Good god, that Volin article is 10 pounds of stupid in a 5 pound bag.
Please don’t tell me that they can’t afford to pay $38 million in cash and $45 million in cap dollars for two quarterbacks next year. Don’t tell me that it will hamper their ability to field a competitive team, or that spending that much money goes against all conventional wisdom.
The Patriots have built a dynasty based on going against conventional wisdom. And have you taken a look at the NFL’s finances these days? Robert Kraft and the other owners are doing just fine.
The Patriots could have kept Garoppolo with the franchise tag and remained a Super Bowl competitor next year.
I suppose if he could grasp the concept of opportunity cost, effective return on resources, and marginal utility, he'd probably be something other than a sportswriter (there are, of course, notable sportswriter exceptions, but his is not a very enlightened profession).
The NFL's finances, and Kraft's finances, are of course entirely irrelevant to the decision. Money is not something an NFL owner can spend or withhold for competition's sake, as it is in baseball or european football. It is a limited resource to be optimized. The question isn't
could they, but rather,
is that the best use of resources.
Assuming Brady is
likely healthy and productive, the best way to improve the team is to spend that $23M in franchise tag (for your
backup quarterback!) on a range of other mid-priced assets around the league. Belichick has made a HOF career as a GM (nevermind as coach) taking advantage of other teams undervaluing players who aren't the headline-grabbing premium talents but are better than the median player on a roster - he spends more on the NFL's dwindling middle class than anyone else, as FO and others have observed, and that remains the current moneyball category.
Volin spills much digital ink arguing that we have few necessary big contracts coming up in next year's offseason. He observes that we have LT and Malcolm Butler to deal with, but have many other key pieces under contract. But he ignores the fact that there are many other positions - DL chief among them - where we desperately need an upgrade from "bad" to "league average" or even "slightly above average", and $23M goes a long way when you can spread it on 5-6 roster positions.
Then there's the consideration of whether Garoppolo becomes another Kirk Cousins if you tag him against his will, but still don't play him. He's not some piece of machinery, he's a guy with emotions and career aspirations. The negotiations with him were proceeding, but Belichick's assessment that he'd be unable to sign him long term to numbers both sides were comfortable with were clearly the difference between keeping him in April and trading him in October. Where is Volin's consideration of that aspect? Where is his deference to Belichick's judgment in such details, since he is
obviously a master at it?
This article is whining and shit-stirring, poorly disguised in an attempt to look like a reasoned critique.