Get your Monday started the right way with a fresh episode of The 300s Podcast! Joey B joins the pod as we regale some tales from our latest golf outing, we debate if the World Cup is Un-American, and is Oprah secretly trying to sink the Patriots? Click here to listen or download on iTunes or Google Play. Subscribe and review today!
Get your Monday started the right way with a fresh episode of #The300sPodcast! Joey B joins us to regale some tales from our latest golf outing, we debate if the World Cup is Un-American, and is Oprah secretly trying to sink the #Patriots? Subscribe today! https://t.co/OY8Hys8cUL
“Golf is the only sport where for whatever reason you just kind of expect to play well even though you only play once a month. Its also one of the few sports where having a six pack before noon actually improves your performance.”
-Tom Brady saying he’s going to retire “sooner rather than later” in his interview with Oprah.
-Joe and I argue about the true value of Kyrie Irving and whether he is now expendable for the Celtics.
-The MMA Minute
-Joe’s latest Snake It Til You Make It award winner
How about that Belichick, man? When the rest of the league is playing checkers he’s playing chess. He trades away his elite young backup QB and then just sits in the weeds waiting for the Jets to outsmart themselves and dump Hackenberg onto the Raiders who then cut him less than 2 weeks later, and thats when Belichick POUNCES.
Sources: former Jets QB Christian Hackenberg is at Gillette Stadium visiting the Patriots today.
In all seriousness I hated this pick by the Jets from Day 1. Well technically Day 2 since he was a second round pick. But the guy flashed as a freshman at Penn State with 20 TDs and 10 INTs under old friend Bill O’Brien. Then he regressed the next two years throwing 12/15 and 16/6 before going pro and getting drafted by the New York Football Jets, despite never posting a completion percentage above 59% in college.
In two years with the Jets he threw a grand total of zero passes despite being surrounded by bums like Bryce Petty, Geno Smith, Ryan Fitzpatrick, and Josh McCown. Not exactly murderers row ahead of him.
But before we all freak out lets just remember that the Patriots, as does every other team in the NFL, routinely workout guys that they never sign. Guys they never even hope to have to sign. These are often just workouts to keep the pipeline full in case disaster strikes and guys on your roster get injured.
Or Belichick is dabbling in the dark arts again and has grand plans for young Hackenberg. Jimmy Garoppo-WHO am I right??
We talk about Julian Edelman’s possible suspension and how apparently the NFL doesn’t even know what he tested positive for, how does this all affect Tom Brady and TB12, some good old fashioned Boston media on media crime and more! Listen, subscribe, and review us on iTunes, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts!
SI – “I know what Julian Edelman posted on Instagram in the wake of the suspension news (“I don’t know what happened”) came off as a little weird, but there is an explanation for it. I was told Edelman’s result was triggered by a substance that wasn’t immediately recognizable, and there are scientists analyzing it. And as to the timing, the test did happen during the offseason (a couple months ago), which means it’s not for any kind of stimulant. You might remember the rash of players saying they got popped for Adderall—the rules have changed now so that offseason use of stimulants falls under the substances of abuse policy, rather than the PED policy.”
Late last week Julian Edelman got popped for PEDs, but it wasn’t immediately known what he had actually tested positive for. However, Bert Breer of MMQB reported today that Edelman’s “I don’t know what happened” defense may not be totally unfounded because apparently the NFL doesn’t know what happened either.
“I was told Edelman’s result was triggered by a substance that wasn’t immediately recognizable, and there are scientists analyzing it.”
Ask anyone who has read “Game of Shadows” or “Juiced” or followed really any of the Olympic track scandals over the past 20 years; the steroid scientists are always ahead of the league scientists. Its just a constant game of catch up as the leagues are trying to reverse engineer everything and figure out what to test for. With that being said, when they do pop someone its usually a hybrid substance or a masking agent of another substance that triggers the test. Breer makes it seem like Edelman tested positive for something the NFL has never seen. But if thats the case, then is the substance he took actually banned? Did Edelman even know if it was or wasn’t?
I mean technically, if its not a banned substance then you can’t suspend a guy for it. You would have to at least inform the NFLPA that it will soon be banned and that it will be tested for in the future. Without knowing all the details its hard to say who’s more in the wrong here (neither Edelman nor the NFL are in the right) because if you’re the NFL how can you suspend a guy for something you didn’t know even existed let alone banned? If you’re Edelman WTF are you doing taking something that isn’t 100% approved by the NFL. A lot of players won’t even step foot in a GNC anymore because who the hell knows whats in half of the supplements they sell? If you don’t know, then don’t risk it.
So the real question is what did Edelman test positive for? Adamantium? Vibranium? The symbiote that forms Venom?
Or is it a TB12 cocktail? I’m certainly not going to point the finger because it would be criminally negligent for Alex Guerrero and Tom Brady to be signing off on anything even approaching questionable as part of the TB12 Method. Doing so would essentially submarine a potential billion dollar business in a second.
But thats not to say the media won’t make the connection, allude to the connection, or nearly come to blows arguing over the mere mention of a possible connection.
Curran is Edelman’s business partner in a book deal. He is a client of Alex Guerrero. Reports on both. Like most in sports media he has opinions about teams he never covers in person (C’s, B’s, Sox). And here he lectures us on journalism. https://t.co/PuuLy9H7Iz
Either way the Patriots have become a constant source of drama and gossip this offseason, which is the antithesis of what this team has been for the past 18 years. Thats tough to ignore because where there’s smoke there’s usually fire. But until that shoe drops, I fully expect the team to win 12+ games and be chasing another Super Bowl this year. So for all the critics calling for the end of the dynasty, saying every great team run ends the same; It only ends once. Everything before that is just progress.
ESPN – New England Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman is facing a four-game suspension for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing substances, league sources told ESPN on Thursday. The suspension is currently under appeal as Edelman has taken “hundreds of tests” and has not tested positive before, a source told ESPN..Edelman, who has been a regular participant in the team’s offseason program, OTAs and minicamp, is returning from an ACL tear during the 2017 preseason that forced him to miss the entire season. He turned 32 years old last month and is entering his 10th season in the NFL.
Goddamnit, Jules.
This is not what the Patriots need right now. Not with all the drama surrounding Brady v Belichick. Not with Gronk nearly retiring to become a wrestler. Especially not with the receiving corps being comprised primarily of cast offs and new faces. If Edelman misses the first 4 games that means the Patriots receiver depth chart will look something like this (barring roster cuts):
Chris Hogan
Kenny Britt
Phillip Dorsett
Malcolm Mitchell
Jordan Matthews
Cordarrelle Patterson
Riley McCarron
Braxton Berrios
Cody Hollister
Matthew Slater
Besides the fact that we lose Edelman for a month, does anyone really care about the sanctity of the game? Football fans aren’t a bunch of MLB HOF voters wielding the vaunted morality clause, which is the biggest difference between football and any other sport. A baseball player tests positive and its the lead story on SportsCenter and that athlete is required to do the Game of Thrones shame walk with the crazy nun before they’re allowed to play again.
I heard Edelman got popped for PEDs and I just thought oh goddamnit, now we’re really gonna miss Danny Amendola. Totally unfair to baseball, but thats what happens when you build your entire sport around numbers and records and then a couple of juiced up sluggers completely destroy said record book by ingesting and injecting everything under the sun into their bodies.
I really just don’t care mainly because I’m jaded having grown up in the rise and fall of the steroid era. I read “Juiced” and “Game of Shadows” in high school and witnessed the fallout with all of these athletes getting outed over the years so many times that I just am numb to it.
The most similar example of then 31-year-old Edelman’s case has to be Rodney Harrison in 2007. Harrison was also suspended the first 4 games of the season for PEDs after coming off a serious shoulder and knee injury that ended his 2006 season at the age of 34. My point being, whether its naive or not, HGH is probably the No. 1 supplement to help an athlete recover from an injury. Is it banned? You bet. But if I’m in my 30’s staring down the barrel at the end of my career, then you bet your ass I’m taking whatever I can to get back to 100% as fast as possible.
What will be really interesting though is the connection, real or imagined, that is made between Edelman’s PED usage and his time working with Alex Guerrero and the TB12 Method. There’s probably no connection as it was made abundantly clear in Tom vs Time that Edelman loves to lift weights more than anything the TB12 Method could offer in terms of pliability and exercise bands. But, as we all know Guerrero has a shady past selling all kinds of shit so the questions will be asked no doubt.
PS – I will be using this as an opportunity to go on the attack if people start with the “Patriots are cheaters” bullshit, particularly in the wake of Peyton Manning’s HGH scandal. Jerry Thornton is doing God’s work over at Barstool keeping everyone apprised of that story. Basically Manning’s lawyers confirmed that Peyton took the HGH, which he publicly denied taking, saying it was for his wife. So a guy who had made over $100 Million in his career was getting his wife’s medicine shipped to some shit hole clinic in downtown Indianapolis IN A STRIP MALL. Get outta here with that nonsense.
Yahoo – Start with this when it comes to Johnny Manziel and his attempted return from self-induced football career disaster – the former Heisman Trophy winner has said all he wants is a chance to play, and faced with no NFL opportunities, he’s grabbing one. In Canada, no less. Manziel, 25, announced Saturday morning that he has signed a two-year contract with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League. Conceivably, he could suit up for a preseason game against Toronto as soon as June 1.
It took me a minute to find the stats for Manizel’s first game because if I asked you right now, where do you go for CFL stats? What’s your go to source? Its not exactly on the back page of the sports section or in my ESPN push notifications.
I ultimately used my brain and just went to the Hamilton Tiger Cats website where I was swiftly and sharply reminded that this is Canada.
If I had just written that joke out you would have ridiculed my wit and said it was too predictable. Welp, thats literally the first thing I saw on this Canadian Football League website, god bless em those hosers love their Tim Hortons.
Say what you will about Johnny Football, but his game was created in a Canadian lab somewhere in the mountains of Alberta. (Does Alberta have mountains?) The wider fields, the larger endzones, the unlimited motion on offense; this is like college football on coke. Anyways, on to the stats because as we all know stats don’t lie. And my dude Johnny Manziel is LIGHTING. IT. UP.
Can’t say I necessarily understand the vaunted three quarterback attack, but in his first CFL game Manziel had an 81% completion percentage going 9/11. Thats a pretty good start after only throwing footballs in the illustrious Spring League and at Texas A&M Pro Days. I have full confidence that Manziel will be wrecking that league in no time at all.
But the real question is; how do I pirate legally stream CFL games? I feel like thats some shit you’re going to need an old school black box from your dad’s shady buddy. So if anyone finds that stream deep down the Reddit rabbit hole tweet me @the300sboston to hook it up. Otherwise, we might have to expense a road trip on The 300s non-existent credit card to Tim Hortons Field in Hamilton, Canada in the name of content.
I think Johnny Manziel needs a new nickname though if he’s going to truly follow in the footsteps of another diminutive American QB and run shit in the CFL.
My vote goes to Johnny Maple. Bookmark this blog so when somebody with a little more venture capital steals it and makes a billion dollar t-shirt out of it, I want my royalties.
Washington Post – “The Browns apparently didn’t draft UCLA quarterback Josh Rosen because of a chat one of the team’s personnel executives had with a Bruins volleyball coach at an airport...Alonzo Highsmith, Cleveland’s vice president of player personnel, talked about the team’s decision to use the No. 1 pick on Oklahoma quarterback Baker Mayfield…As for why Highsmith had Rosen third on his list behind Mayfield and Darnold? Here’s the Canton Repository’s Steve Doerschuk with the transcription:
“I was at an airport,” he said. “UCLA’s volleyball team was in front of me. You heard so much about Rosen. He’s this or that. We all know how people talk.
“So I asked one of the volleyball coaches, ‘What’s Rosen like?’ He said, ‘Aaaaa, you should probably ask his girlfriend. She’s one of the players. She’s over there.’
“I’m like, ‘All right coach. That’s good enough.’
“I don’t know what all this means, but there was something about him that bothered me.”
After I read this article I realized one thing:
The Browns have been terrible my entire life and they’re probably going to continue being terrible so long as they base their Draft Day decisions on innoccuous encounters at the airport or what a RANDOM HOMELESS MAN SAYS.
Cleveland fans, your GM literally admits these things in public, what the hell is he saying in private? That should scare you if this is the man running your franchise.
Cleveland’s VP of Player Personnel Alonzo Highsmith apparently didn’t draft Josh Rosen because the UCLA volleyball coach didn’t give Rosen a tongue bath when randomly approached at the airport. He didn’t even say anything bad either, he just told Highsmith to ask Rosen’s girlfriend who was standing mere feet away. Nah, I don’t like the way this “feels” so Rosen’s off our board. Huh?
Thats a great way to run an organization. Josh Rosen may suck for all I know, but thats besides the point. The Browns are apparently using Survey Monkey and reading the tarrot cards to decide who to draft rather than using analytics (RIP Sashi), statistics, physical results or anything tangible.
Ben Roethlisberger takes an absolute beating for a quarterback. Big Ben is the huge, lumbering, aging, savy veteran thats always extending plays in the pocket and running around before taking some big shots like he’s Cap Rooney.
As a result of that style of play, the last couple of offseasons have unsurprisingly been filled with questions of whether or not Roethlisberger would retire. Well the Steelers just happen to draft a quarterback in the 3rd round and Big Ben conveniently drops this line the other day:
“The way our O-line is put together, as good as they are, they kept me healthy as can be the last couple of years. I really feel I can play this game another three to five years.”
This seems to have shades of Tom Brady and Jimmy Garoppolo, who the Patriots drafted when Brady was *also* 36 years old. When asked why draft a QB, Belichick replied with this famous line that spawned the TB12 institute as we know it today:
“We know what Tom’s age and contract situation is. I don’t think you want to have one quarterback on your team. I don’t think that’s responsible to the entire team or the organization.”
That pissed Tom Brady off more than we’ll ever know and made him recommit to the game. Numbers don’t lie and Brady, albeit slightly, had started to slip a bit at that point in his career. The Pats drafting his heir apparent was likely the thing Brady need to drive him even harder. Starting in 2014, Jimmy G’s first year on the roster, Brady’s numbers improved across the board and of course our favorite vocabulary word was forever etched into the New England lexicon; Pliability.
So is Ben Roethlisberger feeling a little bit salty that his team is planning his funeral and sizing him for a casket while he’s still battling for Super Bowls? You’re goddamn right. Maybe he’s feeling a little more pliable than he was this time last week. Sorry Mason Rudolph, unless Cap Rooney gets his head taken off by a linebacker, you’re ass is riding the pine. God forbid Big Ben finds his way to a TB12 facility, the kid won’t touch the field until his second contract. And I can’t blame Ben either. Imagine your boss telling you this kid is taking your job?
The Patriots love to zig when everybody else zags. They absolutely love it, which is why drafting Georgia running back Sony Michel is the most Patriots move ever. Most teams these days seem to have all but agreed that the RB position is overvalued (except for the Giants). With absolute studs like Alvin Kamara and Kareem Hunt both drafted in the 3rd round, its no secret that you can find elite running backs after Day 1 so why waste the draft capital? So we’re all in agreement? Ok cool.
*Bill Belichick immediately drafts a running back in the first round*
Its the first time he’s even drafted a SKILL POSITION player in the first round since Laurence Maroney in 2006.
Zagging for days.
You saw it in recent years as the Patriots adopted the more commonly seen in college spread attack and hurry up offense, which all but eliminated the need for a fullback. Then most of the league gravitated towards a similar approach. Then the Pats shifted gears and started heavily utilizing a fullback in James Develin, who only made the Pro Bowl this past year. Or what about when the Patriots all of a sudden changed their offense on the fly and morphed into a two Tight End system? They proceed to wreak havoc on the league with a young Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez. Until one of them became a famous serial killer, but the point remains.
Sony was a beast at Georgia playing with the big boys in the SEC, where he averaged 7.9 yards per carry last year.
He’s also the guy that ended Baker Mayfield’s college career with the walkoff TD run in that epic Rose Bowl game earlier this year.
As Phil Perry points out, Sony’s ball control is a bit of a concern, fumbling 12 times in his career, but half of those came in his freshman year. The only thing Bill Belichick preaches more than Do Your Job is hold onto the football. Ball security is job security. So that’ll be something to watch. Perry also shed some light on another reason why the Pats may have fallen in love with Sony:
“But in the passing game is probably where Michel’s true value will be at the next level. He may be the best pass-protector at the position in this year’s class of backs (two hurries on 52 pass-blocking snaps, per Pro Football Focus), and he’s a capable receiver (64 catches, 621 yards receiving in his career).”
The Pats love a guy that can play in pass protection. Thats your No. 1 priority. Then running the football, and if you can also catch the ball out of the backfield? Well now we’re cooking with gas. Too many times in recent years have teams been able to either stack the box or just sit back in coverage because the RB on the field was either a battering ram (Blount) or a receiver (James White). Dion Lewis was excellent as a runner and a receiver, but he’s gone so Belichick got someone who can do both.
The Patriots are the ultimate marketing arbitrage in the NFL, buying and selling where they identify the most value. Everybody devalues running back these days? Time for us to snatch up a potential stud while you’re all sleeping on him just because thats what the rest of the league says you should do.
They are the tastemakers of the NFL. They’re not trying to do business as business is done, no they’re setting the trends themselves and letting the rest of the league react. And thats why the Patriots will always be successful with Bill Belichick running the show.
Plus if you are a fan, not an NFL Draft Analyst that gets paid to scout and report on players, who gets genuinely angry about who your team does or doesn’t draft? Then you are lying to yourself because any rational human being realizes that the only thing we really know about the draft is that we don’t know shit. So just sit back, relax, and enjoy the show.
Dear New England Patriots, Pats Nation, my colleagues here at The 300s, and anyone I’ve failed to recognize,
For almost three decades now I have been a dedicated fan of all four major Boston sports franchises without fail. The lows of the Bledsoe/(Dee)Brown/Bourque/…Valentin? slumps of the 90’s. The highs of breaking the curse, the Big 3, the Cup in 11′, and, of course, that slew of Super Bowls.
The Patriots obviously hold a special place among special places. They are our dynasty. They are our safety blanket. We worship at the Church of the Immaculate Hoodie and at the Statue of the Perfect Cheekbones. We were a down, downtrodden fan base and the Pats gave us hope.
With that said, Baker Mayfield is the balls. There is something about his chip-on-the-shoulder, “Fuck you I’m too small” self-confidence, electric style of play, and just pure competitiveness that is completely absorbing. He sometimes gets compared to Johnny Football, but Baker is a fucking mad dog QB1, a gunslinging sonofabitch who happens to be on the shorter side and can use his feet, as opposed to Manziel who always had a questions mark when it came to his arm and competitiveness.
So with that my dear, dear contemporaries I must confess that should the Cleveland Browns, the worst franchise in the history of anything – and I mean that, there were militias that were quite frankly paved by the Roman conquerors that looked better in comparison – draft Baker Mayfield, I must switch teams. I can’t root against Baker. His elusiveness as it pertains to law enforcement may not pass the sniff test, but he has the ability to drive the ball downfield and into my heart.
I hope you understand this is out of a love gained, not a love lost,
The 300s 