BB the GM is declining

[MrNathanDrake]

First off - BB is the best coach of all time. There is no argument to this. Belichick is one of the reasons I'm a huge Patriots fan.

The saying has always been "In Belichick We Trust", but he's made a lot of errors recently as GM. At 65 tears old we have to wonder if he's beginning to lose it. Many of you will hate on me for making this thread, but this is a discussion board and this is a big topic that most will be scared to touch because of how good Belichicks pedigree is.

1. Letting LaGarette Blount go for nothing. Blount straight up said he wanted to stay. And that was after having the best season of his career with a league leading 18 TD's. Blount was an emotional leader and big part of our last 2 superbowls. He wasnt even asking for a lot of money. BB and the front office let him walk. They signed Mike Gillisslee instead, who turned out to be a huge bust. We are actually LUCKY that Dion Lewis surprised everyone and turned out to have as good of a year as he did. Otherwise our running game wouldve been terrible. Lewis and Blount are completely opposite running styles and we never had that short yardage battering ram all year.
2. Letting Chris Long go for nothing. He literally donated his entire salary to charity this year. He also wouldnt have cost much to re-sign. Long is the perfect Patriots type player, good locker room guy, no character issues. He was happy to play here and then left because he felt the scheme didnt fit, or maybe he was upset that Trey Flowers passed him on the depth chart and thought he wouldnt get many snaps if he stayed. Whatever it was, I think if BB really wanted him to stay he couldve had a little last minute chat like he did with McDaniels and Devin McCourty and gotten him to stay. But they let him walk for peanuts and he went to team that had 3 losing seasons in a row. Long didnt set the league on fire, but he would've been a huge locker room guy and a leader. We could've used some veteran depth at DE this year, and he would've been a key part of the rotation.
3. Knowing that Rob Ninkovich was close to retirement and Jabaal Sheard wasn't going to be re-signed. Surely after coaching him for so many years, BB must've known Ninkovich was close to retirement. We literally had one of the deepest DE rotations in 2016 with Ninkovich, Sheard, Long, and an emerging Trey Flowers. They were a HUGE part of the SuperBowl comeback... knocking the Falcons out of Field Goal range, and sacking Matt Ryan. One year later.... Flowers was the only one still on the team. Losing all that depth in one off season, and who did BB replace them with? A late 3rd rd pick and 4th rd pick. We are actually lucky that Deatrich Wise contributed as much as he did. Usually you cant count on mid-round DE's to do much. Even if Rivers were healthy, who's to say he wouldve been any good? 3rd round DE's are hit and miss (Shawn Crable anyone? Jake Bequette?). I couldnt believe it when the Pats went into this season without any sort of back up plan for losing 3 DE's. Oh, wait... we got Kony Ealy and Cassius Marsh! Kony wasnt given much of a chance and got released before the season started. Marsh was a failure and got released midway through the season. Now we are 1 year later and we still have a huge need at DE. We got lucky the Steelers messed up and let James Harrison go. He was our best pass rusher and played better than expected but it's kind of sad when you have to rely on a 39 year old cast off that signed with your team in week 16.
4. Trading Chandler Jones. He led the league with 17 sacks this season. Yeah he's making a lot of money but, what's the point of drafting good players if you're never going to sign them? By trading away Jones the front office basically admits they don't want a superstar pass rusher and instead want to pick up scraps for less money. The problem with that is there aren't good scraps to be found every offseason. Last offseason is proof of that. Jones is also a good leader and locker room guy. He had one little incident but overall his character seems okay. His reputation was that he tappered off as the season went on, but the coaches also ran him into the ground and he basically played every snap. Shouldve done a better job at rotating players in and keeping him fresh. We couldve used some of that pass rush in the SuperBowl. People will also refute this by saying we got Joe Thuney and Malcolm Mitchell for him, but OG and back up WR are dime a dozen. Star DE's in their prime dont come around very often, especially for the Patriots who are consistently drafting late in the 1st.
5. Letting Akiem Hicks walk right when he was hitting his prime. He was a hidden gem that the Pats picked up for basically nothing. He's turned into one of the best interior linemen in the NFL and isn't getting paid like it. He would've been a steal if we re-signed him long term. Huge talent evaluation misfire. The coaches see these guys in practice every day. They missed on Hicks big time.
6. Instead, we re-signed Alan Branch at 32 years old. He was a healthy scratch for most of the season. Huge disappointment and waste of money. Got replaced by mis-season pick up Ricky Jean Francois.
7. Dwayne Allen trade. Total bust. The Colts mustve been ecstatic to offload that terrible contract on the Pats. He got paid $5million this last season for a total of 86 yards. Absolutely pathetic. All these players the Pats supposedly can't afford to pay. Meanwhile they paid Allen 5million. This was a terrible misfire.
8. Recent Drafts haven't been successful. Cyrus Jones, Jordan Richards, Geneo Grissom, Dominique Easley. None of them have contributed much, if at all. The only player that has panned out recently is Trey Flowers.
9. Underestimating chemistry. We went into the playoffs with newly signed players in the Front 7. Ricky Jean Francois became a Patriot in November. Eric Lee signed in late November when Marsh was released. James Harrison became a Patriot in December. Marquis Flowers in his first season, after being a career special teamer. Deatrich Wise a rookie. It's fine to plug and play a few players when you have a solid core group of players, but this year we didn't. The Front office let the core walk away or traded them away. I know a lot of people are ****ting on Matt Patricia, but Belichick set him up for failure with this defense. Our D was counting on rookies and cast offs. Simply put, Phillies OLine was far superior to our DLine.

Belichick had a reputation of always cutting ties at the perfect time. Players that left the Patriots went on to be forgotten and never played as well. This isnt the case anymore. The players that have left have flourished and the Pats were left with an anemic defense that got exposed.


Going into next season the entire Defense needs help. We need a new CB to replace Butler. We need LB depth since Hightower is injury prone and Elandon Roberts is horrible. We need DT since Alan Branch is good as gone. We need DE. The draft isn't going to solve all those problems and this is a bad free agent year. We'll be lucky if we solve one of those spots in FA.

 

[Guts]

7 Straight AFCCG and 4 SB appearances with 2 Lombardis in the Gronk era. I would not consider that declining. He knows what he's doing although that Butler benching still deserves some explanation.

 

[MrBigglesWorth]

They were two minutes and one drive from winning the Superbowl.. oh wait that happened in nearly every Superbowl there played... You're right they were depleted from last yr but you can't keep everybody

This yrs draft is important to add a few defensive players in the front 7. They need the horses

 

[blackglass3]

We're still complaining about Chandler Jones leaving? We've won a Super Bowl and been one 3rd-and-long whiffed tackle from winning another one since CJ was traded. I'm not saying he couldn't have helped, but if CJ gets paid than Gilmore isn't here. Hicks hit pretty big money if I recall right, Sheard got paid a bunch, and Chris Long wasn't a good fit for us FROM WHAT HE SAID HIMSELF.

I agree on Blount, though. We should have held on to him. Maybe he'll come back.

 

[Triumph]

 

[Sciz]

For the sake of not spending 3 hours on a line by line response, I’m simply going to say that it’s absurd to me that you’re blaming Belichick personally for everything that didn’t work out perfectly with 2 years of hindsight while at the same time calling Lewis, Wise, and Harrison’s performances “lucky.”

 

[Joey007]

I’m not gonna go into the personnel moves considering how successful we’ve been, but I will say that the draft production as of late have been lackluster. (Yes that’s even factoring that we lost a 1st rounder)

We only have two first round picks from the last 6 years still on the roster. And some of our 2nd rounders have been quite underwhelming.

 

[Chris Stevenson]

Honestly, if I ever seen a bannable offense for trolling, this is it.

The fact this team went 13-3 with all the injuries, has BB/Caserio in the mix for Executive of the Year, or at least it should.

This thread is a joke of epic proportions.

 

[SVN]

Look at the UDFA,trades and signings this year. He did a pretty good job. Dont forget the 1st and 4th rounder we lost due to deflategate.

 

[Chris Stevenson]

We're still complaining about Chandler Jones leaving? We've won a Super Bowl and been one 3rd-and-long whiffed tackle from winning another one since CJ was traded. I'm not saying he couldn't have helped, but if CJ gets paid than Gilmore isn't here. Hicks hit pretty big money if I recall right, Sheard got paid a bunch, and Chris Long wasn't a good fit for us FROM WHAT HE SAID HIMSELF.

I agree on Blount, though. We should have held on to him. Maybe he'll come back.

Not to mention, Jones yielded us Thuney, Mitchell and 15 million in cap space. I am assuing the kid who started this thread is in his teens or 20s and just got done listening to Felger and Mazz, and now mommy is calling him to dinner.

I honestly did not even read what he wrote, the thread is so mortifying.

 

[Chris Stevenson]

Look at the UDFA,trades and signings this year. He did a pretty good job. Dont forget the 1st and 4th rounder we lost due to deflategate.

BB is so great, we are the only franchise in sports history to see a cheating commissioner colluding with cheating owners, to try to slow him down.

This is a fact, so it's a pretty hilarious fact.

 

[MrNathanDrake]

For the sake of not spending 3 hours on a line by line response, I’m simply going to say that it’s absurd to me that you’re blaming Belichick personally for everything that didn’t work out perfectly with 2 years of hindsight while at the same time calling Lewis, Wise, and Harrison’s performances “lucky.”

I'm saying we're lucky that Harrison got released. You cant count on things like this to happen late in the season. He was gifted to us.

Lucky that a rookie 4th rounder (Wise) turned out decent. Couldve been another Jake Bequette or Geneo Grissom or Shawn Crable. Can't count on 4th rd rookies to contirbute much. Anything we got was a bonus.

Dion had the best year of his career. He far exceeding expectations

 

[SVN]

I'm saying we're lucky that Harrison got released.

Lucky that a rookie 4th rounder (Wise) turned out decent. Couldve been another Jake Bequette or Geneo Grissom or Shawn Crable. Can't count on 4th rd rookies to contirbute much. Anything we got was a bonus.

Dion had the best year of his career. He far exceeding expectations

Everything is luck in the draft man. Reggie bush was supposed to be the next walter payton and bo jackson and marshall faulk too.

 

[JMC00]

So you **** on Belichick for Blount but then dismiss him for signing Lewis? No agenda there with that take.....


Long wanted to leave because he didn't like how he was used.

Belichick drafted Derek Rivers who was viewed as Ninkovich's replacement. Then Ninkovich decided to retire in camp and Rivers got hurt.

Jones got the Pats the pick that turned into Joe Thuney and Malcolm Mitchell who helped win a SB.

It's is widely known that Belichick basically begged Hicks to stay but Hicks wanted to go to Chicago because of family reasons


Players that went on IR this season

#1 WR- Edelman
#4 WR- Mitchell
#1 LB- Hightower
#3 LB- McClellin
#1 RT- Cannon
#3 DT- Valentine
#4/#5 CB- Cyrus and Jonathan Jones

 

[HailHydra]

Quoting you

1. Letting LaGarette Blount go for nothing. Its LeGarette Blount first of all. Furthermore, I hated to watch Blount when he was part of the Patriots. He was slow and had trouble gaining critical yards on short downs. Lewis is a much better RB in OUR system. Blount's style may better suit the Eagles' OLine.
2. Letting Chris Long go for nothing. He was a good player, but Long didn't feel like it was a good fit in the Pats system. If the player doesn't want it, then its not a good idea to begin with.
3. Knowing that Rob Ninkovich was close to retirement and Jabaal Sheard wasn't going to be re-signed. Oh, wait... we got Kony Ealy and Cassius Marsh! Jabaal Sheard was going to make far more money than we would be willing to pay him, and he was essentially benched for an entire half of the season last year. I wouldn't be willing to pay serious money for that. Kony Early was a minimal risk and high reward move that didn't seem to pay out. Ealy might have been a good player in the Jets' system, but he might not have fit well here. I'm willing to trust Belichick that had he known our DLine would be ravaged by injuries, he might have thought again. Cassius Marsh was a miss - but what teams haven't made multiple of those?
4. Trading Chandler Jones. Chandler Jones is making a buttload of money in Arizona - something that we wouldn't be willing to pay if we wanna keep other contributors. Chandler Jones is being paid 17 million - imagine that being Stephon Gilmore + 2 or 3 other quality depth pieces. I would have loved Jones had he NOT been paid premium dollar on the market.
5. Letting Akiem Hicks walk right when he was hitting his prime. Akiem Hicks has been playing very well over the course of the last season. He wasn't an amazing player while he was in New England, and there's no way to have known if he would have ever played up to his current skill level had he been here. I wish we had kept him though.
6. Instead, we re-signed Alan Branch at 32 years old. Alan Branch was a mistake, but its one that would have been hard to predict given Branch's quality play the season before.
7. Dwayne Allen trade. Total bust. He may not have been worth 5 mill a year, but he was still useful as a run blocker, and part of the reason why our run game succeeded this year. Not the best move though.
8. Recent Drafts haven't been successful. Cyrus Jones, Jordan Richards, Geneo Grissom, Dominique Easley. The only player that has panned out recently is Trey Flowers. This is blatantly wrong. If we consider the draft since Dominique Easley being drafted, we have Deatrich Wise Jr, Joe Thuney, Brissett (he got us Dorsett so I'll include this), Valentine (good last year), Mitchell, Elandon Roberts (not the best but he does play a lot of snaps), Malcom Brown, Trey Flowers, Shaq Mason., Jimmy Garoppolo, James White, Cam Fleming. You can also basically include a 1st rder for Brandin Cooks. Shabby? I think not.

[/QUOTE]

 

[Nikolai]

If Brady doesn't get strip sacked, we're not getting all of these threads. That should tell you what you need to know.

 

[luuked]

Apart from the Akiem Hicks situation -- that was not helped by the fact that he was close with Ryan Pace because he was part of the front office that drafted him for the Saints -- I dont think there is a single point of yours that I agree with.

Lucky that a rookie 4th rounder (Wise) turned out decent. Couldve been another Jake Bequette or Geneo Grissom or Shawn Crable. Can't count on 4th rd rookies to contirbute much. Anything we got was a bonus.

You not only don't understand the salary cap but the quoted sentence above also shows you have no friggin clue about the draft. You can't count on anyone in the draft to contribute. Even your sure fire first round picks are statistically 50:50 propositions.

The fact that we have stayed competitive through 15 years of mostly drafting in the high 20s/early 30s is everything you need to know about BB the GM. And when there are steals to be made in FA he is right there as Moss or Revis have shown.

Jesus.. and all this after a season with a top offense, a top 5 scoring defense and a superbowl berth. I wonder if people could even handle missing the playoffs or if they would just jump off bridges and buildings over that.

 

[Deus Irae]

So.......


Cliff?

 

[maust]

1. Blount was a FA, he was tendered at $1.1m to protect compensatory pick rights and Philly signed him for 1 year.
2. Long came in on a 1 year FA deal, NE didn't let him 'go for nothing' he elected to move on. There was no way for the Pats to gain anything in his scenario.
3. In addition to his many other functions now BB is supposed to read Ninkovich's mind?
4. Chandler Jones was a $12m cap hit for AZ. There is no way he was staying here. NE finished ahead of AZ in sacks.
5. They didn't miss on Hicks, they declined taking a $10m cap hit to keep him.
6. Branch was a legit bad reup and he is good as gone.
7. Allen was a one year roll of the dice, he can be cut with no further cap hit
8. Recent Drafts are hard to evaluate. Yes Grissom & Easley were misses, that's going to happen when you draft low and take risks. Jones, Garcia & Rivers may end up being contributors and Richards already is. Thuney, Mason, Jackson, Brissett, Mitchell, Garoppolo, Flowers, Stork, White, Fleming...not too shabby
9. 'Chemistry' happens when teams win and shouldn't be confused with leadership which took a huge hit when Hightower went down.

Whenever I see people create lists of guys that should have been kept they always ignore the reality of the cap. Keeping Jones, Collins and Hicks would have resulted in $34m in cap hits for those 3 alone. The cap is designed to enforce parity even more so than draft position is, you simply can't keep everyone. The results say Belichick and his team have done a better job handling it than any other team.

 

[varjao]

There are plenty of reasons to question Belichick the GM, none of them are in the list you OP enumerated. Those were pretty reasonable moves.