a fourth (Mark LeVoir) who got plenty of playing time.
What could help the 6-foot-7, 310-pounder would be if Kaczur's appearance at guard during minicamp last week is more than just a cameo at the position in Logan Mankins' absence.
June 4, 2012:
Troy Brown is elected into the New England Patriots Hall of Fame
Wide receiver Troy Brown will be the 2012 inductee into the New England Patriots' Hall of Fame, the team announced Monday.Brown will be inducted in a ceremony outside Gillette Stadium on Saturday, Sept.
www.espn.com
The winner of a five-week fan vote (April 25-May 31), Brown becomes the 18th player and 19th member of the team's hall of fame. It was Brown's first year of eligibility.
Other finalists for induction, selected by a 17-person nominating committee in April, were head coach Bill Parcells and safety Fred Marion.
June 4, 2014:
The Patriots have signed former Chicago Bears and Carolina Panthers linebacker James Anderson.
www.boston.com
The Patriots have signed former Chicago Bears and Carolina Panthers linebacker James Anderson.
The team released former Rutgers wide receiver Mark Harrison to make room.
Anderson (6-3, 220 pounds), a veteran of eight NFL seasons, has experience as both a strong and weak outside linebacker. He’s tallied 556 career tackles and 12 sacks. He started all 16 games last season for the Bears, his only year in Chicago. He led the Bears in tackles with 102.
Harrison never got off the ground in New England. He had been sidelined in 2013 after signing as a rookie free agent. The Patriots placed him on the reserve/non-football injury list. In the team’s OTA practice open to the media last week, he dropped a Tom Brady pass that hit him in his hands.
Yeah, doing that will not endear you to your quarterback or coaches.
Just a few weeks earlier the future looked much brighter.
One of the themes that came up consistently in an offseason study exploring other NFL teams was the idea of searching in-house for every possible answer before signing an external free-agent.
www.espn.com
The former Rutgers Scarlet Knight is 6-foot-3 and 231 pounds, which is about as big as it gets for a receiver and almost puts him into a "move tight end" classification. Harrison had some things going for him coming out of Rutgers but went undrafted and then didn't pass a physical with the Bears (foot injury). The Patriots signed him on May 20 and he ended up spending last year on season-ending injured reserve.
Besides dropping a pass that hits you in the hands, being late never helps the cause of a player that is far from being a lock to make the roster.
Mark Harrison will have to show what he’s capable of in a different city.
www.masslive.com
But the decision to part ways with Harrison might have been fueled by something else.
Harrison was entering the year as a part of a group of wide receiver who were battling for one of the last one or two spots at the position, and did not help his cause by showing up late to an organized team activity this week, according to a source.
While OTAs are voluntary, showing up late when you are the bubble is not a good look.
Harrison ended up never playing a single down in the NFL. Anderson made 579 tackles over the course of his ten-year NFL career, but was waived by the Pats in late August. He has now embarked on another sports career.
James Anderson first played football for the Hokies and later played a decade in the NFL. Now he is continuing his athletics pursuits in the world of golf as a long drive competitor.
news.vt.edu
A little more than a year ago, Anderson, who graduated from Virginia Tech with a bachelor’s degree in studio art and a master’s degree in education, embarked on a career as a long drive competitor. To those unfamiliar with golf and with long drive competitions, the rules are simple: use a United States Golf Association-approved driver, swing as hard as possible, and try to hit a golf ball as far as possible while – and here’s the difficult part – also landing it within a grid roughly 45 to 60 yards wide.
June 4, 2015:
New England Patriots long-snapper Joe Cardona was the final fifth-round pick in the NFL to sign his rookie contract.
www.espn.com
New England Patriots long-snapper Joe Cardona was the final fifth-round pick in the NFL to sign his rookie contract. It is a four-year pact, as is customary for drafted rookies, but the deal has a slightly different look than most rookie contracts, likely tied to Cardona's potential service in the US Navy. Specifically, Cardona's deal includes a signing bonus of $100,000, which is less than the $189,532 his draft slot calls for.
However, the contract also includes $100,000 more in roster bonuses that are tied to him being on the 53-man roster, injured reserve list or physically unable to perform list between 2015-17. This structure provides the team a bit of security in the event Cardona has to serve his Naval commitments, while it gives Cardona the upshot of earning more on his contract than either of the two players drafted in the two picks ahead of him.
June 4, 2019:
Veteran TE Austin Seferian-Jenkins, who had signed a one-year deal with the Patriots in April, has been released.
www.espn.com
The New England Patriots have released veteran tight end Austin Seferian-Jenkins.
Seferian-Jenkins had signed a modest one-year, $895,000 contract on April 10, and he was vying for a roster spot at a position where the Patriots are transitioning without the retired Rob Gronkowski. The contract included just $50,000 in guaranteed money.
Seferian-Jenkins wasn't at the team's mandatory minicamp Tuesday, with coach Bill Belichick foreshadowing his release by saying that all players who were required to be present had reported. The 26-year-old Seferian-Jenkins, who has 116 career receptions for 1,160 yards and 11 touchdowns in 43 games over five seasons, also wasn't present during a voluntary practice in May that had been open to reporters.
Veteran Benjamin Watson headlines the Patriots' depth chart at tight end, but he will miss the first four games of the season because of an NFL suspension for banned substances. Matt LaCosse, Ryan Izzo, Stephen Anderson and Andrew Beck round out the depth chart.
Seferian-Jenkins had 11 catches for 90 yards and a touchdown before going on injured reserve in early October with a core muscle injury that required surgery. He became a free agent when the Jacksonville Jaguars declined his $500,000 option for 2019.
He joined the Jaguars on a two-year, $10 million deal before last season after resurrecting his career with the New York Jets. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers cut him after a September 2016 drunken driving arrest, which ultimately resulted in a two-game suspension by the NFL at the start of the 2017 season.
Seferian-Jenkins is taking a month off to work on “personal issues’’ and hopes to be ready to come back to football in July.
www.boston.com
The Patriots are releasing tight end Austin Seferian-Jenkins, a league source confirmed.
Seferian-Jenkins is taking a month off to work on “personal issues’’ and hopes to be ready to come back to football in July. The door is not closed between the tight end and the Patriots in the future, the source said.
In his five NFL seasons Austin Seferian-Jenkins played more than nine games only once, missing nearly as many games (37) as he played in (43). The 6-foot-5-inch, 262 pound former second rounder from Washington had 116 career catches for 1,160 yards and 11 TDs. ASJ never re-signed with the Patriots or any other NFL team.
Oops. Upon review, ASJ fumbled the ball short of the goal line in the Jets 2017 week six game in Foxborough. Not only was the touchdown overturned, but the ball went
out of the end zone for a touchabck - resulting in a turnover and Patriots' 1st and ten at the twenty yard line. That was the difference in the game as the Pats won, 24-17.
June 4, 2021:
The Patriots have added another receiver to the roster
www.masslive.com
The New England Patriots have acquired a former Atlanta Falcons wide receiver. No, it’s not Julio Jones.
Hall joins a receiver group that now includes: Nelson Agholor, Kendrick Bourne, N’Keal Harry, Jakobi Meyers, Tre Nixon, Gunner Olszewski, Matthew Slater, Devin Smith, Kristian Wilkerson and Isaiah Zuber.
During his NFL career, Hall has spent time with a total of six teams, the Raiders, Cardinals, Falcons, Bears, Lions and Browns.
The Patriots released Hall with an injury settlement on August 25.
June 4, 2024:
Pats sign undrafted rookie free agent WR
David Wallis, of DIII Randolph-Macon
Following OTA's, the New England Patriots have signed rookie free agent David Wallis (Cedar Point, N.C./Croatan), a former wide receiver from Randolph-Macon College.
www.rmc.edu
Apparently he was a standout at rookie minicamp.
The Randolph-Macon product attended rookie minicamp on a tryout basis.
www.patspulpit.com
A 4.49 40, FWIW, and 21 YPC at a Div 3 school.
And to borrow from an old saw, I can see the potential (although the number is amusing).
June 4, 2025:
