3 Things Reporters Need to Shut Up About

-Bill Belichick "wasted" a shitton of money ($5.77mil), and this somehow negatively affected them. And thus Belichick sucks and should hire a GM. This is the most asinine line of thinking out there currently. "Oh the Pats wasted all this money on bonuses for the veterans they cut." Yeah, no shit. That's how you get veterans into camp. The only one that was a mistake was the Fanene deal, and he withheld info about an injury. How is that their fault? It's not like this money was going to go to someone else. Who else would they have brought in? It's not like even if they had this ~$6 mil they are going to go out and change their philosophy and go after freaking Mario Williams or something. We should be happy about this. Happy about the fact that our owners are willing to eat more money in bonuses than others in the league so that we can bring in as many players as needed to increase the level of competition. Thus, increasing the caliber of the team. Not all these guys are going to work out, and the Patriots and Bill Belichick go into the process knowing that some of the money will be dead money, and they do that because they want to increase the overall talent level on the team. "Oh he needs someone that can check his decisions because he just makes decisions on the fly and signs whoever he wants," you are fucking stupid if you think this. Belichick is methodical and everything he does is for a reason. "Oh, they could have got a deal done for Welker if they didn't waste this money," ummm no. The reason Welker isn't signed isn't because they don't have enough money, it's because they have put a value on him, and he disagrees. We have seen this in the past, and the only real mistake in the value they have put on a player has been Richard Seymour. I think they wish they could have that one back, but other than that, when have they put a value on a player, held their line, and gotten burned? It doesn't happen. And why doesn't it happen? Because Belichick is a great GM, and these reporters just want to burn him at any opportunity because "he doesn't give them enough info or good stories to right" WAH. Shut up, you sound stupid and lose credibility.

-Brian Waters not reporting is about money. The only reason Waters isn't here yet is because he doesn't want to leave his family and live out of a hotel for another 4 months. What he wants is the Pats to cut him so he can sign on with one of the Texas teams and be close to the family. He is not holding out for more money because "he has leverage now that the Pats O-line is struggling." Now, if the Pats really want him back, their best bet is probably increasing his base salary to an amount he cannot say no to. My feeling is that number is probably around $3.5-4 mil, which is a big raise from the $1.4 they are slated to pay him. I think Belichick realizes this, and doesn't want to award anyone that refused to report with a big payday. So, they are kind of  at a place where someone has to budge. What it will really come down to is this: does Brian Waters have enough money saved up to the point he thinks his family is set for life? Or does he need to come back for another cash grab? I think it will come down to that, and there will be some compromise in the salary to around $2mil.

-Players that were cut could come back. Gah, shutup. Granted, this has slowed down in recent days, but when Branch and Gaffney and everyone was getting cut, all the beat guys were like, "oh yeah, he was cut, but he could be back after week 1." This basically NEVER happens. It is a small possibility, but not to the point that you need to say it for every player. More than likely, none of these veteran WRs come back, get over it. We are going to be playing an offense that is going to run very very very few sets with 3+ WRs, and none of these guys wowed them, so they moved on. Time for people to move on as well.