He maybe pretty damn poor for the Revs, but he did turn a $200 million dollar investment($25 mil for the stadium in 88 and $175 mil for the Pats in 94) into a 1.3 billion dollar value. I would think if he sold the Pats today he would get close to a billion for the team.
Check your facts. Ginger refused to renegotiate his contract with the Revs and left because he wanted to leave, not because the Revs were unwilling to up his pay.
He had made it clear he wanted to head to Europe. Young and single guys who play good soccer often do . Then towards the end of the season he injured his knees so the timing was off to go to Northern Europe for a trial so he accepted a trade to the CRapids. It was clear Jeff wanted to leave the area after four years at Brown and 4 more with the Revs. There is absolutely no evidence his leaving had anything to do with what the Revs were offering to pay him.
You honestly think that Bob Kraft, with all of his domain of Kraft enterprises to oversee, is ruling on Revs' contract offers? He doesn't do that with the Pats, and why would he even want to get involved in that kind of stuff for the Revs? Does anyone go around saying that "he" refused to pay Richard Seymour, Adam Vinitieri or Deion Branch what they were worth - and now they're gone?
Yes I think Kraft has a reputation for holding the line on contracts and not overpaying players like many owners do. The proof is in the pudding. He lets players go that want more than he's willing to pay and he still wins Championships. That's smart budget management. Does he do the actual dickering?I doubt it but I bet he sets the rules and makes the final decisions on the big name players.
That is more Belichick than Kraft. Look in the time period between 97 and 99. They signed guys to big deals and got into major cap problems. When Kraft hired BB/Pioli the cap problems began to disappear. In fact I am willing to say other than Brady, Kraft doesn't care who come and goes and what is payed out.
The Patriots have a reputation right now for underpaying their players. I don't see how its hard to make the connection that the same business plan was being used for the other sports team Kraft owns. Also no DP, no SSS, no marketing, seems to be a lot of evidence against Kraft.
The operative words are---business plan. There is a reason Kraft has made a lot of money---by being smart in how and when to spend his money. People on this Board give him a lot of "stick" because he doesn't spend his money the way they think he should (they also don't know his reasoning). Bottom Line: The man knows how to grow a sports franchise. To call him disinterested or cheap may appeal to those who think he should be spending more but his track record of success says he's just being smart and using good timing with opeing his pursestrings.
3 Superbowls will hide a lot of problems below the surface. As will a bit of luck (tuck rule, David Givens knocked out but still holding onto the ball, False start in Baltimore on MNF, etc...) But what is your response to the following: Don't want to pay fair market value to Deion Branch? You end up with Reche Caldwell. Don't want to pay fair markey value to Assante Samuel? You end up with Delta O'Neal and Duane Starks. Don't want to pay long term for a still pro-bowl caliber Richard Seymour? Trade him for future picks. Those were all key players that were lost and/or replaced with players of far inferior skill albeit it at a far reduced financial value. And the results on the field showed it accordingly.
While I agree with Samuel and Richard Seymour Deion Branch over priced himself and actually Caldwell had a respectable year following Branch's departure. Branch really did crap since he left. He had a career year in 05 and went down every year since. I think the pats actually looked good on this one
Exactly, to argue for any of those deals is a little silly considering the Pats came out winners across the board. We got a first round draft pick out of the Seymour deal from the Raiders who were pretty much a lock for a high pick. Seymour was one of my favorite Patriots ever but that's how Belichick does things. Assuming he gets a nice player in the 2011 draft, one can argue the Pats won that deal. Asante Samuel missed two opportunities on the final drive to lock up our undefeated season and failed. Let him go to Philly for that kind of money, Belichick has proven he's able to find quality cb's. Branch disappeared so Pats won that one too. Outside Vinatieri who has a weaker leg than Ghost anyway, no one on that list has really made much noise elsewhere in the league.
OK, I will nibble. What exactly is his "business plan" for the Revolution? Hold the line on off-the-field expenses. If you can get by with a department of 8 people to do the work that used to be done by 10, then do it. Of course, this means that you don't have the bandwidth to take on new, and possibly very worthwhile revenue-generating projects. Maintain strict controls on budgets. Is it really necessary to send your coach all over creation to look at players when we already have a pile of DVDs that they haven't finished looking through? Raise revenue with one-off special events. Get a couple of big-name teams with large ethnic following to come. We'll max out the revenue from those groups and it won't matter if some of them are alienated because they aren't the Revs' "target" demographic. Oh yeah, don't forget the "Beckham game" every year! What are they doing for long-range growth of the brand? What kind of name recognition and visibility does the team have locally? Has it increased or decreased in the last 15 years?
I love to nitpick when I do actually post! It was David Patten who got knocked out and had his leg touching the ball as his head lay out of bounds, keeping possession for the Pats against the Bills in overtime. That's the way I remember it anyways!
My bad, I meant to type "Patten", not "Givens". I was thinking about the MNF game in Denver when Givens got the TD late in the game to win it.
No - those who complain about losing those guys blame Belichick, not Kraft. The Patriots football operation is run by Bill Belichick and no one else. Anyone who knows anything about the Pats will say that. Kraft learned his lesson with the Parcells situation and does not get involved in the football operations. With the Revs, I challenge anyone to produce any evidence that Bob Kraft has been involved in any decisions to hire or not hire, extend or not extend any player with the Revs. Kraft gives his soccer people a budget and the rest is in their hands. They make the decisions about soccer operations and they have to be accountable for the results. That is very much like the way he runs his football team. Doc, I think you're off-base here if you're saying he's involved in the sports operations side of either team. The point isn't whether they were good moves or not (BTW, I'm going to start liking the Seymour move a LOT next April!), it was who was making them. And, just like with Larentowicz, it was NOT Kraft.
FWIW, there's more and more complaining coming from Pats friends I know recently. I will make you a bet that he's involved in the negotiations with Brady. He might not be in the front room, but he's very much involved in a contract that could pay out $40-$50m in guaranteed money. If you don't think he's involved (after all, he's a savvy businessman), I really don't know what to say. Hard to tell. We have no idea who has set the limit on the DP contracts they're tried to get signed ...
If you listened to Mike Felger today on 98.5. he was blasting Bob Kraft today for being a cheap owner. Also for being of the fore front for the labor problems in the NFL.