Bob Kraft Makes Some Uncharacteristic Statements

Bob Kraft is a great owner in a lot of ways. He makes a few statements here or there in which he mostly puts out the Patriotspeak. Nothing overly controversial, mostly positive and supportive statements. He's well respected in the community for keeping the team in Massachusetts not once, but twice. He gets involved with things like the recent labor dispute and was instrumental in progressing the talks, ensuring that football wouldn't suffer from the lockouts that have been plaguing sports like hockey and basketball recently. He doesn't skimp out, he spends up to the cap every season and has invested a lot of money into facilities at Patriot Place. He thinks big, he sets the tone for the organization and he's learned that a good owner knows to delegate and get out of his own way. That's why I was really surprised by some of the statements Kraft made at the owners meeting. Some of the lines that the media have been blowing up lately are not his usual fare.

"I don't answer to Tom Brady"

It's 100% true and when you add some more context he dovetails it nicely by pointing out that Brady's an important member of the team and saying that he spoke to Brady, but it's just such a combative reply. The guy just took a pay cut to improve your football team and he's the most beloved figure in the history of the organization, there has to be a more diplomatic way to phrase this.

"Wes Welker, just to be very clear, was our first choice to be with the team,"

Why would you ever say something like that? It sounds like something the Red Sox ownership would say. "Just so you know Danny, you're our second choice." It reminds me of what Red Sox ownership said about Carl Crawford after Theo Epstein left town.

Beyond these things, we got some insight into what happened with Wes Welker. The way Kraft tells it, there was a significant disparity in how they evaluated Welker compared to how he and his representatives evaluated him. Welker hit the open market and the Patriots started looking at other options. From how it sounds, when Welker approached them with the offer from Denver they had already committed themselves to Danny Amendola.


"Wednesday, I personally got a call from Wes and he told me about this offer from Denver. He called Bill [Belichick] as well. We met and we chatted. We have a lot of people, we've committed a lot of money to this inside position you have Gronk [Rob Gronkowski], you have [Aaron] Hernandez, you have Danny [Amendola] now it was just unfortunately a little bit too late.

"If he had called one day earlier, he would have been with us. I'm very sad about it and I wish he would have been with our team."

The belief was that the Amendola signing was a quick reaction to Wes Welker signing with Denver. The way it's portrayed by Kraft here the Amendola deal was finished first. Kraft went on to say that he felt the offer the Patriots gave Welker was the better deal because it had more guaranteed money and speculated that the Broncos would cut him after one season as none of the second year money is guaranteed and the cap hits are $4 Million for the first year and jumps to $8 Million for the second year. He might be right, but it still feels like he's crying over spilled milk, something I believed was beneath an organization that prides itself on professionalism.

Robert Kraft: "I have heard that it's been reported Tom made demands about who he wanted us to sign. Absolutely not. It never happened."

In a recent interview discussing Tom Brady's new contract I thought that Bob Kraft dropped an interesting tidbit that apparently there was no agreement from the team that they would use the salary cap space saved by his new deal to sign a particular player.

I have heard that it's been reported Tom made demands about who he wanted us to sign. Absolutely not. It never happened.

In the immediate aftermath of the deal it was widely speculated that there was an implied agreement that the Patriots would use the additional cap space provided to sign Wes Welker, one of Brady's favorite targets since his arrival in 2007, to the elusive contract they have been working on since last offseason. It seemed to make sense given that the salary cap savings seemed to coincide closely with Wes Welker's asking price. It's possible that this is just a negotiation tactic from the Patriots organization. If Kraft had said "Yes, we promised Tom that if we took this deal we'd re-sign Wes for him" it would certainly give Welker the leverage in the negotiations going forward. With the franchise tag deadline approaching and free agency looming it will be interesting to see how this situation unfolds. I have to imagine that they work out some sort of deal with Welker. Welker likes it here and I have to imagine the Patriots value him more highly than any other club would.

The rest of the interview doesn't say too much. Kraft insisted that there was no implied renegotiation planned for later in Brady's contract and shared his desire for Tom Brady to retire a Patriot rather than have an iconic player finish his career with another team like Brett Favre, Joe Montana, Peyton Manning, etc. It does suggest that perhaps Tom Brady will retire after this new 5-year deal expires.