The Patriots duped their fans into thinking they’d spend money – Felger & Mazz
With NFL Free Agency well underway, the New England Patriots have lacked making a “big splash” to improve the roster. The team has really just re-signed its own players and brought in a few mid-tier free agents. On Monday’s Felger and Mazz, the guys discussed how Patriots fans were duped by the team saying that they’d be big spenders in free agency.
Did the Patriots dupe their fans into thinking they’d spend?
Mazz: How can you disagree with the general assessment of there was all this sort of hype with the new regime. There was Mayo saying they were going to burn some cash. There was Eliot Wolf saying…
Felger: He’s going to “weaponize the offense”.
Mazz: Thank you. Yes. Thank you. It’s a Monday. I’m a little slow firing on the cylinders right now. So there was that, and then they come out and basically just kept some of the people they already had, let a couple of others go, signed a couple of scrubs. And I say scrubs, can I call filler?
Felger: Yeah.
Mazz: Decent players.
Felger: Middle class filler?
Mazz: Yes. And I would add K.J. Osborne to that list by the way. When I watched him play with Minnesota, I liked him in the way I liked Kendrick Bourne when I watched him play with the Niners. To me, he’s a guy who’s a third receiver and I’m not telling you, you know, could he turn into something else? Sure, but I need to see it. But they have a bunch of guys like him already. So there’s no high end talent, there’s no buzz, there’s no real cornerstone, there aren’t many guys I look at and say, well, that’s a guy that’s going to be part of their future for the next five years, four years, three years, whatever. Draw the line wherever you want. I just don’t see those kinds of pieces here, which tells me that they’re basically building a bridge team, and that is hard to get excited about. How do you get excited about a bridge team?
Jim Murray: I got duped, you know, I was yelling back at you early last week. And I still understand what they’re trying to do and why they brought in someone like Jacoby Brissett to be their bridge quarterback and all that and I think they are going to stay at three and take a rookie quarterback, but “burn some cash”, “weaponize the offense”, you’re going to say those things to me? It’s no different than we’re going full throttle. “Football Red Sox” that’s what they are right now. And the tipping point for me happened Friday night with Tyron Smith, the left tackle who was last with Dallas. The guy’s a stud. You need a left tackle. You have money. Spend it!
Felger: So whether it was Tyron Smith for $6.5 million guaranteed, or Justin Fields for a sixth round pick in 2025 that could go to a fourth if he plays over half the snaps this year. There was a tipping point there. Or Keenan Allen going to the Bears for a fourth round pick. So like there’s there’s been a couple there that you just say, “oh the Pats aren’t doing anything. They were never really going to do anything”.