- 6 weeks ago
Patriots Insider Tom E. Curran joined Rich, Ken, and Ted to discuss the Christian Gonzalez contract situation and he still believes a deal will get done before the season begins.
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00:00but you know what does make sense having a genius on with us a football genius well you have ted
00:05already i mean well i mean right here stand right here we're double double the genius we got that
00:10we got the player and the guy who's you know he's right in the fish wrap he's taking he's uh
00:14making
00:15sure he's getting the storyline straight digging for answers our buddy tommy curran from mbc sports
00:21boston uh tommy curran thanks for joining the show bud yeah i'm your football gumshoe out here
00:27patrolling the beat trying to try to suss out what's going on um yeah it's uh it's really
00:34interesting because i'll just launch um it's clearly a rebuttal to elliot wolf answering the
00:42question whether or not gonzalez still has the highest offer in the league on the table for him
00:48and elliot wolf saying yes so adam schefter is as we all by now know the leading voice nationally
00:57um and every gm and every agent goes through him the days of me calling up agents and they've
01:05given it to the daily bugle are gone they go right to the national people so they can cut out
01:09the
01:09middleman and make their points through the national media and for adam to get that information it's
01:16clearly not from the patriots side the patriots aren't going to tell them they're not in the
01:19neighborhood so their rebuttal is from the gonzalez side they're not close they're not giving us the
01:26highest offer i'm of a mind that the patriots robert craft and elliot wolf did not lie bold
01:31face and say that it was because eventually we're going to see the contract and if it's not as big
01:36in
01:36some way then we'd say well that's not bigger than witherspoons somehow the patriots look at it and
01:42there's more value to it somehow in their minds and somehow gonzalez is looking at it and go no it's
01:49not you're not giving us as much in the first two years as witherspoon got you're not giving us
01:54uh guaranteed money it might be potential money but it's not guaranteed and that's where the
01:59difference lies so for people who are saying are they lying no they're they're looking at it from two
02:06different sides but this is the rebuttal and to me gonzalez has kept his mouth shut and this salvo
02:13shot across the bow by his camp is one that's pushing back on the craft narrative so where it
02:22goes from here should be interesting you know tc i'm curious what you think if you're on gonzo's side
02:28doesn't it feel like he's got i don't know some leverage in the sense that you know the you know
02:33the
02:33pass rush you know he's he's one of the star players you drafted him um you know i just feel
02:40like you could make a pretty good case if you're gonzo as to why he's deserving the highest paid
02:46contract for a cornerback right yes i think his leverage though is is less concrete than it is
02:54symbolic you know he he's played 34 games in three years and i'm not doing the the negotiation from
03:03the patriot side i hear you yeah he played 34 games in three years he's got three picks he's been
03:08here for three years they went four and 13 four and 13 14 and three it's not a premium position
03:15he has to be an all pro player for each of the next five seasons if they make him you
03:21know the
03:21highest paid by a lot cornerback in the league i would imagine that them being dubious about setting
03:28a benchmark with a player who hasn't played all that much nor produced statistically all that much
03:33is reasonable but the crafts don't like to be called cheap they don't like to be the butt of jokes
03:41and gonzalez as you point out is the best defensive player along with milton williams on a team that
03:50is really going to be up against it defensively this year if you can't generate a pass rush
03:55and nobody in the nfl is looking at the patriots pass rushes being one of the top 25 in the
04:00league
04:01then you're going to have to cover on the back end and if you can't cover on the back end
04:04it's a
04:04non-starter you can't have kindle vildor and charles woods running around against jackson smith and
04:11jig but you know 11 days it's going to be an embarrassment so yes he's got a lot of leverage
04:16in terms of public perception of the craft being stingy um and what the patriots need right now
04:23hey tom little dealer's choice for you here we had two very interesting things come out from the
04:27the team this week one was mike vrabel talking about his depth and lack thereof and the other
04:32was elliot wolf mentioning the cash budget which of those two struck you as more interesting
04:36significant rare that sort of thing cash budget by a lot because i think mike was just speaking the
04:42truth of something that we've talked about on the show when i've come on a bunch of times
04:47they just don't have a lot of elite players still you know you get may you got gonzalez you got
04:52milton
04:54williams now you have aj brown after that you have some good players you know robert spillane
05:00carlton davis kevin byard and whenu campbell could be good henderson you don't have any depth they have
05:09no wedge players they don't have really linebackers um past the two who are out there spilling so they
05:15don't have depth they're not a good team and that's why vrabel has really been he brought it up
05:20because he's petrified to put his starters out there in harm's way he literally told pod munkin
05:24i'm not putting any good players out there because if they get hurt we're screwed so i i thought that
05:29that was kind of just confirmation of what i had been expecting but for elliot wolf to say we operate
05:35on a cash budget he just laid it on the table that this conversation we're having with gonzalez
05:42is not about annual you know average per year it's not about overall signing bonus it's about how much
05:52money we have to cough up early and if you remember again and i'm just revisiting this stuff for folks
05:58who may long since have been exhausted by it but trent mcduffie signed a contract paying him about 31
06:05million witherspoon trumped that and he trumped it not by a lot he went up to 33 million dollars per
06:13year but he got 101 million dollars guaranteed compared to mcduffie's 100 but he got 59 million
06:20dollars in the first two years compared to the 50 of mcduffie so witherspoon went up almost 10 million
06:27dollars in the first two years and if gonzalez is looking for more that means he's looking for 65
06:32million dollars or so i'm guessing but it's going to have to be if they're barking that badly it's
06:38going to have to be that's where it is and it's a cash budget and he wants that money and
06:42that's
06:42where the hang-up is and the crafts are looking at and say well you know in 10 months we're
06:47going to
06:47be doing one for um drake may and it's going to be similar so they're like how are we going
06:52to
06:52cough up 60 million for him and then another 103 million for the other guy it's not for me to
07:00worry
07:00about but i'm sure that that's what they're choking on can i ask you about the second part of that
07:05shefter report where he throws in there kind of randomly you know listen from what i think mike
07:12vrabel prefers defensive linemen i guess prefers it over the corner position i don't want to misquote
07:20him but it sure did that seemed to be what they insinuated is that if this thing doesn't go through
07:26maybe it's because vrabel has some sort of say in this and they'd rather spend money on defensive
07:32linemen than a corner what did you make of that comment that just seemed jammed in there yesterday
07:39it did seem jammed in there and it seemed an effort to not to discredit shefter's effort but it seemed
07:47an effort to give both sides so credit where it's due i should say for shefter trying to what's
07:52what's the logic sometimes we just throw things out there and we don't give an explanation as to why
07:56the situation might exist he was trying to explain why um and it's kind of a a known
08:04you know fact of the nfl edge players get a crap ton defensive linemen get a crap ton that's how
08:12it
08:12works so he wasn't really shedding new light but i wouldn't be surprised if mike block to pay in a
08:18corner that kind of money again but that's not his decision right but that's the because i to me it
08:24sounded like maybe that came from the crafts and that's them trying to publicly cover their ass in
08:31case this thing goes sideways that they can put the blame on mike vrabel and saying well you know
08:36mike vrabel likes linemen he doesn't like corners so we just went and did what he did that to me
08:42sounds
08:43like if you want both sides you obviously got christian gonzalez's agent side with the money
08:47and maybe this side is from the crafts where they're setting up a way to cover their ass if
08:52this doesn't go well could be crafts could be vrabel could be wolf um because i would not rule that
08:59we
08:59have a tendency to point our finger at ownership regardless if it's a football decision or a financial
09:06decision and uh you know your competitor i was on with him last night on bsc and he made a
09:11really good
09:11point he said michael holly if i said to you you could have a steak tonight but you're going to
09:17have carrots for the rest of the vacation how that sounds um that was a really good illustration i think
09:22of what maybe they would say you can have your 35 million dollar corner but boy i don't know how
09:30we're going to be able to do these other things that you want to do um so that was a
09:34theory espoused
09:35that maybe the crafts would be saying to me i think it's a general you're exactly right and i
09:42can't say where it would have come from but it did seem to be at least an explanation as to
09:47what was
09:47making the buck and i wouldn't be surprised ted played with ty law by the time ty law was being
09:52a
09:52pain in the ass about his contract he had been an all pro a pro bowler he had won super
09:57bowls he had
09:58led the league in interceptions he was eight years into his career or whatever he was again christian's
10:06been in the league for three years he's 24 years old he's played 34 games and has three picks
10:10i would not be the least bit surprised if they're saying really we gotta pay him all that just because
10:17oh my god yeah it's gonna be fascinating why'd you say oh my god because i think it's interesting
10:23am i no no you're right i mean but that but but it has to be what's going on exactly
10:30and like
10:31they're probably they're probably trying to show him why he's not i mean that's obviously negotiations
10:35one side tries to show the other one that you're not worth the money that you're asking for
10:39but what a dangerous game to play with everybody's watching and braves just got here you know culture
10:45they there's just if there's a bigger impact to this contract than just gonzalez getting paid i think
10:50right you know there is there's there's not to mention the variable thing there's the perception
10:55of uh the crafts yeah you know they hate it they hate being called cheap they will say scoreboard look
11:03at all the championships look at what we've done look at the new balance athletic training facility look
11:07at um you guys have been coming here with no psls for your entire uh the life of your fandom
11:14um and
11:15they're crummoxed as to why they're painted as such but they are and this becomes you know
11:23an albatross for them if they don't pay christian gonzalez because if he's not playing in two weeks
11:27and i can't imagine that'll be the case i still think they're going to get a contract done
11:30what would you guys say i would say it's still 7.7 out of 10 that they're going to get
11:35it done
11:35yep wow i agree i've been saying the same thing i've been saying this feels like theater eventually
11:41they're going to say that you know what this is what the market is he's going to end up getting
11:45a little bit more than devin witherspoon in the end which is what we all thought he was going to
11:49get yeah it's interesting i mean he's you know two-thirds of their i think defensive calls were
11:54his own so it is it's it is fascinating you know to see how it all goes one last thing
11:58yeah one last
11:59thing that didn't even occur to me until last night and i it actually debunks a little bit of what
12:05my theories have been why has he been on the field and i keep saying it's because he's going
12:11to play of course he's going to play why has he been on the field the reason he's been on
12:13the field
12:14is he's trying to show them despite the fact he's only played 34 games and has three picks and has
12:21had injury problems he's tough yeah he'll play you want to we want you to give us a ton of
12:26money
12:27and i'm going to answer the bell for you here i am because if he was holding out they'd probably
12:31be
12:31less uh giddy about giving them the money that they did but he's been trying to give hey look
12:37see i play i think from his standpoint he's handled himself i think pretty pretty good tom you know
12:42considering i think you know i think he has to i think he has to i do think i can
12:48see the uh
12:49the patriots viewpoint on this really we have to pay this for this guy i mean he's great and
12:54everything but we went four and 13 twice for the moment to eat yeah um but i said it went
13:01well but
13:02i also still see the patriots point of view and is he the best cornerback in football by far truly
13:08yeah he's out there but i can see him scratching the head but why do we have to do this
13:14those people
13:15stop calling the chief that's why and it's a tough schedule but do it well well tommy curran we spent
13:21so
13:21much time talking about christian gonzalez we didn't get to talk about the scottish hammer
13:25which is apparently the punter that just uh got himself a little try out there with the page i
13:30just like the name i don't know anything about him tell me a little about just real quick we got
13:36it we got 30 seconds scottish hammer time tell me what's going on with him matt hack
13:43the guy who kicked no there was some other guy they worked no his name is oh gosh i have
13:47his name
13:47somewhere but that's no it's a dude they're calling the scottish hammer i read about this
13:50right before i got on the air and i'm like oh that's unfair to me that's unfair to me you're
13:55breaking news jamie gillen jamie gillen is his name they call it's a punter they just oh yeah he's
14:02the scottish hammer yep all right i got i got another one real quick tom ashton grant calling
14:08plays last night something or nothing oh nothing nothing it's the same thing as ryan cowden it's the
14:15same thing as ryan cowden doing media later in the day after elliot wolf wants to give everybody
14:20opportunities to know that you're seen we're giving you opportunities you're not just here
14:26to stand on the background and uh we want you to have opportunities to do these things so you can
14:31you know advance your career oh dude i just googled scottish hammer and this guy looks like his name
14:36would be the scottish hammer he's a work computer yeah he's like scottish thor and he's got his big
14:43long hair uh i guess he played for uh he played college football for the arkansas pine bluff golden
14:48lions i i don't know where else but there we go so all i know is that it would just
14:53be so much fun to
14:54play scottish hammer highlights all morning long when after a game but what can we do if it's not
15:00christian gonzalez at least we can have this guy i think you're running i was here i think you're
15:03right you're right you're right it's all by himself the tartan army has still got me all amped up from
15:09when they were here and took over the city all right uh tommy curran great stuff uh thanks for
15:14coming on with us once again and uh we'll talk to you again thanks tom all right have a good
15:18weekend