Everyone has been freaking out the Patriots traded Jimmy G back in October. Who is gonna take over when Tom Brady retires? Whats the plan of succession? How are we going to compete in the future with studs like Jimmy leaving town? We are all doomed. Well, I got my first look at Patriots rookie QB Danny Etling today…..and I think we’re gonna be alright.
If I know anything about playing quarterback in the NFL, and I think I do, being handsome is like 80% of it. Brady, Russell Wilson, Cam Newton, Drew Brees, Marcus Marriota, Garoppolo. All. Handsome.
So I just want to get ahead of the crowd and invite Danny Etling into the Handsome Men’s Club.
Show of handsome? All in favor?
Its only the first day of practice in his first year as a pro, but I think the Patriots may have struck gold with this 7th Round handsome son of a bitch.
*Insert over-used “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” reference here.* (Go ahead and even sing it in your head, if you want.)
FOOTBALL IS BACK, BABY!
The Patriots officially kicked off training camp in Foxborough today, and per usual there are plenty of storylines to get to.
But this year feels a little bit different. Instead of focusing on positional battles or guessing which player you’ll invest a high fantasy draft pick on only to see Belichick bury them on the bottom of the depth chart before the first leaves even change color (see: Dobson, Aaron; Gillislee, Mike; Ochocinco, Chad; Ridley, Stevan; Taylor, Fred), people seem to be much more concerned with how much “fun” the team is having, how “mean” Belichick really is, or why Tom Brady doesn’t eat tomatoes (no, but really, he doesn’t).
This entire offseason has felt like an episode of General Hospital, and I’m honestly done with all the soap opera bullshit. I’m just ready to watch some good action on the gridiron.
Here’s the first of a weekly series from The 300s focusing on actual football-related issues pertaining to Brady & Co. before Christmas finally arrives on Sunday, September 9:
Sexy Rexy vs. the New Kid: Who Ya Got?
The Pats surprised a lot of people in May when they selected former Georgia stud running back Sony Michel with the 31st pick in this year’s NFL draft.
Sure, Dion Lewis – who totaled over 1,100 yards from scrimmage and 10 touchdowns last season – had signed with the Titans two months before, but the team still had Rex Burkhead, James White, and Mike Gillislee, the last of whom people thought maybe (JUST MAYBE) could have a bounce-back season after the Pats signed him to a two-year, $6.4 million deal last summer. (OK, I know most people forgot Gillislee was even on the team, but let’s not forget that this was a guy who averaged just under six yards a carry and scored 12 total touchdowns from 2015-2016 as a backup to LeSean McCoy in Buffalo. He also had 98 carries for the Pats through the first eight weeks of last season before being banished to the bench for the rest of the year, save for six carries in Week 16 against Buffalo. He’s most likely going to be cut unless he has a monster camp, but he’s really not a bad player and should re-emerge somewhere throughout the league this season.)
Nevertheless, Belichick and McDaniels saw something in the 23-year-old Michel, who finally signed his rookie deal on Monday and looks primed for a feature role in the offense.
But wait a minute, Mattes, what about Burkhead – who had eight touchdowns in 10 games last season – and White – the loveable, reliable pass-catching specialist who got robbed of a Super Bowl MVP award against the Falcons two years ago? (Sorry, Tom, but White was absolutely the MVP of that Super Bowl. Period.)
First and foremost, White’s role is locked in, and regardless of whether or not the Pats took Michel this past spring, not much is set to change for him. He’s still going to get the bulk of the targets out of the backfield, finish with 50-70 catches, and serve as the emergency ball-carrier in the event Burkhead and/or Michel go down.
But what about Burkhead?
After signing with the team as a free agent last summer, Burkhead played in just 12.3% and 10.5% of the team’s offensive snaps, respectively, through the first two games of the season before sitting out the next four games due to injury. However, after returning against the Falcons in Week 7, Burkhead played in about a third of the team’s offensive snaps the rest of the way, ultimately becoming the team’s main goal-line back and secondary pass-catcher out of the backfield – before missing the team’s final two games of the season, again due to injury.
So while durability issues may be a bit of concern for Burkhead, there is no doubt that he is a true all-around threat at the running back position. And after re-signing with the team yet again this offseason, the coaching staff obviously plans to use him.
Sooooo where does that leave Michel?
Well, no team in their right mind is going to use a first-round pick on a running back only to have him ride the pine for the majority of his rookie season. We may see this happen with quarterbacks, even more so in recent years, but first-round picks are not spent on running backs unless the team believes they can handle the rock right away. Michel is going to get his.
Even with Burkhead in the fold last year, Lewis still received the lion’s share of the playing time in the backfield, averaging exactly 15 carries per game over the team’s final 10 contests. He also hauled in 25 catches over that same stretch.
There were also five instances last season where both Burkhead and Lewis each surpassed 50 total yards in the same game, demonstrating that the Pats, much like the vast majority of the NFL, are furthering the belief that the days of a bell-cow back are truly coming to an end. (OK, sorry, I see you Le’Veon Bell. You’re a freakin’ machine. OK??)
Also, while there is no doubt that Michel was an absolute FORCE to be reckoned with at the college level – 1,227 rushing yards, 17 total touchdowns, and an out-of-this-world 7.9 yards per carry average (WHAT??!!) last season – he was never truly a bell-cow back himself. Michel only exceeded 156 carries in a season one time in four seasons, and he actually shared a feature role in Georgia’s backfield for the past few years with fellow NFL rookie and Cleveland Browns second-round pick Nick Chubb. He also averaged just 16 receptions per year as a Bulldog, so he is no threat to White’s status either.
Now, I’m not trying to make it seem as though I’m not absolutely amped to see this kid play. (Again, he averaged SEVEN-POINT-EFFING-NINE YARDS PER CARRY last year against the toughest conference in the country.) I’m just saying that people need to temper expectations if they expect him to be the next Zeke Elliott or Leonard Fournette.
Editor’s note: AJ Green begs to differ:
It should also be noted that since 2004, only three guys – BenJarvus Green-Ellis (2010), Stevan Ridley (2012), and LeGarrette Blount (2016) – have toted the rock more than 200 times in a season for the Pats, and there’s no reason to expect that trend to change this season.
While it’s often an exercise in futility to try and predict exactly what Belichick and McDaniels are going to do in any scenario, I am still going to provide you with my completely meaningless 2018 stat prediction for the Pats three-headed monster at running back:
Rex Burkhead:141 carries; 544 yards; 42 catches; 382 yards; 10 total touchdowns
Sony Michel:192 carries; 839 yards; 11 catches; 45 yards; 7 total touchdowns
James White: 55 carries; 205 yards; 61 catches; 510 yards; 4 total touchdowns
All I know is, Belichick knows how to use running backs of all shapes, sizes, creeds, and colors; he’s proven it throughout his career. Not since the days of Clock Killin’ Corey Dillon has Bill invested his entire stock into one running back, and he both understands and appreciates the value of having multiple guys who can carry the load.
So no matter what happens, it’s nice to know the Pats shouldn’t be in dire straits without Lewis this season, and it’ll be fun to watch how it all shakes out.
Be sure to check in with The 300s next week for Part 2 of the series!
Of all the things that make me irrationally angry in this world, The fact that Dan “I’m a fucking asshat” Shaughnessy is SOMEHOW going to be beatified as a saint by the media when he one day dies is perhaps the most infuriating. Shank is a troll plain and simple. He is an amalgamation of the worst parts of old media and big J journalism and he delights in nothing more than writing bad stories that no one cares about while grinding whichever of his axe is the dullest that week.
Unfortunately for Mr. Shaughnessy at the turn of the millennium a new sheriff arrived in town that very simply put, was not going to put up with his shit, that was intellectually and creatively superior and who could, no matter what Shank did or said or wrote, make Boston’s worst columnist look like a child at any waking moment. To put it in terms I myself can understand better, Shaughnessy is any number of hapless, 155 pound subpar grapplers and Belichick is Khabib Nurmagomedov, just taking down, holding down, stifling, and making life absolutely miserable and humiliating for his broken opponent.
But what a weird fuckin fanbase we are for getting fired up for by this huh? While other teams have to wait for the first deep call completed in full pad drills to get stoked for the impending season, we just have to wait for our coach to verbally checkmate a jackass reporter within 3 moves.
Yahoo! – “When I first got [to New England], I thought in my head, ‘I’m better than this dude.’”
Lee pressed him on the notion several times, that Garoppolo really believes he’s better than the quarterback that’s won five Super Bowls, been to eight, and is regarded by many as the greatest quarterback in the history of the league.
“It was always a quiet confidence. I would never speak that,” Garoppolo said.
Hot take: I’m totally ok with this. Maybe it is because I will always have a “what if?” kind of fan-hood for Jimmy G, but this is the kind of confidence you like to see a franchise QB have. It suddenly makes sense why he did so well in the limited action he has seen in his NFL career – he has a fucking DEEP belief in himself and his abilities. He did a literal “hold my beer” when BB asked him to step up and take the reigns from Brady for a few games and it showed. It wasn’t that failure wasn’t an option, it just didn’t exist in his reality.
While this might come off to some, specifically the dregs of Pats Nation, as cocky, it says something that he kept this to himself. He said and did all the right things while he was here, went about his business, and was a team player, especially when it came to needing him to come off the bench. The fuck should we care how he got himself to the right place 6 years ago at age 23 to be able to survive and even thrive in the NFL?
Given “Tom Vs. Time” and the knowledge that all the pink salt and weird ass exercises weird ass Alex Guerrero gives him to do won’t sustain Brady in perpetuity, this really hits an awkward spot in my gut. We knew Jimmy G was good. Now we know he is insanely confident as well. What did we miss out on?
P.S Anyone else hear he banged a porn star? Crazy!
Another photo of Tom Brady’s vacation on the island from LOST went viral yesterday and for all the wrong reasons. TB12 was pictured in a stunning emerald green bathing suit, but rather than compliment his sense of style, everyone on the interwebs pointed to the fact that Tom didn’t have a 6-pack.
The TB12 Method never claimed to get you shredded, it claimed to make you the best at what you do through pliability as well as impervious to sunburns. Simple stuff. Guys, its Tom Brady. When was Tom Brady ever a walking GI Joe?
Its summer vacation, we’re all imbibing one too many craft beers and an extra one or 12 hot dogs at the family BBQ. I get it. Now Tom may be indulging more on avocado ice cream, chia seeds, and maybe even a couple of strawberries, but the point remains.
So to all those who body shamed my guy Tom yesterday; for shame. If people were saying this shit about Giselle they’d have to shut down the internet for a day. I think Tom looks stunning, glowing even, as he squeezes out the last few days of summer vaca before getting back to the grind of winning another Super Bowl.
Browns Wire – “[Jamie Collins] is entering the second season of a four-year, $50 million deal signed after being acquired in a trade with New England. Collins has the seventh-highest contract at his position group. It’s a major stretch to include him as one of the 10 best at his position.
Collins ranks 19th on the list of the worst contracts for each of the 32 NFL teams. The explanation, from Jason Fitzgerald of indispensable contract tracking site Over The Cap, makes a lot of sense,
Collins is a good player, but he is not a difference-maker and does not play an expensive position. The Browns still signed him to a top-market contract, which treats Collins as if he were an elite-level player. He played only six games in 2017 and recorded just 21 tackles with one sack.”
Remember when every story written about the Patriots was focused around how they had so many budding young stars on defense that they would need to find a way to pay them all? Times have changed. Dont’a Hightower, Chandler Jones, Malcolm Butler, and Jamie Collins. Now just a couple of years later only one remains with the team. That is downright shocking.
Chandler Jones has come back to bite the Patriots hard, despite his fondness for consciousness altering edibles, recording 17 sacks last year, made the Pro Bow and finished 3rd in Defensive Player of the Year voting. I always take this list with a grain of salt because its voted on by the players, but Jones was also ranked 28th in the NFL Network Top 100 Players this year. Meanwhile the Patriots had only two on the entire list, Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski, with exactly zero on the defensive side of the ball.
Now the effect of Malcolm Butler’s departure remains to be seen as his tenure kicked off in an absolutely legendary fashion, clinching a victory in Super Bowl XLIX. It clearly ended badly in New England though with his ultimate and baffling benching in Super Bowl LII. I love Butler, I think he’s a great player but we’ll see how he performs down in Tennessee. Unless Butler is an absolute disaster for the Titans from Day 1, there’s probably no coming back from the roasting Belichick will get for benching Butler in the Super Bowl for the rest of his life.
But, moving on to our old friend Jamie Collins. Jamie, Jamie, Jamie. For every move that Belichick screws up with a Chandler Jones, theres 10 Jamie Collins he ships out of town. The guy was an athletic freak, most notably jumping the offensive line and blocking a kick, as seen above, before the NFL outlawed that too. Collins fell out of favor though and famously bitched about his role on the team. Bill didn’t even blink before he shipped Collins out mid-season to the NFL purgatory that is Cleveland. That very offseason Collins got PAID by the Browns with a 4 year $50 million deal. I remember all kind of shook our heads. Sure Collins had great potential, but potential doesn’t sign the paychecks.
Well after just one year of that albatross of a contract, a year where Collins played only 6 games and had just 21 tackles, its already on the list of worst deals in the NFL.
Somewhere on the calm and icy blue waters of Nantucket Belichick smiles quietly to himself while laying out in the sun on the VII Rings.
A new episode of The 300s Podcast is hot off the presses! This ep is a grab bag of news as we’ve got headlines everywhere from drug rings to a historical run by the Red Sox to PED suspensions and back to NBA free agency. Click here to listen or download on iTunes or Google Play. Subscribe, rate, and review today!
A new episode of #The300sPodcast is hot off the presses and its a grab bag discussing: Hanley Ramirez had a bad weekend, the #RedSox are chasing 100+ wins but I still don’t feel great, Edelman is fighting the #NFL, and a big announcement from The 300s! https://t.co/0oi7aJtKBK
It came out the other day that Hanley Ramirez was allegedly Pablo Escobar andddd now he’s apparently not. Whoops.
The Red Sox are on pace to win 100+ games for the first time since 1946 and I’m still not sold on this team.
Julian Edelman is pulling a Ryan Braun and appealing his 4-game suspension on the way his test was physically handled more so than the actual results.
LeBron “The Decision” James reportedly doesn’t want a recruiting circus this time around in free agency. Is this the height of hypocrisy or has LeBron learned from getting roasted after The Decision?
The 300s has a very exciting announcement to make and that my friends is what they call a big market tease.
NBCSports – Somebody needs to tug on Tom Brady’s sleeve and let him know that fun’s fun, but he’s drifting into Brett Favre territory now. Forty-eight hours hadn’t passed since the Oprah Orchard Interview in which Brady said his retirement was coming “sooner rather than later” and there he was on Instagram Tuesday afternoon insinuating in Spanish that he’s back to playing until he’s 45. Given that he’s 40 right now and his contract expires at the end of the 2019 season, 45 seems like later not sooner. That’s standard fare this offseason.
Tom E. Curran wrote an article yesterday about Tom Brady’s back and forth retirement timeline plans thats definitely worth the read. Curran is as tied into the Brady family as anyone so when he writes about Brady I pay attention.
It’s definitely frustrating to not know when exactly Brady will ultimately play until, but thats the cross you bear for having a 40-year-old quarterback, who just won the MVP by the way, leading your team. I’m sure 99% of the NFL would swap places with Patriots fans right now.
The waffling and the mind games are what will drive people up a wall though. Saying ad nauseum that he’s playing until his mid-forties or beyond, only to tell Oprah that he’s going to hang em up “sooner rather than later” only to then cryptically comment “45” in Spanish on an ESPN post on Instagram.
The Brett Favre comparisons will only grow louder unless Brady makes a definitive public statement declaring his intentions one way or the other, but why would he? It’s frustrating, but I get it. If my job asked me to commit to 3-4 more years I would give them a big shrug emoji.
Did Brady likely bitch and moan to the owner to get his heir apparent in Jimmy Garoppolo shipped out of town? All signs point to yes, but its not Tom’s job to make sure the Patriots are set up for 2024. That’s on Robert Kraft and Bill Belichick.
Listen, if Brady up and retires tomorrow it is a massive dick move and is a complete about face from everything he’s preached for the last few years. That would be unforgivable after he basically forced Kraft to ship Jimmy G out of town….but fans would forgive him sooner rather than later. Sure, Bill may never talk to him again outside of Hall of Fame inductions and such, but its become pretty clear over the past several months that these guys aren’t exactly ripping it up together on the VII Rings in Nantucket.
Back to Curran’s larger point here though. Brady joked after the Super Bowl when asked about retirement “Why does everyone want me to retire?” Thats just it. Everyone, outside of New England at least, does want him to retire. The rest of the league has just been counting down the seconds on the imaginary doomsday clock thats been ticking, and ticking, and ticking since the day the Pats drafted Garoppolo and we all became aware of “Tom’s age and contract situation.” So yea no kidding everyone wants to know when Brady is retiring. So they can start planning to maybe possibly be competitive or even potentially win an AFC East title for the first time in nearly 20 years.
“does he not get that his and the Patriots stranglehold on the NFL isn’t like Jordan’s on the NBA. It’s closer to Godzilla’s on Japan, and that every other NFL team and fanbase is counting the seconds until he walks.
That’s why every throat-clearing, every pause, every social media “like” is scrutinized for clues as to which way he’s ultimately leaning.”
The end is coming. I don’t know when, but we’re not quite there yet. They may have announced last call at the bar, but they haven’t turned the lights on just yet. So until then lets just enjoy the ride.
Joe stops by The 300s Podcast studio to chop it up and it is a must watch. In this fresh new episode we discuss a series of questions, including: is Oprah sneaky trying to sink the Patriots, should the Celtics trade Kyrie Irving, and whats the biggest sport in the world?
Its only the first day of practice in his first year as a pro, but I think the Patriots may have struck gold with this 7th Round handsome son of a bitch.
The 300s 