If the Pat's don't spend the cap money, are they "cheap"?

[HEY BRO! WHAT UP?]

YES! Look at the reciever situation. There were many recievers out in the free agent market that the Pats passed on. I don't know what their deal is. Great draft, I give it an "A". But free agency the past two years deserves a big "F-"!

 

[mgteich]

The pats chose to go after Law and Branch with big bucks. By the way, if BOTH signed up for a $1M salary and a $10M 2006 bonus for a 5 year contract, the total cap hit for BOTH would be $6M, not even half the currently available cap space. Ask Miguel, but at this point, we need about $2M for injury replacements (I'll use $2.9M). That would leave about $20M to spend on bonuses for 4-year contract current extensions for current players (including Seymour's option), presuming no change in the current salary, which are usually reduced when a new contract is signed.

$3M Law
$3M Branch
$2.9M injury fund (much higher than last year)
$5M for $20M of extension bonuses over 4 years
------
$13.9M

$20M in signing bonuses for 2006 players, $20M for the future.
$6M for 2006 and $5M of cap for the future.
nice balance
------------------------------------------------------
But we didn't get Law or Branch or anyone for THAT $6M. These two or their replacements would be in addition to what we have, easily afforded. Of course, we could have afforded even another 2 players with $10M signing bonuses for new players instead of extensions of several players. That would indeed be the "win now" philosophy.

And course the future cap situation is in good shape, not even considering the ever increasing cap.

Some of the $40M available for SB money will be handed out, but $40M is unlikely. More likely is to simply find ways of moving $10M of cap money more directly into the future. There are many methods as we have discussed, but the bottom line is the same. We apparently don't need to use the $10+M of cap money to improve the 2006 team, or don't want to because the best plan is to use all the money for the future.

This really takes a heavy dose of koolaid. Even Bob Kraft said that they were saving the monies for Law and Branch; they did not plan to use it for the future. In other words, they failed to get the players they wanted and could get at the prices they wanted, there was no one else who was worth signing or tradng for, so plan B, or C, or D seems to be to use the money for 2007-9 and have everyone say how smart they are.

 

[RayClay]

The pats chose to go after Law and Branch with big bucks. By the way, if BOTH signed up for a $1M salary and a $10M 2006 bonus for a 5 year contract, the total cap hit for BOTH would be $6M, not even half the currently available cap space. Ask Miguel, but at this point, we need about $2M for injury replacements (I'll use $2.9M). That would leave about $20M to spend on bonuses for 4-year contract current extensions for current players (including Seymour's option), presuming no change in the current salary, which are usually reduced when a new contract is signed.

$3M Law
$3M Branch
$2.9M injury fund (much higher than last year)
$5M for $20M of extension bonuses over 4 years
------
$13.9M

$20M in signing bonuses for 2006 players, $20M for the future.
$6M for 2006 and $5M of cap for the future.
nice balance
------------------------------------------------------
But we didn't get Law or Branch or anyone for THAT $6M. These two or their replacements would be in addition to what we have, easily afforded. Of course, we could have afforded even another 2 players with $10M signing bonuses for new players instead of extensions of several players. That would indeed be the "win now" philosophy.

And course the future cap situation is in good shape, not even considering the ever increasing cap.

Some of the $40M available for SB money will be handed out, but $40M is unlikely. More likely is to simply find ways of moving $10M of cap money more directly into the future. There are many methods as we have discussed, but the bottom line is the same. We apparently don't need to use the $10+M of cap money to improve the 2006 team, or don't want to because the best plan is to use all the money for the future.

This really takes a heavy dose of koolaid. Even Bob Kraft said that they were saving the monies for Law and Branch; they did not plan to use it for the future. In other words, they failed to get the players they wanted and could get at the prices they wanted, there was no one else who was worth signing or tradng for, so plan B, or C, or D seems to be to use the money for 2007-9 and have everyone say how smart they are.

I think they're doing pretty good so far.

Of course they do fail to win the Super Bowl every other year so there is room for improvement.

Given a year are you rock solid sure that Branch/Givens are better that Jackson, Gabriel, Caldwell? I'm not!

 

[MoLewisrocks]

I'm just going to assume you spike your koolaid on Friday nights mg.

 

[mgteich]

Since I was a kid. It was wine then.

I'm just going to assume you spike your koolaid on Friday nights mg.

 

[mgteich]

Of course, I can't be sure. I like our new receivers a lot. That doesn't mean we don't need a starter.

What I am sure of is that the team would be better if we added Ty Law to the current team. I am also sure that the team would be better if we added Branch. And yes, I believe that we would have been better in a year.

Branch, Gabriel, Brown, Jackson,Caldwell, with Brown retiring after the year and adding back Childress. Is this worse or better than the current team? The issue has never been whether we would be better with Branch; of course we would!

I think they're doing pretty good so far.

Of course they do fail to win the Super Bowl every other year so there is room for improvement.

Given a year are you rock solid sure that Branch/Givens are better that Jackson, Gabriel, Caldwell? I'm not!

 

[RayClay]

Of course, I can't be sure. I like our new receivers a lot. That doesn't mean we don't need a starter.

What I am sure of is that the team would be better if we added Ty Law to the current team. I am also sure that the team would be better if we added Branch. And yes, I believe that we would have been better in a year.

Branch, Gabriel, Brown, Jackson,Caldwell, with Brown retiring after the year and adding back Childress. Is this worse or better than the current team? The issue has never been whether we would be better with Branch; of course we would!

I think the issue is:

do you fill every position with high dollar or long term contracts for the best team this year?
or
do you have patience and try to limit long term contracts so you will have the cap space/draft picks to compete every year?

I believe the Patriots made good offers to the free agents Law and Givens, but they found they could make more elsewhere.

Branch wasn't a free agent. I personally think their offer of 6.25 mil/per was more than he's worth so I'll take the pick and move on.

The crucial contracts were Brady's and Seymour's.

 

[wcda]

The Pats had the 6th largest payroll in the NFL last year. http://asp.usatoday.com/sports/football/nfl/salaries/totalpayroll.aspx?year=2005 I don't consider that being Cheap. What about all the other teams below them. If we are considered cheap what do you call them.

 

[PatsSteve1]

The cap year isn't over so they can still spend this years cap space they have left . If you won a lottery that gave you a credit card with 1 million a year to spend on it, but if you didn't use it all in that year you lost what was left, that wouldn't be being cheap, that'd be being dumb. There are ways to use that cap space without overpaying for players and being dumb in that sense. There's ways to use that money to build for the future (resignings/extensions) and even still get new players this year that improve the team, if there are any available. If they had to, they could go to players agents to redo this contract year to give players a raise in salary to make them happier and maybe make them more likely to resign when the time came. If you can do that. Cap space is like an asset each team has to make thier teams better. You should make every effort to use it.