Looks like it’s going to be another crazy Tuesday. Here’s a look at today’s top stories.
Patriots Get Gillislee – For the second straight offseason, the Patriots raided Buffalo’s roster and the Bills are left without a key player heading into the 2017 season.
One year removed from having lost Chris Hogan after the Patriots put together an offer sheet Buffalo couldn’t match, New England got the best of them yet again by doing the same thing with running back Mike Gillislee.
Monday’s 4pm deadline for Buffalo finally revealed Gillislee’s fate and despite taking the entire week to do so, the Bills ultimately decided to decline to match the Patriots’ offer sheet.
It has to be frustrating for Buffalo knowing that Bill Belichick and the Patriots front office got the best of them two years in a row, leaving them forced to watch the fourth-year standout from Florida line up behind Tom Brady this season.
The Bills’ PR department announced the decision three minutes early at 3:57pm on Monday via Twitter with two terse Tweets.
The @buffalobills have opted to not match the contract tendered by the New England Patriots to restricted free agent RB Mike Gillislee.
— Buffalo Bills PR (@BuffaloBillsPR) April 24, 2017
As a result of not matching Gillislee’s offer, the Bills have now acquired the Patriots’ fifth round pick (163rd overall). https://t.co/R0qnbqRfqi
— Buffalo Bills PR (@BuffaloBillsPR) April 24, 2017
It’s a great move for the Patriots, who pick up a solid player to carry the football for the mere cost of just a 5th round pick and the $6.4 million he’ll earn over the next two seasons.
His addition fills out a backfield that now features Gillislee, Rex Burkhead, James White, Dion Lewis, D.J. Foster and Brandon Bolden. More importantly, it likely spells the end for LeGarrette Blount, who remains a free agent and may now have to find a new team to play for after Gillislee’s signing.
 It seems Butler might be back for one more year. |
Butler Likely Sticking Around – One month ago it looked like Malcolm Butler’s time in New England was coming to a close and it seemed like a foregone conclusion that he’d be playing elsewhere in 2017.
Instead, it appears the likelihood of him playing at least one more year for the Patriots might be a reality and that’s good news for fans who are hoping to see New England head into the season with a formidable pair of cornerbacks in their secondary.
According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, it’s “highly unlikely” that Butler will be traded this offseason, which given Schefter’s similar take so far with Jimmy Garoppolo, means that Butler will still be part of the team this season.
That’s good news considering that Butler seemed to be on a collision course with the Saints after visiting with New Orleans last month. There appeared to be a mutual interest but New Orleans never gave Butler an offer sheet, having said publicly there was no way they were going to part with their #11 selection and things appear to have cooled since.
Butler signed his restricted free agent tender last week, which put him under contract for the upcoming season and opened up the possibility for New England to trade him now that he’s officially signed.
Instead, that may no longer be a possibility, which is good news for a player who will certainly make them that much better paired with newcomer Stephon Gilmore this season.
Patriots Pick Up Cap Space With Amendola’s New Deal – The final numbers are out and according to ESPN’s Mike Reiss, Danny Amendola’s new deal frees up a fair amount of cap space.
Reiss reported on Monday that Amendola’s new contract freed up $4.75 million worth of cap space, giving an already well-stacked team even more financial flexibility.
According to Reiss, Amendola received $100,000 in the form of a signing bonus, a base salary of $1.25 million, and he can earn an additional $300,000 in per-game roster bonuses at the amount of $18,750 per contest.
The even better news is it keeps one of the most consistent postseason performers on the roster at a reasonable cost, which is something every fan in New England should definitely be feeling good about.
 Robert Kraft is the latest victim of a ridiculous hit piece on DeadSpin. |
Another Day, Another Witch Hunt – We’ll close with this because after just coming across it, I think my head is going to explode.
After a Monday full of debates surrounding Tom Brady’s philanthropic practices, it appears there’s one writer who has reappeared after falling off the face of the earth and this time, he seems to be looking for vengeance.
Prime Patriots hater, former New York Post writer Bart Hubbuch, the man who was fired from the newspaper for an inappropriate Tweet during campaign, has landed with Deadspin and resumed his obsession with taking down the franchise he clearly doesn’t like.
Hubbuch wrote an article Monday night about Robert Kraft’s apparent affiliation with a corporation he claims puts him in violation of the NFL’s policy surrounding gambling. Hubbuch’s story focuses on the fact that Kraft is a board member of private-equity firm Appolo Global Management, which in 2008 teamed up with TPG Capital to buy a controlling 60 percent interest in Caesars Entertainment.
According to Hubbuch, while Appolo’s stake dropped to 16 percent during an ongoing bankruptcy fight, they still hold an interest in the company. Kraft reportedly joined their board of directors back in May of 2014 as one of just eight directories of the company.
As Hubbuch points out, Kraft is “profiting off of casino gambling and sports betting” and that the NFL “knows all about it” but hasn’t done a thing to shut it down.
Hubbuch cites what he believes to be a “notable example” of why Kraft should be punished after the NFL forced Tim Rooney — the son of Steelers’ founder Art J. Rooney — to sell his entire stake in the team in 2008 because Yonkers Raceway, which he owned, received a gaming license.
That seems to be what Hubbuch is trying to force here with Kraft.
Hubbuch later cited the league’s policy where he was told by NFL spokesperson, Brian McCarthy, that the diversity of the company and the small percentage of the overall related to gaming wasn’t enough to violate their rule.
He disagrees, citing one sentence he feels puts Kraft in violation with his emphasis in bold.
“NFL Personnel may own interests in publicly-traded enterprises where less than one-third of the enterprise’s gross revenues or operating profit in any of the last three years is attributable to gambling-related operations, so long as the NFL Personnel does not own more than 5 percent of the company’s stock and does not serve as an officer or director of the company.”
A league spokesman told Hubbuch that Kraft is not in violation of the policy because “the NFL didn’t consider Kraft’s Apollo stake a violation of the casino ban because Caesars Entertainment is one of more than 100 businesses in Apollo’s portfolio.”
Hubbuch disagrees and went on from there to complain about how he originally wrote this story a long time ago and voiced his frustration about how he was shut down after approaching Patriots spokesperson Stacey James and the story never ran. From there, he went on a bizarre rant to complain about his frustration with losing his job with the Post and the unfair treatment he believes Kraft and the team receives from the league.
Honestly, as the piece turns into Hubbuch’s vehicle to vent, it just really becomes strange to read. When he was a reporter for the Post it all seemed like an act and a persona he was putting out there for the sake of getting followers. Reading this now, it appears to be just how he is, and his obsession and comments are alarming to say the least.
It’s a strange twist considering two months ago he was suing the Post for firing him, one month ago he dropped the lawsuit and on Monday, he drops this. It’s definitely a strange turn of events and whatever Hubbuch is trying to ultimately accomplish, all he’s managed to prove is that he’s still a, really, really disturbing individual.
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Ian Logue is a Seacoast native and owner and senior writer for PatsFans.com, an independent media site covering the New England Patriots and has been running this site in one form or another since 1997.
