Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - LOCKED ON PATRIOTS- 8/7/17- Brady's Mom Gets a Ring, Jason Taylor Gives Props To Brady/Belichick In Hall Of Fame Speech, and Bill Belichick Talks About Today's Generation

Episode Date: August 7, 2017

Chris Simoneau, Patriots Insider for Scout.com, discusses an array of topics, from Tom Brady's mother receiving a Super Bowl ring, to Bill Belichick talking about the difference in generations. #patriots Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Learn more about our healthy benefits at fepblue.org slash getmore. Good morning, I'm Chris Simineau, Patriots Inside of a Scout.com, and also your host of Locked On Patriots. Today is Monday, August 7th, 2017. We're actually going to do two shows for you guys today. We have a ton of stuff that we have to get to, a lot going on, but I wanted to make sure that we get you guys all the updates from today's live practice with Jacksonville. We'll get you that news tonight, as practice is still going on right now. And right now we're going to get you guys updated on all the latest from this past weekend and any other news and notes that we may have. Before we get started, I just want my listeners to know that I can be found on Twitter under the handle Chris underscore Simono. You can also find us at LockedOnPatriot, which is also on Twitter.

If you have any questions for the show, be it about the Patriots, myself, Patriots Insider, or if you're looking to advertise here on LockedOnPatriots, 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-A-S-T-O-P-H-E-R, the number 5 at gmail.com. If you're a member of Patriots Insider on scout.com, you can contact me directly on the site via message. That's actually the best way to get a hold of me, and that's the best site to sign up for, so go do that.

So, not going to waste any of your time. Let's get right to the Patriots news, we've got a lot going on, and like I said, we're going to have two different shows today, but we at Lockdown Patriots do not like to waste time. That's one of the biggest things we like here about the Lockdown Network, too. 20 minutes in and out, you guys get all the information you want, you get some good opinions, you get good stuff, and you're not listening to a two-hour podcast, which can be ridiculous.

So first and foremost, I thought this was pretty cool. Bob Kraft and the Patriots gave Tom Brady's mother a Super Bowl ring. I think that shows a lot about the true closeness of the Kraft-Brady relationship, not just between the player and the owner, just between the ownership, the team, and the family. Clearly, there's a close relationship there, and it's very nice to see that they would do that for them. I do think there's another side to this, and this is just the journalist thinking.

This also could affect the relationship with Kraft and Belichick going forward. So, you know, how gung-ho is Bob Kraft going to be when Bill Belichick goes to him at the end of this season, next season, or the season after and says, hey, we got to move him, we got to do something, I got to cut him, I don't want to let go of Jimmy. It's going to be interesting. And when you got Kraft giving Super Bowl rings to Tom Brady's mom,

you know, it makes you wonder if it might be one of those situations where Kraft is saying, listen, he's not going until he says he's going. And that could cause a bit of a rift between Kraft and Belichick. I'm just, I'm very interested to see that happen. I'm not one here to sit here and speculate. It's just obvious. I mean, look at the relationship between the two. You have a GM slash coach who is pretty ruthless

when it comes to letting guys go at the end of their career. And it's not because he's a bad guy. It's because he understands what it takes to win, and he understands that if you keep guys too long, it can affect your cap, it can affect losing other players, and that's what he's afraid of in this situation. So something to keep an eye on, and something like, you know, Tom Brady's mother getting the ring may seem like something just, you know,

oh, that's pretty cool, and it's not, which it is on the surface. But if you look a little bit into that a little bit deeper, it just goes to show how tight the relationship is between the owner and the coach, which seems to be the owner and the quarterback, which seems to be closer than the coach and the quarterback and maybe even the owner and the coach, which seems to be the owner and the quarterback, which seems to be closer than the coach and the quarterback and maybe even the owner and the coach. So it's very interesting. Speaking of Tom Brady, his brother-in-law, former Red Sox first baseman

and third baseman Kevin Newkos, he called out Bob Lee and ESPN for them questioning Brady on his comments regarding his health and past concussions. We spoke about that here two days ago on our past show. We talked about it. Brady had said it's nobody's business. And the truth of the matter is that's true. It isn't anybody's business.

There's a thing called HIPAA. It's a health code that we have to go by. It's an acronym for something. I don't know every single letter of the acronym. But I do know what it's an acronym for something I don't know every single letter of the acronym but I do know what it's all about and it's about our healthcare records being safe and secure and legally

being unable to be shown to anybody that's a HIPAA violation so the media constantly asks these guys when we get all these reports, the injury reports, all that stuff anything that's given to us by the doctor that's not okayed is a violation. So some of the stuff that we've been getting information from is ridiculous. We shouldn't even be getting this information.

So for Brady to say it's none of your business, and for a reporter like Bob Lee and his ESPN cronies to question him and say, you know, that what he said was, oh, it is our business, well, no, it's not. It's absolutely not anybody's business. So it's nice to see Euclid saying, again, I know it's his brother-in-law, but he did come to Brady's defense, and I think a lot of other people should too. You know, ESPN, get off your high horse. You guys have been after Brady for three years now, then all of a sudden you're going to start questioning him

because he says it's none of your business on the concussions when it truly is none of your business? Remember, there's certain things in this country that people have rights, and one of those things is protecting their health care and the knowledge of their own health care from the public. People don't need to know that stuff. That's between him and his doctors and the league doctors. Not between him and ESPN.

Go away. Go away ESPN. Enough of you guys. So, on to another quarterback. This one we thought was gone, but he's coming back apparently. Jay Cutler is coming to the AFC East. Good luck, Jay. The Patriots

will face the overrated Malcontent most likely twice in 2017. Looks like Ryan Tannehill is going to be facing knee surgery. They keep saying they haven't made a decision yet. They might do rest, this and that. If it's torn or it's even partially torn, get it fixed. He's too young to have that as something that could cause problems. That knee won't be stable if he doesn't get that thing.

It could be an issue where it doesn't heal all the way. It might not heal right. It could mess up his plant leg. It could mess up a lot of different things. So it would be foolish of him. Actually, I think it was his landing leg. But either way, either knee, if it's messed up, it's going to mess with the mechanics. So go get the surgery, Ryan.

Do the right thing. You got Jay Cutler and his angry-looking face. Still go to jaycutler, smokingjaycutler.com, one of the funniest websites on the Internet. I'll post one of the photos today when I get a chance. How about scout.com? You guys get a chance on my Twitter account. I'll put one up there.

But he's going to face the Patriots twice next year. So this is just my opinion. I think Cutler's awful, and I think this is a positive development for the Patriots. I don't root injury on anybody. I feel awful for Ryan Tannehill. I like Ryan Tannehill. I think he's getting better. I know a lot of people think that he's an idiot and he can't mentally handle the game.

I saw Hard Knocks do, and I've seen some interviews with him, and I've seen him not seem like the brightest bulb in the world, but he works hard, and he does get better every year, and he does do some things, and he does have some good games. And I think he brings more to the table right now than a guy like Jay Culler. So good luck, Jay, even though I really don't think that's a good pickup. Danny Amendola spoke about his possible consideration of retirement. People had asked if he did consider it, and he said, no, absolutely not. He's not done yet.

That's what it comes down to. He's not done yet. I think taking a pay cut for him made sense, though. If you look at it, there's no guarantees he's going to get signed anywhere else. And even if he does, he could be cut or have to hold to learn a whole new system which i think people take for granted fans take for granted learning a whole new system is not easy you know i understand that football is football and there's there's only so many different things you can do but the terminology sometimes is hard you have to remember all the

terminology with the different routes and all the different things that you're doing you know it was hard enough for him to learn the patriots offense and I know he got pieces of it and lots of it when he was with St. Louis because he was with Josh McDaniels. But if you look at what he's done, came from St. Louis to New England, he clearly feels comfortable in that system. So why would he leave it now towards the end of his career? And the other thing, too, it makes sense to take less money when you know you're most likely going to have a job on a great team,

and he's very important to Tom Brady. So all in all, it's a good move to keep him around and for him it's a good decision to take the pay cut knowing that he's going to have a job here in New England. On the injury front, it appears that Matthew Slater is still dinged up. It looks like he's dealing with something that could take him some time to recover from and hopefully this doesn't force him to miss any regular season games because he's huge to the coverage unit. So keep an eye on that one.

We're going to keep you guys updated. Matt Slater still not looking good. You can tell he's frustrated, I feel, for the guy because he loves the game clearly. He's probably going to play as long as his dad did. I think his dad played for like 24 seasons or something crazy like that as a left tackle for the Los Angeles Rams before they became the St. Louis Rams, and now the Los Angeles Rams again.

But that's a story for another day. But either way, he played for a long time, and it appears that his son, who's a great special teams player, he's just carved out his niche in the league. He's also fast as can be. He's going to be around for a while, but they definitely need him to get healthy because they're going to need him this year if they plan on doing what they want to do. I saw some speculation out there about Jacoby Brissett possibly being cut. Come on, guys, seriously?

That's ridiculous. Why would they cut him after taking him in the third round? And they've already seen that he could deal with the bright lights when he stepped in last year and started two games. He played the second game, although not well. He was actually pretty horrible. But he had a broken thumb. He went out there with a broken thumb because Garoppolo had bruised,

I think it was bruised ribs, and said he couldn't go. So this guy goes out there with a broken thumb, which is worse when it comes to playing football, taking a snap with a broken thumb, come on. Getting hit in the ribs is going to hurt. I know that. But you can put something on. You can put on one of the rib protectors and you can help yourself a little bit. There's not much you can do with a broken thumb.

Every snap you take, it's going to hurt. So they saw that he was tough enough to handle that. And he won a game against a good team. And what turned out to be a huge game as far as momentum in a positive way for the Patriots and a negative way for the Texans. I think he might be the future, not Garoppolo, so he isn't going anywhere unless it's a trade they can't refuse. I know that maybe his mechanics look a little bit off this preseason. He definitely needs some work, but they're going to work with him because he's got something, so the whole speculation about Brissette possibly getting cut I think is ridiculous.

Now, if somebody came in and offered a king's ransom for a trade for him, I think the Patriots would be forced to listen because they would say, you know what, how can we not look at this if we know that Garoppolo is going to be the guy we keep? But again, Garoppolo might not be the guy that they keep. So it's interesting to keep an eye on. In other news, a player from another team, a former great, Jason Taylor talked about Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, in his Hall of Fame induction speech this past weekend.

Taylor said he had the highest level of respect for Brady and also Peyton Manning for making him raise his game. His comments on Belichick were, quote, I never had the pleasure of playing for him, but I had the pleasure of facing his teams for twice a year for more than a decade. Bill, you put a target on my back, my front, my sides, and as a result of that, I never felt more respected. And I'm going to say this about Jason Taylor. I have more respect for him as a defensive player,

as a player against the Patriots, than any other guy I've ever seen face that team. He gave them fits. He gave them absolute fits. Matt Light gave them a really hard time. Matt Light, I believe, and nobody, I don't know if anyone's going to agree with me on this, and I don't care if you do or not, I think Matt Light deserves consideration for the Hall of Fame.

He was a left tackle for five Super Bowl teams, three teams that won it. And from the time his rookie year until his final year in the league, his rookie year, he went to the Super Bowl teams, three teams that won it. And from the time his rookie year until his final year in the league, his rookie year, he went to the Super Bowl and won. And his final season, he also played in the Super Bowl, too. He may have only played 11 years in the league, I believe it was 11 years in the league, but he absolutely deserves to be considered for Hall of Fame. And Jason Taylor was the guy, the only guy, that he couldn't handle.

Taylor was just a beast. But Matt Light, I'm sure, respects Jason Taylor, and I respect Jason Taylor. For him to be able to do what he did to Light for all those years just speaks to how good he was, considering that Light shut everybody else down. So the Patriots, there was always rumors towards the end of Taylor's career that they were going to get him.

He was going to sign a free agent deal with the Patriots. And there were times when it seemed like it was close, but it never happened. I think Taylor alluded to that when he said, I never had the pleasure of playing for him, but he knows that it almost happened more than once. Congratulations to Jason Taylor, an opponent of the Patriots who I had the utmost respect for. I think he absolutely deserves to be where he is. Again, congratulations to Jason Taylor on your induction to the Hall of Fame. I think that you had just a terrific career and I think you're one of the best

Patriots adversaries there ever was. Speaking of Bill Belichick, before we go and talk a little about SeatGeek, I wanted to talk about this quote that I read that Bill Belichick had said. I didn't hear it firsthand. I actually read this and he said quote i think the generation that we're dealing with is a little different than what we've dealt with a decade ago or back in 05 and in there that 2000 to 2005 range it's a different type of kid different type of athlete we try to prepare the players the best we can for their transition not only into professional football but into this area of the country and also into this football team.

We spend a lot of time trying to educate them in all the different aspects on the field, off the field, training, teamwork, leadership, and so forth. These guys have responded well to it. I think our last two draft classes are two of our best classes in terms of that. Guys that buy in and have really tried to do the right thing for the team. Interesting, because I agree with them wholeheartedly. You know, I'm 41 years old. I've been a basketball coach for 24 years now.

I started doing it right out of high school. I started coaching football not that long ago, but I've been scouting the game for a long time. I started coaching football in 2012. I've been scouting it since the mid and late 90s. So I've been around it myself and I work with kids. That's the other thing that I do too. I work with kids. I worked for the Boys and Girls Club. I currently work for a middle school and I coach high school kids in football, basketball, baseball. So I'm around it a lot. So Belichick is 100% right. The kids from 2005 are different from the kids from 2017,

just like the kids from 1996 were different from the kids from 2005. You know, there's a big difference. There's a huge change. But I think the kids now are significantly more different than the kids from 2005. And it just shows the change in the way that we get information, how fast people are growing up now. You know, sometimes kids, not only do they grow up, sometimes they grow up too fast. Sometimes they don't get a chance to grow up at all, and they don't do things for themselves,

and they've had things handed to them, and it's such a different range of kid now. And I think Belichick actually alluded to that when he said, you know, these last two classes we've seen, you know, they've been really good. I think basically what he's saying is a couple of classes before that weren't. And maybe it's just maybe a change back, a shift in the culture, back to more of a personal responsibility and holding yourself accountable instead of blaming things on other people because that was and is a major problem nowadays with these young kids, these younger guys.

There's a lot of blame, a lot of pointing the fingers around there. Nobody turns around and points their fingers at themselves and looks in the mirror anymore. But I've seen over the last two years, three years actually, I've started to see progress again, progress in the right direction where we're starting to get kids back to realize I can't act like a jerk. I have to respect my coaches. I have to like a jerk. I have to respect my coaches. I have to respect my bosses. I have to respect my leadership. When we were seeing for a long time it was going down a bad path.

So Belichick, to have him refer to this and speak about this, I think that it carries a lot of weight. It doesn't just carry a lot of weight in football. I think that you can look at this in education too and say okay well not only do we see this with kids who are kids in the seventh eighth sixth all that level or even high school kids we're seeing this when they get into their 20s and they're still technically you know they're adults but they they're still they're old kids really at that point because the world has changed so So Belichick, the fact that he notes that, I think that's going to help educators realize, okay, there really was an issue here.

There is an issue here. We need to make sure that we continue to stay on the right path that we decided to get back onto, and it comes in the parents too. In fact, it all starts with the parents. So good for Bill Belichick to point that out, and I'm glad he did because in my line of work, it's good to see that somebody who carries so much weight with the words that he says uses the right words to maybe help families and educators push their children in the right direction instead of relying on everybody to do things for them, actually having character and showing a backbone so um so one of the things i want to talk to you guys about is uh seat geek seat geek it's a great site um you can buy tickets in sports concerts you know sometimes it can be hard but it can be a pain in the neck too so if you want to get tickets like pearl jam

and you can't get them because it's such a pain in the neck well the simple way to do it is with seat geek it's the smartest easiest way to get tickets to live events. What you want to do, you've got to download their app. That's what I did. I went and downloaded the app on my phone. It's by far the easiest way I found to shop for tickets. I can be anywhere, a couple taps, I can instantly find the seats that I want. I just used the SeatGeek app this summer and during basketball season, too. I wanted to go to that Red Sox game.

Well, I got the app on my phone, clicked on it, found the seats that I wanted. You know, for me, it was this easy. I just hit the couple buttons there and it would work for me. What SeatGeek's doing at the same time is they're searching multiple ticket sites to compare prices and find great deals. So you get the best bang for your buck. They grade every ticket based on value to help you immediately identify the best seats that fit your budget. So every ticket is also guaranteed, so you can shop for your tickets with confidence. So definitely what you need to do, this is the best part because you actually get money back. My listeners are going to get $20 off their first SeatGeek purchase.

So download the SeatGeek app I just spoke of and to the promo code LONFL. Go do that today. Download the SeatGeek app and enter the promo code LONFL. That's promo code LONFL for $20 off your first SeatGeek purchase. It's a great deal. You want to go to a concert?

Go do it through SeatGeek. You want to go to the Patriots preseason game either Thursday or the 31st against the Giants? Go to SeatGeek. I guarantee to go to the Patriots preseason game, either Thursday or the 31st against the Giants? Go to SeatGeek. I guarantee you you'll be able to find tickets on there. So go check it out. Again, that's SeatGeek app and the promo code is LONFL.

Put it in today. Earn $20 off your first SeatGeek purchase. Don't miss out. I'm telling you, you'll save yourself a lot of money. I got some awesome Red Sox tickets this past summer from a great site. Go check it out. I'm telling you, you'll save yourself a lot of money. I got some awesome Red Sox tickets this past summer from a great site. Go check it out, SeatGeek.com. So the Jaguars are in town. Patriots are having their practices.

They're practicing Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday with the Jags, and then Thursday they're having their preseason game. So I'm sure it'll get a little heated down there. It might get heated during the game at some point. But the Jaguars are a good test for the Patriots in practice and in the exhibition game. They're filled with talented players. They just haven't been able to put it all together.

But when you come to drills and practice, great players tend to stand out. So don't be surprised to see some of the Patriots struggle with players like Allen Robinson, Leonard Frenette, Marquise Lee, even Denard Robinson, guys like Blake Bortles. He struggled pretty early. He was struggling pretty bad, though. But he started to resemble an actual NFL quarterback over the last week. So that's something to keep an eye on. Jimmy Garoppolo, he gets to face a different colored uniform.

We'll let you guys know tonight in Part 2 of today's shows if it had the same effect as it did last year when he got this chance to start the regular season. Garoppolo is known as a gamer, somebody who does well when he's facing another team, so I think that might have an effect on him in practice today, and I think it might have an effect on him in the game on Thursday night. Also, a guy to keep an eye on, the guy I've been talking about, I'm pumping him up, Devin Lucien.

He's looked very good in camp. He's going to have a chance to show that he can do that against competition from another team. It's going to be interesting to see if he matches up with rookie Jalen Ramsey. That's something I want to see. Hopefully we do. Again, we're going to let you guys know tonight how that went. We'll keep you guys updated, get you guys updated on all the developments from today's practice with the Jags. Another thing I want to really keep an eye on is the offensive and defensive line. They faced their first two tests of the preseason, and it works both ways

because I coach linemen, and I know they think they're going 100%, and then they get into a game, they get into a practice, they get into a drill with another team. Things start getting a little bit more heated because you're going up against a guy you don't know. He's trying to do something. The other guy's trying to do something. And when you're in practice, guys know, guys tend to get comfortable.

They're teammates. They tend to let guys do this, and some guys will let an eye guy do another thing and make themselves look good and make themselves, you know. There's times when the players will step up and get angry and dominate a player on his team. But most of the time, it's not the same level of effort you're going to get when you're facing somebody from another team. So today's going to be tiring, I think, for the offensive and defensive lines.

I think it's going to be a good test for both of them and show them what it's really like, not just the practices they've been going through. The Jaguars receiving core is big. They'll give this revamped cornerback core here a run for their money this week. Not only will the coaching staff be interested to see how Stephon Gilmore performs, their new pickup, basically who they picked up because of this, the wide receivers they're going to face, but also Eric Rowe, who's had some great moments in camp

and could lock down a spot as maybe one-on-one big wide receiver defender, kind of the same role that they've put bigger corners in in the past. Another player that I'm interested in watching this week, the same role that they've put bigger corners in in the past. Another player that I'm interested in watching this week, especially with another team in town, is Kony Ealy. Can he step up? If he can, that might clean his slate and get him back on the good side of the coaching staff. Belichick's comments that I spoke about, think about that. That could be directly related to a guy like Ealy and his behavior since joining the team. He wasn't drafted in the last two years, and I know he wasn't drafted by the

Patriots, but he doesn't have to be. He could be talking about the draft class as a whole, and Ealy is one of those guys who comes from the malcontent section of the years of the draft. So keep an eye on Ealy. I know that he's, I wouldn't say he's uncoachable, but he's very stubborn, so it should be interesting to see how he handles this week. Dietrich Wise looks to be one of the steals of the draft. We're going to leave you guys with this. So he's another one. Is he going to be Wise or is he going to be Ealy?

Is Wise going to steal that spot, the fourth runner coming out of nowhere who seems to be very comfortable with the media, very comfortable with his coaches, very comfortable with his teammates, but is he as talented as Ealy is? Probably not because when Ealy turns it on, you see what he did in Super Bowl 50. But Wise seems like the guy who gets it more, so this is going to be a fun one to watch play out over the next three weeks. So keep an eye on that.

So, again, we're going to definitely be on again tonight. Again, we wanted to get this morning's show out, get you guys updated on all the weekend developments and what we wanted to watch for in practice today. So again, what we wanted to watch for is what we're going to be talking about when we rejoin you guys tonight at around 7.30 p.m. So thank you guys for all for joining us

on this Monday morning edition of Locked on Patriots. Be sure to go to iTunes and subscribe to our show today, as in right now, and tell your friends about us too. Again, we'll be back tonight, so make sure to check in for part two of our two-part series today. I'm here at Locked on Patriots. We're all about getting Patriots fans

the most info you need to be the most in-the-know Patriots fans. Have a great night. Have a great morning, Patriots fans. We'll talk to you tonight. 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

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