Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - LOCKED ON PATRIOTS- 3/17/17- Discussing the Dont'a Hightower Deal & the Malcolm Butler Saga

Episode Date: March 17, 2017

Chris Simoneau, Patriots Insider for Scout.com. discusses the new deal Dont'a Hightower received from New England, and also discusses the saga known as the "Malcolm Butler Situation." #patriots Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Napa Know How. There are lots of amazing cars on the road, but perhaps none more amazing than the paid-off car. It may not be pretty, but the price is right. Heck, if you keep that thing running, it'll actually start paying you. Because with Napa Rewards, for every $100 you spend, you'll get $5 off. So keep your car running longer, stronger with Napa Rewards, and watch the savings start rolling in. That's Napa Know How. Good afternoon. I'm Chris Simino, Patriots

inside of a scout.com and also your host of Locked On Patriots, your source for everything Patriots. Today is Friday, March 17th, 2017. Happy St. Patrick's Day out there to all you guys. Out there celebrating, drinking green beer, having some corned beef and cabbage. And just for you guys out there who may be Catholic or Christian,

maybe a little worried about eating meat today, well, the Pope told you that you could have corned beef, so that doesn't mean you can go out and have a roast beef dinner, but you can have some corned beef. The Pope said it was okay, so go nuts. Tonight, today, sorry, we're still during the day here. I'm going to get you guys updated on all the free agency signings that have happened in the days that we haven't been on. And any possible trades that we might have heard of.

We're also going to take a deep dive into the Malcolm Butler situation. We've been on that the whole time. You know, it is what it is. So we'll talk about that, among other things. We're also going to get you up to date on any Patriots news, including where they stand now as far as a salary cap space after the re-signing of linebacker Dante Hightower. His deal seems to be more cap-friendly as each detail comes out, too,

which is also another interesting thing. I did not, I was pretty clear that I felt 43, four years, 43 million, and I'm not trying to take a victory lap here, but you guys know, you listen to the show all the time, we made it very clear that we thought that 43 million was the number, and it was. But the other thing to keep in mind, too, is that a lot of that is based off of bonuses, and they just don't have as much. He didn't make as much guaranteed money as what was reported.

Let's put it that way. I still feel good about what we projected and what we said was going to happen, but it doesn't change the fact that they definitely fudged those numbers a little bit. And I just don't believe that he's going to make as much money as, uh, as what his contract is reported to make. So again, we hit the nail on the head as far as the number that was reported and what was given to us from our sources and things of that nature. Um, but we don't know,

um, a hundred percent what he's actually going to get. So we'll get into that a little bit too. So he's here though. That's the good thing. You fans should be pumped. Dante Hightower is remaining with the Patriots and they still do have some cap space to work with so we'll talk about that in a minute. Before we do get started,

I want my listeners to know that it can be found on Twitter under the handle Chris underscore Simono that's C-H-R-I-S underscore S-I-M-O-N-E-A-U. And if you have any questions for the show, be it about the Patriots, myself, Patriots Insider, or if you want to advertise here on Locked On Patriots, you can email me directly at simono.christopher5 at gmail.com. That's S-I-M-O-N-E-A-U dot C-H-R-I-S-T-O-P-H-E-R, the number five at gmail.com. That's S-I-M-O-N-E-A-U dot C-H-R-I-S-T-O-P-H-E-R, the number five at gmail.com.

If you are a member of Patriots Insider on scout.com, you can contact me directly on the site via message, and that's the best way to go about it, because you get all types of discounts on tickets and all that good stuff that we're going to get into a little bit later in the show. So, again, this is one of those times of the season where it's this free agency, really.

Free agency and trades. We're going to get deeply into the draft starting on Monday. We're going to start to attack it. You guys are going to see where my roots are from coming from Scout.com and just my own background in general being a scout and a coach and also obviously I'm a writer and do my own podcast and stuff. But my roots are in scouting and coaching football, among other sports too. I'm a basketball guy too, and baseball, but football is where I've really spent most of my time.

So I have a good read on what college players are going to work in the Patriots system. I've actually done pretty well as far as who they're going to predict over the years. It's hard to hammer everybody and say, oh, this is the guy they're looking at. But, you know, Dante Hightower, Chandler Jones, guys of that nature, we kind of had an idea they were going to take, and we ended up being right about it. So we're not going to close our eyes and whip a ball or whip a dart or whatever they do on that radio show that you guys all listen to up here that's garbage.

But we will definitely give you guys some informed opinions on the players that are going to be coming out. So, again, that starts on Monday, so don't miss out. The college prospect barrage, because that's what it's going to be. We're going to be coming at you guys for a while with the with the college players so let's get first thing on the list here we haven't really talked about it because it's been a couple days since we've done a show just that's how it is during the during the off season we're going to do five shows a week but they're not going to be in a row it's just the way it is uh hightower signed a four-year

was said to be a 43.5 million dollar $19 million guaranteed. It came back that the deal looked like it was actually four years, $35.5 million, $17 guaranteed, and he has $8 million worth of performance-enhancing bonuses. A lot of it has to do with his injuries. So he still has that money, and that's still what the contract is, but if he doesn't play those games and he doesn't hit those bonuses, then he doesn't get that money, and then that changes what the contract actually is. So, again, I do feel good that we hit the nail on the head for what the number was ultimately, but I still feel like he's not getting paid what was reported,

and I kind of feel like the Patriots really made out on this deal because I was expecting him to sign between 12 and 13. I thought 12.5 was a number. When he first started up, when he first went to market, as things went on, my number changed down to about 11, 10.5, 11, which was the right number. But I thought he was going to make more money on the market. I thought there would be more teams interested in him. I thought teams that were smart enough to realize and look at him and say,

you know, this guy can do more than just be a Mike linebacker. He's a great guy on the edge. He does a lot of different things. In fact, Ed Bouchette from the, I can't remember the name of the Pittsburgh newspaper that wrote it, but he's one of their better writers down there, talked about how the Steelers dodged a bullet and it would have been the biggest waste of money and how they paid that much money to an inside linebacker. And the thing that blew my mind is how much Ed doesn't understand the game.

These guys can be moved around. They're not just one guy. It blows my mind when I see some of these old school writers and some of these old school football guys who have been around the game their entire life not pick up on the fact that, wait a minute, Hightower is a pretty good guy off the edge. Hightower does a pretty good job coming up the middle. Wow, we can move this kid all over the place. He's strong as a defensive end or a defensive lineman. He's fast as a linebacker. Yeah, he's not great in coverage, but you know what? You don't have to send him out in coverage.

You could have him affect the pass game by blitzing him instead, and he's one of the best run defenders in the league. So for a guy like Bouchette to come and say that you know the steel has dodged a bullet and blah blah blah sometimes it makes me wonder if he's got the organization saying here write one of these articles so that way the fans think that we didn't do bad even though we lost lawrence timmons um you know we're watching landry jones um what's his name i can't think of his name. Oh, Jarvis Jones, another one of their linebackers, went and signed with Arizona yesterday. So the Steelers, because they're cheap and they have all their media guys at their dispose, can go and rip a guy like Dante Hightower

and say that the Patriots are the ones that did them a favor and this and that. Did they do you a favor when they whooped you in the AFC Championship last year with Hightower on the field? I don't think so. So don't forget that Lawrence Timmons is now off your team. He's in the AFC East now. The AFC East, the underrated division that's actually better than the AFC North. So the whole thing with the way Hightower was treated and the way he went through it, now the Jets trying to smear him a little bit, saying that they pulled their offer off the table and it wasn't as much as they said. And I saw a thing today that was put out by, I believe it was Jason Lock and Four,

but I'm not 100% on that, so Jason, if it wasn't you, I apologize. But basically what it said was that, oh, they were really, really thrown off and blown away by some of the things that they saw on Dante Hightower's physical. Really? I'm saying that, like, really? He's a 27-year-old linebacker who played for Alabama and the Patriots, and he also was an unbelievable high school football player. This guy's been playing football since he was probably five years old. Of course you're going to see things on his MRI and on his physical that you're going to not like.

He's only average playing 13 games a year in his career in the NFL. He misses games. He clearly has issues with his games a year in his career in the NFL. He misses games. He clearly has issues with his back. He clearly has issues with his knees. He's still only 27, though. He's going to keep playing. He's tough as nails. He's going to get over that stuff.

He's probably going to have a shortened career. He'll probably only play until he's 32, 31, 32. But you know what? To say that, it's just typical Jets nonsense, stupid nonsense. The moment they say, the moment after they said that they offered him the biggest deal, he signed with the Patriots. Two minutes after that, you see reporters saying, well, no, the Jets actually pulled the deal when he left New York.

Bull crap. They didn't pull the offer when he left New York. They were pleading and begging and pleading for him to stay with them and to come to the Jets because nothing would have made it better for them to take a Patriots player from them in his prime like Hightower is. They didn't take a Revis guy in his prime. Revis came here, got a ring, and then they got the leftover Revis. Now Revis is going to get in shape and probably come back to New England and win another one, but that's a story for tomorrow because we're going to get into that a little bit.

Actually, maybe we will today depending on how much time we have. But the whole Hightower thing, I felt like he kind of got a bad name through the league. People kind of ripping him a little bit. He didn't get the offers that he wanted. The Patriots ended up having, they played it perfectly. Even I'll admit that because I was on board the whole time saying they had to get him signed. But he's here, and the deal is done. So Dante Hightower remains a Patriots for another four years,

assuming that nothing happens with him getting cut or injuries or things of that nature. And the Patriots get to keep their defensive quarterback. So good for them, good for him, good for his mother getting to do her little dance on Instagram because that was hilarious and I loved it. So Dante, if you hear this, welcome back to Foxborough. You know I'm one of your biggest supporters in the media. You know how I feel about you as a player because I'm it. So, Dante, if you hear this, welcome back to Foxborough. You know I'm one of your biggest supporters in the media. You know how I feel about you as a player because I'm an actual scout. And I actually know what you do out there and how much of a difference you make.

Keep slamming those guys when you squeeze down. Keep doing what you do. All right? But, Dante, you're our guy. So, the next topic that we just can't ignore. And, honestly, we are 10 minutes and 38 minutes, 10.38 into the show. So we may only be talking about a couple different subjects today because as I've told you guys a million times, and I apologize because we did this for 36 minutes the other day because I got rambling.

We're only going for about 20 to 25 minutes today. That's what we want to do. We want to give you guys short blurbs and give you guys all the info you need but not overwhelm you. So we're going to talk a little bit about Butler here and maybe a couple other things that we see in the news and then we'll go from there.

So the whole thing with Butler and the Saints, who he had met with them yesterday, apparently the meeting went great. Have you ever heard of a time when they come out of the meeting and say, oh, that went terrible? It doesn't happen. So the rumor is out there is that Butler's going to get between a $10 million

and an $11 million offer from the Saints. So here's the deal. The Saints have no cap space, none. They have probably a million dollars worth of cap space. They went out and they re-signed Nick Fairley and another guy whose name escapes me because he wasn't the greatest player. But that was about $9.5 million on the $10.5 million that they had available on the cap. So they definitely don't have a lot of money to work with. Now, the tender that they're trying to get Butler, that the Patriots want to get Butler to sign,

is for $3.91 million. That's what the Patriots would be trading. Okay? So if the Patriots don't, the Patriots aren't trading $10 or $11 million in cap, that's not what's going to happen here. So what the Saints are going to have to do is convince the Patriots and convince Butler

to come up, sign his contract tender, get that taken care of, and then the trade goes down. convince the Patriots and convince Butler to come up, sign his contract tender, get that taken care of, and then the trade goes down. Then the Patriots would get back. I'm hearing today that somebody's saying they're going to get their 30-second pick back. That's crap. That's garbage. If that's the return they get on a top 10 starting corner in the league who's still just getting better and still going into his prime, then they get ripped off. They should be getting back the 11 pick, period. End of discussion. The number 11 pick should be coming to New England. They don't have to get anything else. They don't have to get a third. They don't have to get a fourth. They don't have to get a fifth. They don't have to do anything out of nature. But if you are going to go out and trade Malcolm Butler

and you're going to give away a guy who you know that if you wanted to keep him you could keep him you could make him hold out whatever he's not going to hold out he's going to sign so you have control of the situation still with the leverage his agents a moron as we've all come to realize you know he's obviously somewhat intelligent has some business savvy because he was able to get this far. But we're going to see in the end that he's going to end up messing up this whole entire thing. I guarantee it. But if I'm the Patriots, I'm still fighting to keep him.

It's not a matter. It's not too far. Everyone says it's too far down the road, too far down the road. Bull crap. It's not too far down the road. This kid made himself with New england belichick loves him so no matter what happens here if belichick looks at the situation and says you know what we can keep this guy and make this thing work then guess what they're gonna keep him and they're gonna make

it work and they're gonna figure it out if there's an office sheet that comes up and the patriots see that he's gonna get paid you know 10 million dollars a year and it's not a crazy bonus and crazy amount of money there is a very good chance the Patriots say you know what we're going to go ahead and match it this time because there's nobody out there in the market we like besides Rivas and Rivas is a question mark and we know that we're gunning for as many Super Bowls as we possibly can while Brady's still able to play the way he has Tom Brady is going to fall off soon. I hate to break it to you guys. I keep warning you people.

I'm going to keep warning you guys because I see things in the present. A lot of people don't see it like that. He is going to start falling off soon. And when he does start to fall off, they need to make sure that they have all their other positions covered. If they don't have great corners, great defense, great everything, they're not going to be able to stay as a contender. So that's one of the reasons why they've got to make sure that their roster is strong.

At the same time, they want to make their roster strong for the future by maintaining guys like Garoppolo, but also make sure that you maximize everything for today and go out and keep all your top-tier players. It may sound hard to do, but the Patriots are geniuses, and I know that they can figure it out. So in the Butler situation, if the contract offer that he received looks like something that they're not afraid to match and something that they're comfortable with say it's three years four years five years I don't think that's going to matter I think what's going to come down to is guaranteed

money that the Saints offer him if the Saints offer him an exorbitant amount of money that's guaranteed offer then there's a pretty good chance Patriots are going to take the trade, let him walk away. But if there's not a crazy offer, sign him. Get him locked up, sign him. That's what I would do. So we'll see what happens in that scenario. Again, Barstool Sports has already reported that the trade has happened, but then they came back and said that it was a mistake.

In fact, the Saints tweeted them directly and said, no, that was not the case and that he has not been traded for. And we'll let you know if and when it happens and things of that nature. I don't think this thing is even close to as far down the road as everyone keeps saying. I just don't see it. You know, people can keep saying what they want to say. But until I actually see that they've gone ahead and made the trade and the deal is done, then I'll come on here to Patriots,

Lockdown Patriots, and say it's a done deal. But as of right now, it's not. So we're not going to stop making rumors up. It's just not what we do here on Patriots, Lockdown Patriots. This is not how we roll. So Malcolm Butler, he's not a saint. He's currently still under the Patriots' control. I think that they're

going to probably try to keep him as best they can regardless of all the praise that Sean Payton's putting on him in the media which I find to be odd the whole thing's odd because I know Belichick likes to keep these negotiations and stuff quiet and the Saints are not being quiet and one of the reasons why I think the Saints aren't being quiet is because they know that the Patriots don't want to make a deal and I think they're trying to put public pressure on them. How's that going to go? Not going to

happen. So there is a lot to read into in this situation. I recommend you guys go to ESPN Boston, check out Mike Reese, some of the stuff he's written, go to scout.com, check out some of the stuff I've written. You guys will get a good idea of what's actually going on down here. So I don't think he's going anywhere, no matter what Sean Payton may be saying. So, you know, it's just one of those things where you got a lot of media nowadays and they all have their own agendas and it is what it is. So Daron Harmon had a chance to talk today. He came in for the first time after signing his contract. He had to say about Butler, you know, people have to do what is best for them. But for him, there was never a question of him coming back to the Patriots, which is great because he really has been awesome for them in the secondary. As far as the free

agency is concerned, nothing's really cooking too crazy right now. I'm sure something will probably happen over the weekend with some of the younger guys, you know. But we'll see. It's just one of those things with, you know, veterans are out there that I'm sure the Patriots are interested in. And I'm sure there's some younger players that didn't really work out in their first rookie contracts. I know the Patriots still have to pick up too, so we'll keep an eye on that also. So before we let you guys go today, I want to make sure that you all go on Patriots Insider on Scout.com. We provide daily news, video from NFL.com, fantasy football, and you can also earn money

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I'm talking $25 off each ticket, and you could probably, family of four, save $100, pay for your parking, pay for this website for the year. You'll also receive 10% off purchases from Fanatics.com. And you can also get Sports Illustrated free for one year. All of this costs $5 per month or $50 for the year. So this is just a no-brainer. What you want to do is go to nwe.scout.com to register today. This is an unbelievable deal. Again, $5 a month, $50 a year.

Discounts on tickets to all the sporting events, movies, amusement parks, 10% off Fanatics and Free Sports Illustrated. $5 a month, $50 a year. nwe.scout.com. Go register today. Don't waste any time. Go do it. So in closing, I want to thank you guys for joining us for this Friday edition of Locked On Patriots. Again,

the green day, St. Patrick's Day. Be sure to go to iTunes. Go there now. Go click on iTunes. I'm waiting. Subscribe to my show today. Click on it right there. There's a little button. Just click on it. Do it right now and tell your friends about us too here at Locked On Patriots

we are all about getting you Patriots fans the most info you need to be the most in the know Patriots fan be sure to join us again tomorrow like you said

we're going to talk about any up to the minute news things change by the second so you just never know so we'll definitely have some news for you guys

we're going to talk about some free agents that I'm interested in that are still out there namely Jarrell Rivas never know. So we'll definitely have some news for you guys. We're going to talk about some free agents that I'm interested in that are still out there, namely Jarrell Rivas and Adrian Peterson. And we'll talk about some other guys that are kind of flying under the radar. Again, I'm your host, Chris Semino. I want to thank you guys all for joining us in this shortened edition of Locked On Patriots.

Go out to your local establishment, have yourself a green beer tonight. If you can't drink alcohol, well, they got a lot of alcohol beer. Throw a little green food coloring in there and you'll be having fun with your friends. Be sure to join us again tomorrow. Have a great night, Patriots fans. Make sure you drink water before you go to bed. Is democracy in danger or decline? Condoleezza Rice, William Galston, and Carlos Gutierrez and others take on this question in the fall edition of The Catalyst, a journal of ideas from the Bush Institute. Surveys show Americans place less trust in institutions like the media and business. Others contend America has faced far more challenging periods and emerged strong. Leading policymakers, Bush Institute experts, and respected journalists take on this debate.

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