What a surprise, here comes Borges with the negative spin.

When I see the name Ron Borges on the byline, I don't even read the article. His schtick is to be negative towards the Patriots and to alway be a contrarian. I don't mind criticism of the Patriots, but he goes way beyond that. He's a waste of ink, space, and time.

Wow....the Sunday Globe, opened it up hoping for Pats articles after lots of FA activity. After a quick scan. We have our pathetic Borges article, an article on the Bruins on the front page, an article about Jonathon Papelbon, a Celts article and another Bruins one.

Wtf. Nice Newspaper. Who gives a **** about the Bruins.

Great counter material from Borges himself, and who ever said you can't have it both ways? It was must not have been a sports writer.....

Does anyone else think that Polian is going to try to come up with a rule that "coaches of the Pro Bowl can not sign a player he coaches," just knowing what a cry baby the guy is I sure he is pissed that AD is with the Pats.

God I hope the Pats open up in Indy and Thomas drops Peyton 3 times.

fitch said:

Does anyone else think that Polian is going to try to come up with a rule that "coaches of the Pro Bowl can not sign a player he coaches," just knowing what a cry baby the guy is I sure he is pissed that AD is with the Pats.

God I hope the Pats open up in Indy and Thomas drops Peyton 3 times.

Click to expand...

More like 5 times.

Why do I continue to read this crap??????


http://www.boston.com/sports/football/patriots/articles/2007/03/04/more_of_the_same/

>>>>>Banking on Thomas is no sure thing.>>>>>
Oh, Adelius, we forgot to mention one thing. Don't bother reading the Globe because some of the writers
would bemoan the tax implications if you hit the Powerball,seeing the negative of everything.......

From the article
>>>>Since the Ravens won the Super Bowl six years ago, they have lost a trainload of defensive talent in free agency. None of the players who departed went on to maintain their level of play at their new addresses>>>>>

Uh, the same could be said for the Patriots (see Law,T., Milloy,L., McGinest, W.,Washington, T., Hamilton,B., for example)
And if he had gone to another team, especially one in the AFC East, he would bemoan the fact that the Pats had to face him twice a year. Look at other LBs at 30, it's the time in BB's system that they have the knowledge to fully integrate the mnaterial. A player with a few years ( read 4 or less) just isn't likely to have the experience necessary at LB as opposed to other positions.

>>>>>What is worrisome, though, is whether the source of that production was more Thomas or the people around him.>>>>>>>
That must be a typo because I think the intended name was Ray Lewis.......



Compare this with Felger's opening paragraph....
http://patriots.bostonherald.com/patriots/view.bg?articleid=186257
He’s known as “Slash”because of all the different positions he can play. He’s tackled LaDainian Tomlinson at the line of scrimmage and covered Chad Johnson outside the numbers. His former teammates called him “The Coordinator” because he knew the defense so well. He’s a stout, 270-pound linebacker who first made the Pro Bowl covering kicks. His former coach said he’s a cross between Lawrence Taylor and Carl Banks.

I actually found some of that to be of value. The AFC North GM who critiqued Thomas's style of play was valuable. I'm not taking it at face value, but it's good to hear a line of criticism. Of course, the Patriots like to look at what a player can do, and NOT emphasize his negatives. This GM doesn't understand that. The Patriots want to be in position to take care of your talents. They like to fit players together like puzzle pieces. They look for complements, so if you have deficiencies in the running game, well guess what. You'll be playing next to players who are stout. While they can't rush the passer well, or cover the TE,w ell that's where you cover up their deficiencies.

This is what I objected to mostly:

So is his athletic versatility, the kind that would allow a football mind as facile as Belichick's to have a field day using Thomas's skills differently from week to week to create difficult matchups.

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Say what? BB's mind is facile? Uh, go look up that word in the dictionary Ron.

Since the Ravens won the Super Bowl six years ago, they have lost a trainload of defensive talent in free agency. None of the players who departed went on to maintain their level of play at their new addresses.

That is true of defensive tackle Sam Adams, linebacker Jamie Sharper, cornerback Duane Starks, safety Kim Herring, cornerback Gary Baxter, defensive linemen Rob Burnett, Keith Washington, and Lionel Dalton, and linebacker Ed Hartwell.

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Sam Adams and Kim Herring made the Pro Bowl after they left Baltimore. Washington, Dalton, were not really ever stalwarts. Burnett was old when he left. So, Borges extrapolates from two free agent busts (Starks and Hartwell) that it's obvious the Ravens players only excel in that system, even though Hartwell busted because of injuries.

Don't let the tool bother you. Only two days earlier in an article posted on MSNBC.com, Borges himself placed Thomas first on his list of free agents “most likely to deliver value for their services” :

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17392462/page/2/

It must have been quite a challenge for Borges to somehow, some way paint a negative picture of the Pats signing. He rolls out a pretty weak argument doubting Thomas because of his age, his price tag, and the history of defensive players after the leave Baltimore. There are a number of Borgisms in the article, for example the obligatory unnamed NFL personnel man, AFC executive, etc. but my favorite occurs when he proceeds to manipulate Ozzie Newsome’s quotes regarding Thomas, player value and free agency:

Sounds good Ron, but you forgot to mention that the last paragraph was actually spoken by Ozzie in direct response to a reporter’s question about Tony Pashos and Jarret Johnson! http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article.jsp?id=16696

Just another example of how Borges’ personal vendetta against Belichick makes him a joke. He might have gotten all of Belichick's quarters in high school, but he wouldn't have even noticed that Bill copped his dollars in the process.

Pats67 said:

Gee, I wonder what happened between the time Ron posted this to MSNBC Friday and the time he posted his Globe article this morning:

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That time Borges thought SF would get Thomas.

Borges isn't worth the aggravation unless viewed as entertainment because of how many times he's been dead wrong
More noteworthy is the fact that after an almost historical Patriot weekend in FA,The NYGlob offers up a take by none other than Borges (eternally anti-Pats), a regurgitation of the BB "flaws" written by somebody or another who they probably deem as "safe", then calls it a day.

smg93 said:

This is exactly a case of "I will write a cautionary article on Adalius Thomas. If he succeeds, everyone will forget that I wrote the article. If he fails however, I will now have an article that I can shove at BB's face everytime and I say I TOLD YOU SO, I TOLD YOU SO".

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Actually what Borges does is say "I will write an article critical of the Patriots so the local fandom will get all up-in-arms and talk about me, thereby increasing my visibility and advancing me career."

In otherwords, in his business, it's better to have everyone talking about what a moron you are (because then people are reading you) than to have no one know who you are. Everytime people in here react to something Borges writes, you give him exactly what he wants and he laughs all the way to the bank.

People probably need to cut Ron some slack on the day after the Pat's shoot his base mantra full of holes. He loves to smugly point out that the system (Beliehick) doesn't make tackles, players want to get paid and you can't get by forever on chewing gum and string.

So Ron was forced to change tacks on the fly - why else would anyone with half a brain even talk football with an NFC North executive yet alone seek his insight (LOL). And I'm not convinced going from Baltimore to Arizona or Houston or Atlanta or Cleveland or St. Louis on the heels of winning a ring would be terribly predictive of what a Ravens player who barely got a taste of success there in his rookie season might do in NE. Guys won rings, got big paydays to go to lousy teams, got hurt, lost their motivation mired in mediocrity and dysfunction and didn't turn those franchises around. Gee - sounds like what happened with some of the players we lost after the first ring. Thomas didn't blossom in Baltimore until after they hit the skids and had nothing to hang their hats on for a couple of seasons but playing good defense. Duh...

It must really suck as a sports writer when your first sporting love (boxing) is a farse and you work in a place where your primary function (covering the NFL) revolves around covering a wildly successful HC you can't personally stand. Almost as much as it sucks to be an NFC North executive.

has anyone written this guy and called his ***** out about this yet, because I am about to

brabirschorr said:

Don't let the tool bother you. Only two days earlier in an article posted on MSNBC.com, Borges himself placed Thomas first on his list of free agents “most likely to deliver value for their services” :

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17392462/page/2/

It must have been quite a challenge for Borges to somehow, some way paint a negative picture of the Pats signing. He rolls out a pretty weak argument doubting Thomas because of his age, his price tag, and the history of defensive players after the leave Baltimore. There are a number of Borgisms in the article, for example the obligatory unnamed NFL personnel man, AFC executive, etc. but my favorite occurs when he proceeds to manipulate Ozzie Newsome’s quotes regarding Thomas, player value and free agency:

"This was not an 11th-hour decision," Newsome said. "We've been facing that since the beginning of training camp [in 2006], knowing that we could have to make that decision. I think it was a fair decision. I think it was fair to the organization and fair for A.D.

"I had a chance to sit down and talk with him the Monday before I came to the combine and explained our position, gave him an opportunity to talk to me. I think it was the fair thing to do.

"The way we approach it, we come to the threshold of what we think the player's value is in Baltimore. When it goes beyond that, then we don't mind them going out the door. If we lose them, we feel like we can go out and find some more."​

Sounds good Ron, but you forgot to mention that the last paragraph was actually spoken by Ozzie in direct response to a reporter’s question about Tony Pashos and Jarret Johnson! http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article.jsp?id=16696

Just another example of how Borges’ personal vendetta against Belichick makes him a joke. He might have gotten all of Belichick's quarters in high school, but he wouldn't have even noticed that Bill copped his dollars in the process.

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Nice 1st post and great catch on the Ozzie quotes! Welcome to the board!

Since we know how Borges writes negatively/contrarian about the Patriots in almost all of his articles, why would anybody here get upset that he did it again?

Posters who have pointed out the "read him with amusement" argument are correct IMHO. Sometimes, rarely, his articles are correct. If not...who really cares. Often, like todays, they provide some great laughs. Especially true with some of the nice research done by other posters on his change in direction from recent columns and his outright duplicity in attribution of quotes to subject matter.

Heck....good times to see Borges scuttle around like a ****roach in a dance studio.

Every king needs a jester....BB has his too. Long live/write Ron Borges!

brabirschorr said:

Don't let the tool bother you. Only two days earlier in an article posted on MSNBC.com, Borges himself placed Thomas first on his list of free agents “most likely to deliver value for their services” :

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17392462/page/2/

It must have been quite a challenge for Borges to somehow, some way paint a negative picture of the Pats signing. He rolls out a pretty weak argument doubting Thomas because of his age, his price tag, and the history of defensive players after the leave Baltimore. There are a number of Borgisms in the article, for example the obligatory unnamed NFL personnel man, AFC executive, etc. but my favorite occurs when he proceeds to manipulate Ozzie Newsome’s quotes regarding Thomas, player value and free agency:

"This was not an 11th-hour decision," Newsome said. "We've been facing that since the beginning of training camp [in 2006], knowing that we could have to make that decision. I think it was a fair decision. I think it was fair to the organization and fair for A.D.

"I had a chance to sit down and talk with him the Monday before I came to the combine and explained our position, gave him an opportunity to talk to me. I think it was the fair thing to do.

"The way we approach it, we come to the threshold of what we think the player's value is in Baltimore. When it goes beyond that, then we don't mind them going out the door. If we lose them, we feel like we can go out and find some more."​

Sounds good Ron, but you forgot to mention that the last paragraph was actually spoken by Ozzie in direct response to a reporter’s question about Tony Pashos and Jarret Johnson! http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article.jsp?id=16696

Just another example of how Borges’ personal vendetta against Belichick makes him a joke. He might have gotten all of Belichick's quarters in high school, but he wouldn't have even noticed that Bill copped his dollars in the process.

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Great find. What a tool this guy is.

He is a classic, if the Jets had made the signing it would have been "the best pickup of the entire 2007 offseason shifting the entire power balance of the AFC East and yet another sign that the Patriots are cheap"

The guy operates in strange, dirty, twisted parellel universe.

"Best values
1. Adalius Thomas, LB: He wants a $18 million signing bonus and will probably get it, likely from the 49ers. Wherever he goes, the 270-pound Thomas appears headed toward making an impact."

Ron Borges 2/2/07, MSNBC.com
http://pnpoc.msnbc.com/id/17392462/page/2/

His demise will come when people stop reading and talking about him,when he becomes so predictable it simply isn't worth anyone's time anymore. He's getting very close to that-jmo. It's no surprise the Glob is the paper who retains him; he's their perfect representative.

Oooh he got the double-yolker. Managing to downplay a new Patriot whilst simultaneously praising a Patriot that's leaving! Well played indeed sir.

Sorry, it's not him. It's an Afc North exec. He does exist. He didn't make up those quotes at all.

SoonerPatriot said:

It is amazing isn't it. Borges seems so desperate here. So hopeful this is a bad move he reaches for whatever he can find to make it so. To borrow a line from Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. Borges is a rat. His whole family is rats. 200 bucks says he made up or embelished the quotes from the other NFL personnel guy. A 100 more says if he didn't the source was Polian.

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Man, I was thinking the same thing. I'd bet my son that Borges made up these quotes from his normal unnamed sources.

He's such a baffoon! If the Pats sat idle, he'd have written again how cheap they are. Then, they sign the number one rated free agent available, and his article is on what a mistake it may be. I say "may", because as Borges usually does, he put in the obligatory sentences that gives him an out later.

He's an effing fool!

P.S. - I don't have a son, but I still say he's lying.