Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - New England Patriots Finance: DeAndre Hopkins Offer, Cash Spending and the Importance of Incentives

Episode Date: July 20, 2023

The New England Patriots are facing some scrutiny for their failure to sign receiver DeAndre Hopkins to a seemingly doable contract. But is the Pats’ financial frugality being unfairly targeted? Host Mike D’Abate welcomes Miguel ‘PatsCap’ Benzan to discuss the important details surrounding the team’s offer to Hopkins, the unnecessary outrage regarding their cash spending, and the misinterpretation of the Patriots utilization of incentives.Find and follow Locked On Patriots on your favorite podcast platforms:Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/locked-on-patriots-daily-podcast-on-the-new-england/id1140512627Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1c5ZxFmwg3WbfxAU3tR5Ve?si=k196wH-yRqifUcQQz8SjIQStitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/locked-on-patriotsAnd follow host Mike D’Abate on Twitter, where he’ll be sharing the latest news about the New England Patriots and talking with fans.Twitter: @mdabateNFLSupport Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!eBay MotorsFor parts that fit, head to eBay Motors and look for the green check. Stay in the game with eBay Guaranteed Fit. eBay Motors dot com. Let’s ride. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply.LinkedInLinkedIn Jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/LOCKEDONNFL. Terms and conditions apply.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Don’t miss the chance to get your No Sweat First Bet up to TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in Bonus Bets when you go FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG(CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat(CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Operating costs, cash spending, it's got to be time for some Foxborough Finance. We've got the pharaoh of Foxborough Finance here with us. Let's kick it off because you're about to be locked in to the Locked On Patriots podcast. You are Locked On Patriots, your daily New England Patriots podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello to all of you, Foxborough faithful. Thank you once again for making Locked On Patriots a daily part of your New England Patriots coverage and also your first listen every day. Download, subscribe to, or follow for free on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcasts

to make sure that you get the latest episode as soon as it's available. I am your host, Mike DeBate, and I cover your New England Patriots for Patriots Country of Sports Illustrated. So reach out to me and let me know what's on your mind on Twitter at MDABATENFL. And while you're out there showing some love to the Twitterverse, please be sure to follow the Locked On Patriots account as well at LO underscore Patriots. Pats fans, I always open the show with a special shout out to all of you everydayers out there. And if you are a Locked On Patriots everydayer, your team every day, you know that the pharaoh of Foxborough Finance is sharing the screen with me today.

The incomparable Pat Scapp himself, Miguel Benzon, and he is here to enlighten all of you with a pure masterclass on Foxborough Finance. Miguel, thank you very much for joining me today. Welcome back to the pod, my good friend. Oh, it is always a pleasure and honor to be on the show, Mike, even though I was wrong about the Patriots signing DeAndre Hopkins. Okay. At the end, remember, folks, at the end of my last appearance,

I said they had to make him an offer that he could not refuse. They did not. Okay. Apparently, there were just too many incentives in that deal. It was not a good deal for the Don in Foxborough. So, apparently, they pass on DeAndre Hopkins. But, you know what? Let's begin there because I know a lot of Patriots fans heard through yesterday's report that

the New England Patriots apparently were willing to go the extra mile to reach the 15 million max that he wanted to reach. However, the Patriots wanted that 15 million to be reached more with incentives. Tennessee Titans were willing to let that relax a little bit. A lot of that more guaranteed or upfront money. Where essentially did this deal go south if that was the hang up why were the incentives such an issue for this deal getting done i think that the patriots and this is just my opinions like the wide receiver core like the tight ends like what the guys in the running backs can catch the ball with all right but they also thought hey they're going to improve the the team if they got the hundred opkins but they weren't willing

they had to establish the value and they weren't going to go past that value for him and so right what paca got half of his deals and incentives i I can imagine that if we believe the reports, Hopkins got $12 million in cash and has the opportunity to earn $3 million in incentives. So 12 divided by 15 is 80%. I'm thinking that the Patriots probably offered him the $15 million and probably said, hey, we'll give you $9 million. $9 million.

It was $6 million in incentives, which is 60%. I can understand if Hopkins at the end of the day said, I'm going with the most money. He didn't even wait for a player to get hurt in training camp. He didn't even wait for the Jets to do whatever they're going to do with Denzel Mims. He said, he thought to himself, and probably correctly, this is going to be the best offer I'm going to get.

I might as well take it now. The Chiefs had offered him, what, $4 million in cash with the opportunity to get the $6 million in centers to get to $10 million. So the Patriots and I think the Chiefs are off around the same amount of centers. The Patriots offered a bigger base. But at the end of the day, Hopkins went with the money. It is what it is i was and i guess one piece and what the next topic is talk about um cash spending folks i don't i i don't know what to say about the we i got some we got some figures and things there there's so some slides in there to show you but for people to go automatically to say that the

patriots are cheap patients are not willing to spend um i don't know what i i've you know if you if you listen to this podcast you listen to me me say this once, if not a thousand times. Cash spending has nothing to do with winning. All right. My good friend Troy, Texas Cap, has a Substack newsletter. He wrote about the same thing, about cash spending and its lack of correlation to winning earlier this month. I highly recommend you read it. So if we could put that up, that'd be great.

Okay, so you can see here, the Patriots are near the, close to the bottom of spending, but in terms of wins, all right? And I will have to say this, this goes from 2011 to 2022. So this does not include the spending for brady's um when brady became the highest paid player in the league in 2010 that signing bonus happened in 2010 so that's not

included in that so the pages might have been a little bit higher if we went down to 2010. um look at the look at the far left the cleveland browns, all right? Look how much they have spent and how many little wins they've had for that. That's all I got to say. You know what I'm saying? Look at Kansas City, a continual playoff contender. The Pittsburgh Steelers, Tomlin has not yet to have a losing record. All right? One of the lowest cash-spending teams. All right?

So I'm fighting an uphill battle. And, of course, one thing I wanted to say is they don't talk about incentives. All right? For example, the Patriots have $8 million in LTB incentives. Now, Mike, can you bring up that slide? I can. Okay. So, folks, look at this.

Several teams don't even have LTB incentives in their deals. All right? Patriots have $8.18 million. All right? Which means, and if you take out the Patriots average, you'll see just about the average is about $1 million. So the Patriots have eight times as much as the average team. Let's talk about that $7 million difference, all right?

So we've seen teams this year give players signing bonuses and prorate that money over five years. So let's say the Patriots instead of using incentives. All right. And now they have this seven million dollars to spend to allocate the other players another way. All right. They could have given the players numerous players 35 million dollars in signing bonus prorate that over five years and have that seven million dollars hit the cap the same same cap allocation but your spending would have cost would have been up 35 million dollars because these incentives folks all right an FPA, these incentives do not account against

their cash total until they're earned. So after the season, after the regular season is done, the FPA says, hey, this guy's earned some of the incentives. This guy's blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. They do that after the season. season. All right. And because the Patriots have about over close to 40 million dollars in incentives total. All right. They're at a disadvantage right now when you use the cash spending total, because we don't. Somebody had asked me this on Twitter. What would you guess how many incentives would they earn this year? Each year has been different because um they never have a standard they definitely don't have a standard incentive amount different players get injured all right like last year Trent Brown earned all of his incentives all right which is why the Patriots had a negative

adjustment in going into this year which is which was you briefly showed that in the prior slide. All right. So when we hear these, the beat writers talk about the Patriots cash betting now at this moment, I feel that they should mention the Patriots having LTB incentives and incentives period. All right? And it's not like it's close. The other teams are close to the Patriots in LPT incentives.

The Patriots are eight times league average. Eight times league average. All right. But that's not in the total. That's not in the cash spending total. But you can't allocate that. That $8 million is on the cap. You can't spend, that's not, zero against the cash right now, but it's $8 million against the cap. The pages are tied in that sense. All right. Okay. So let's go back into the slide you showed about adjusted cap numbers. Okay. All right here. All right. So, okay. So this is the league year cap is $224.8 million. All right. You'll notice that the, at the page is near the bottom in terms of carryover. All right.

So they only carried about $1.2 million. The average team carries about $4.3 million. All right. And then because they had so many incentives earned last year, they actually had a negative adjustment of $3.6 million. $3.6 million. Excuse me. All right. $3.68 million, $3.6 million, excuse me, all right? So you can see that the Patriots' adjusted cap number, all right, is actually less than the league cap, all right? So you can see, like, for example, the Kansas City Chiefs,

because they won the Super Bowl, all right, and Patrick Mahomes won a couple and had to earn a couple incentives, they have the lowest adjusted cap number. So they can only allocate $220 million to their players. The Cleveland Browns, who have the highest adjusted cap number, can allocate $251 million, almost $30 million more, Mike. So that $30 million in allocation, so you could spend. That's why the Cleveland Browns are able to spend more than the average.

All right? I think they lead the league in over $300 million because they have the high – just the cap number is so high. The Patriots are down near the bottom. All right? Because the folks – and what these guys do, who seem to be obsessed with the cash spending all right let me just bring up my I didn't get a chance to uh email it to you Mike so let me just bring it up on my screen hold

on a minute okay so they don't mention how much how little the pictures actually end up in cap space each year. All right? We see right here, they were down for this $1.2 million. The year before, $100,000. The year before that, they had a ton of cap space because they had the opt-outs. All right? And they don't talk about, when they talk about the cap spending,

they always include 2020. They don't mention, they don't mention that the Patriots had eight opt-outs, which led once again, led the league by far. All right. So we had expensive players in August. And I don't know how Mike, you know, saying like, why, I don't know why the people who are obsessed, I don't know what, you know, add some context don't know why. Add some context to 2020, folks. Do your job. Add some context. Let's mention the fact that they had eight opt-outs. They had Dante Ahaitawa.

They had Patrick Chung, Marcus Cannon, Matt Lacoste, and our man, man's, Murph's favorite guy, Brandon Bolden. All right? I am sure all five guys would have made the team. So that was about $20 million in cash. I know they got replaced, but I'm going to say it's around $20 million that they would have spent on those guys that they're not showing up in 2020 because of COVID. I know all of us want to move on from the pandemic.

Let's just be real and be honest and let's be showing some context about what happened in 2020. It wasn't because they chose not to spend the money. Those players chose not to play in August.

Who are you signing in August to replace them? They didn't. They couldn't. Alright. And then they followed it next year with the most money, set of records for total spending, but somehow that doesn't count.

That doesn't count because they drafted, they spent the money before they drafted Matt Jones. People say, no, they should – people spend the money when they get a rookie quarterback. They just happen to spend the money. They knew in 2021 they were drafting a quarterback in round one.

I don't – Mike, I don't remember seeing a mock draft that didn't have the Patriots picking a quarterback in 2021. I don't know. Do you recall one? I don't. I was pretty much on the Mac Jones train right from the start. He was going to be their guy. But most of them, I mean, whether they had them trading up for Justin Fields or for Trey Lance, or whether you had them selecting a quarterback in the later rounds, mostly or later picks, I should say, most people had the Patriots dipping into the quarterback well, either in the first round or at the very latest in the early second round. You very, very seldom saw someone leave that position off of that depth chart or off of

their picks for a good long while. That was something that was almost a foregone conclusion for the Pats. Folks, it is always amazing when the pharaoh of Foxborough finance comes in, really enlightening us all, myself included. It is a masterclass for myself as well to really see the correlation between cash spending, between winning, and the impact that incentives have on the New England Patriots, as well as all 32 NFL teams, when it comes to setting your salary cap for the 2023 or any NFL season. But we're not quite done with the Pats cap just yet, because in just a moment, we're

going to talk about the approximately $16.93 million that the Patriots have available. We're going to talk a little operating costs and what the New England Patriots may need to do in order to operate throughout the year. Who could they possibly bring in? And then, of course, in a segment unique to Locked On Patriots, my good friend the Pats cap himself will absolutely set the record straight on any erroneous and superfluous cap myths out there. Stay tuned, folks.

You will definitely want to stay locked in to this episode when the Locked On Patriots podcast continues. Proud part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team, every day. But first, folks, today's episode is brought to you by our good friends over at FanDuel Sportsbook. Take your first swing at betting MLB on FanDuel and get 10 times your first bet amount in bonus bets, up to $200. That's right, just bet $20 and you'll land $200 in bonus bets. Win or lose,

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Pat's cap himself, the salary cap top gun, the pharaoh of Foxborough finance, the wizard of Benz on. Yeah, we're going to increase Miguel's names every time he comes on the show because he not only deserves that, but most importantly, he's definitely worthy of all the monikers

he gets. My main man, my good friend, Miguel Benzon, is joining me here today, already breaking the wisdom and counsel meter when it comes to cash spending, incentives, all the impact that it has on the New England Patriots roster and the New England Patriots operations for 2023 and beyond. And speaking of operations, Miguel, I wanted to pick your brain a little bit on operating costs because after DeAndre Hopkins chose to take his talents to Music City, one of the big things that we heard

was that the Patriots are trying to stockpile money or save money for operating costs. You kind of give this masterclass to us each and every year, but we've got a lot of first-timers, we've got a lot of newcomers, a lot of new everydayers out there that are listening to Lockdown Patriots.

Please enlighten us how the approximate $16.93 million, according to your calculations, might be used in the coming months, days, weeks, however long in the 2023 season by the New England Patriots. Okay. So we know they've got to still sign christian gonzalez and keon white so there goes about 2.7 million dollars either 2.4 or 2.7 all right i'm doing off the top of my head all right then we gotta these guys gotta then for the patriots they have to replace the injured players this is a this is a collision sport not a contact sport so they

already get to replace players for example they're gonna replace for Conor McMillan on the cap. He's right now on the top 51 list. But when the season's – after Ross' cut down, he's going to go on from the active list off the top 51 list and just go on to my medical list. So then you got another player who's going to replace that salary all right so patriots typically put 10 to 15 players on ir during the season so i say ballpark because i don't know when the injuries are going to occur and i don't know who's going to occur all right when they're going to go to youtube so i usually use a ballpark of five to eight million dollars. And I think every team does that. Probably not the Titans, because they've been damaged by injuries the last couple of years. They probably have a higher cushion. All right. Which would be I'd be surprised because of that.

I would not be surprised to learn the Hopkins deal has a void there or two. All right. Practice squad. Okay. This is an operating expense that occurs at roster cut down the day after a couple of days after the roster cut down and throughout the season. All right. So I use one number because I'm including elevations. All right. So for them, for the Patriots, it's $4 to $5 million. Some other teams are going to be less than that because the Patriots typically have an older practice squad than other teams. All right, Mike? They're going to have

the salaries of, like I said, the top 51 list. Once Ross the cutdown starts, I'm going to include everyone's salary. That salary to play is $52 and $53. That's $1.5 million. Then, throughout the season, there are players who can earn, not likely to be earned after roster bonuses. For example, Ty Montgomery.

He played in one game last year. So starting on week two, he starts earning, not likely to be an active roster bonuses. So if you go on to the NFLPA public salary cap page on either Tuesdays or Wednesdays of the week, you will see each team who has active roster bonuses and who has players earn not likely to be an active roster bonuses lose cap space because of that. All right. And right now, I use a range because I don't know who's going to make the team. And I don't know who's going to be healthy throughout the year.

So I say they're going to use at max $2.2 million. But they could lose probably one. I use a range of $1 to $2.2 million. Right now, that's max. If they cut some players, then that max will go down. They don't have to have this cap space right now to cover it all right because you could just wait to see who earns that

you know see if the player gets injured you don't need to have that question at the end because literally at the week 17 game right right um the Game 17, that was Week 18, excuse me, that's when you have a lot of players earn a not-likely-be-bearing-actor-roster bonus at the end of the season, all right? At the beginning of the season, you just might have Ty Montgomery, and as the season goes along, you're going to have more and more players earn not-likely-be-bearing-actor-roster bonuses. And the last season or the last regular

season game, you're going to have whoever could probably do it earn it. You don't have to create the cap space, have the cap space now. You just have to be able to have the ability to create cap space. For example, when the Patriots traded Stephon Gilmore during the season, that created a lot of cap

space. Within a month, half of that cap space they created by trading himself and Gumbel's gone. Half. And I said this a couple times on Twitter already. From the start of training

camp to the end of regular season, since the 2020 CBA, which is the latest CBA version, which introduced elevating practice squad players. The Patriots have used average using $16.25 million in cash rates from July to the end of January slash February, $16.25 million. They're right around that number right now,

but let's not forget, folks, at roster cut down, you're going to probably have players who are not in the top 50 or lower at the bottom end beat out more expensive players. For example, let's say Sam Roberts beats out Lauren's guy

for a roster spot. I said this before because I just keep on thinking about Sam. All right. That creates about $2 million in cap space. All right. And then you do that for a couple of players. That multiplies.

So if you have, if the Patriots can have a good year health-wise, they might be able to end the season they have a good year health-wise, right? They might be able to end the season with maybe $5 million in cap space. They don't usually end the cap space, except for 2020, all right? They usually end the season with less than $5 million.

Geez, man, I wish I had the average. Okay. Yeah. It's been a while since they actually been over five. It's been since 2016. They went over five. End of the season, more than $5 million in cap space. Except for 2020. That's not out of our normal every year.

Yeah. Kind of an outlier. It's definitely an outlier. Because they've never had, like like, never had end of year with $19 million in cap space. There was six. They ended up with the sixth highest amount of cap space at the end of the year. The rest of the time since the 2011 CBA, right, they're either in the teens or in the 20s,

and one time they were 31st. So 2020 is definitely an outlier for them, which is why I think the media should admit that when it comes to cash spending. It's an outlier. But they spent so little in it that year, but the papers are getting hammered for that. I think you make a great amounted for that. I think you make

a great amount of sense, and I think you actually enlighten a lot of us when it comes to the correlations there. And again, when it comes back to cash spending, the knee-jerk reaction is always to go for, oh, well, the Patriots didn't spend the money. They're not investing the money into the team. You don't see all the behind-the-scenes

stuff that goes into it, folks. All of the incentive work, the outliers, like Miguel said, in 2020 with COVID-19 and some of the difficulties that put the Patriots into, and the fact that they very seldom go into the end of the season with more than $5 million in cap space available. This is something that New England Patriots always look to keep a little bit in reserve for operating costs, but I think, Miguel, you've articulated it extremely well in terms of what the Patriots need to operate, what they like to typically use to operate, and then what they can do throughout the season. So we're seeing guys like Leonard Fournette, Daryl Henderson coming in for workouts.

These are probably lesser deals that the Patriots will be able to work with. Dalvin Cook is probably going to want a little more than they're going to be willing to spend at this point. But at the same time, there is still availability, folks. And if the Patriots really want to make this work, they can. They could have brought DeAndre in to do that. Like Miguel said, put a cap on exactly what they were willing to spend for him. Tennessee exceeded it. The Patriots wouldn't

exceed it that's why he's in nashville now so one more thing about cash spending when they had tom brady right and and greg badad wrote this in sports shows rated all right in 2013 he agreed to extension before then he met with the robert craft robert craft convinced him i can't pay i don't want to pay my quarterback more than 18 of the cap all right so that's that's when brady started taking a discount all right they kept on winning they kept on winning with with brady taking a discount all right over there you could say that because they took a ticket they won they won and yet people continue to complain that the patrons should have spent more while they were winning all right you're a business i'm gonna ask you if you're a businessman all right and i go to you in the bob craft in the meeting and i say you should spend more the first thing he's going to ask me why what's the why he's going to say we're winning right now in my and i'm having my expenses low so why are you gonna why am i increasing my spending and cut into my increase

my expenses and decrease my profits he's in this he's he owns the patriots one reason is to make money so these folks who complain about how much the Patriots didn't spend when they were winning are saying that Bob Kraft should have went out of his way to lower his profit. And for what reason? When the other teams, you didn't see a correlation between cash spending and winning for the other teams. And they kept on winning. Yet Bob Kraft is getting considered cheap. I'm like, I could not imagine if I was working for the Patriots. Hey, Bob Kraft, you should spend money.

Why? Because people want you to. Why is he in there? He bought the team to help himself make money. Why should he increase his expenses? For what reason? Just to get not criticized? Come on.

Yeah, essentially you're looking to win just points in the social media universe. And believe it or not, whether you spend money or whether you don't, if you're hoisting those Lombardi trophies they're the same size whether you invest 20 million 2 million 200 million doesn't matter if you're getting that trophy you've done what you need to do for the operation and the patriots are willing to spend we saw that in the off season in 2021 they brought in a lot of guys and they spent a lot of money on players that maybe some hit maybe missed, but they weren't afraid to write the checks and spend money. So this is a very, very good eye-opening, enlightening class of Foxborough Finance. And I, for one, have been taking notes like Mad Miguel, but you know what, bud? We wouldn't be doing you justice, my friend.

We would not be really, I think, satisfying the requirements here for a true Miguel Benzon visit to Lockdown Patriots without giving you the opportunity and the freeform opportunity to close the show today to set the record straight. Are there any erroneous cat myths floating around out there in the Twitterverse that you've seen that are kind of rubbing you the wrong way that you really need to make right? The floor is yours, my friend. Take us on. Okay. I got to talk about the future cash spending. Okay. So, Mike, if you could bring up where I talk about the number of players the Patriots have signed, rookies and veterans.

Okay. This is a great point here. Just look at Trent Brown. All right. This, folks, is the secret. This is the salary cap. This is the NFL PA report. All right. Look at Trent Brown's number. $6.5 million. You notice his cap number is $12.25 million dollars what was the difference his incentives i was just proving them

just showing you proof that incentives not included in the cash total on july 5th pff wrote an article right wrote an article about salary cap help you notice the page is the second ask yourself mike how many articles did you see in the boston media about this this this is a good thing for the page to be second and salary cap help all right how many articles did we see in the boston media about this okay i'm i'm putting out i don't know i mean i'll make a call for myself i'm not going to call anyone else out but i didn't do one yeah okay but there's a i didn't see that many. But let's just say it was second to last.

We would have seen a lot more. That's all I'm going to say. That's how I feel. That's how I feel. Trust me. Try to convince me that I'm wrong. I see your point. I definitely do. If it was second to last, we would have seen articles.

The second to the top, we're not seeing any articles. So you have leads me to believe like, hey, if you want to be negative about the Patriots, that's what they can lead off with. And somebody says, like, I carry the water for the Patriots. I'm an optimist in real life. All right. So why shouldn't I look at the right side of things why shouldn't i expect the journalists to show the entire context not just what the negative numbers are at okay um so let's go okay this is my second right because this should have been i swear that should have been a couple of articles by somebody all right or all right um let's show the numbers with the the um

the future players on the team so they talk about future cap spending and like as if it's a fixed number all right okay but look at 2026 the peots have very few, one veteran, Joe Cardona, on its sign that year. Does anyone listen to this? I swear, if you listen to this and you think at March 26 that the Patriots only have 13 players on their roster, and you believe that, I got nothing to say to you. I got nothing. That's not going to happen. They're going to have at least 51. All right. And so that number, that cash spending is going to be higher.

All right. And, you know, I'll talk about the difference between me and OTC. Basically, I'm saying I know for a fact I am just assuming that Christian Gonzalez and Keon White are signing deals. So their numbers doesn't include that. Okay? They wait till the OTC waits till the players sign their rookie deals before they add their cash spending. All right? In 2026, all right, that's several seasons from now.

I am willing to bet that highly anyone who's listening will be able to tell us now for sure who's locked to be on this race of patriots rosa for that year so why are we carrying carry about care about how much cash spending as today we're doing in 2026 you cannot how many players can you possibly name like you think for sure gonna be on that roster in 2026 i'd'd say maybe Christian Gonzalez and

a good Mac Jones. And maybe Colton Strait. There's not that many. I'm like, locked down. And they don't put an example in the cast. It's true.

And say they don't mention that Mac Jones is on his rookie deal. They criticize the Patriots for not spending while he's on his rookie deal. But they don't mention in the future that he's only signed through 2024. So 2025, he counts zero against the cap. 2060 counts zero against the cap. All right? Either if you're going to extend him or pick up his option, that number is going to be $20, $30 million. Doesn't get mentioned. Doesn't get mentioned. There's lack of contact. And so, and I said to this in the last show, Mike, I think it's, I'd rather have the Patriots in this position. Because if Matt Jones works out,

and we're both believers in him, then you have the cap space to not only extend him, to build around, to continue to build around him. If he doesn't't work out you can quickly shift mike and acquire an expensive veteran quarterback and draft a replacement you have that you have that flexibility i think that's a good thing okay i think it's a good thing i that's why I think I think that this focus on future cash spending is lax context. And that's, you know, saying I'm not a that's all I get is lax context. And that's just being polite.

OK, that's all I got to say about it. OK, OK. The other one I want to say set in the right straight. But let's not say that John Hopkins signed the same deal as Nelson Aguilar. Nelson Aguilar signed a two-year, $22 million deal with incentives that gets him to 26. Hopkins signs a two-year, 26 years with incentives and gets him 32. All right? That 26 that Aguilar includes incentives.

The 26 for Hopkins does not include incentives. Therefore, they're not the same deal. All right? That's setting the record straight, adding further context. But once again, if you have a chance to paint the pages in a negative light, why be 100% true? Exactly. Show all sides.

What do they say when you go in a witness? You tell the truth, nothing but the truth and the whole truth. The media is failing us, Mike, in this regard when it comes to the peaches and cash spending. They're failing us big time. Sorry. And that's my rant. No, and that's a good rant. And that's why we need you here to set the record straight and give us all a little masterclass in Foxborough Finance. Miguel, I kid you not, I learned an awful lot today from you and things

that I didn't know, things that I need to be a little bit more diligent on reporting and maybe even a little bit more accurate in terms of how we portray things here in the media. I only speak for myself. I'm not going to speak for anyone else. But I always appreciate you, and I always am enlightened by what you bring to the table here. And that's why we love having you on Locked On Patriots. And in a segment that is unique to this podcast, Miguel has the ability to set the record straight and let us all know what we need to know and what we should know about the Patriots' salary cap.

And I know all of you out there are much better fans and much smarter fans as a result of listening to what we had here today. Miguel, I can't thank you enough for taking time out of your busy schedule to join me here on Locked On Patriots. Folks, he is a regular here, and you know he's coming back before the start of the regular season. We're going to talk any potential Patriots moves. We're going to be talking about operating costs into the season, maybe even a little bit before roster cut down, so Miguel can calm anyone down

and make us realize that all of the guys that are being cut, that are being signed, the Patriots have a plan, folks, and they have a financial plan behind it. Miguel's the man to tell us what to do. In the meantime, my friend, please let everyone know where they can reach out to you interact with you what you have coming down the pike uh I can't thank you enough thanks so much floor is yours I'm still on Twitter at Pat's cap I actually do have a threads account at Pat's cap um don't you haven't haven't posted anything on threads as I found it um on unusables so i'm actually gonna not probably post on threads until they put a desktop app i personally like um using twitter on my pc um rather than my phone right um i just finally use it since i use

pictures a lot it's a lot easier to just grab the pictures and screenshots that way I'll be there I'm expecting the Patriots I continue to say this The sign, the two first draw effects And then we'll see what happens And I'll just say this, folks Patriots will be going to start training camp next week

They'll put a couple players on PUP They'll put a couple players on on PUP, they'll put a couple of players on non-football list, entry list. Okay. I wouldn't worry. As long as they're on the active PUP and active NFI, don't worry about it. They have until the roster cut down to come off the active list, active PUP and active NFI.

So I would not worry about it. I do expect the Patriots to sign the fill of those two roster spots, and we'll see who they are. If we had done the show last week, my guess would have been a wide out and an offensive tackle. So, of course, they're looking at money backs. And two pretty good ones as well. Yeah, exactly.

No one can predict the New England Patriots, but there is definitely a need there, especially with James Robinson now not a member of the New England Patriots. You have to think that receiving back is something that the New England Patriots are going to be looking at. But bottom line, my friend, I'm looking forward to seeing you at training camp. At some point throughout the entire schedule, we'll definitely have the opportunity to cross paths. It's always one of my favorite things per year. But folks, definitely

stay tuned to what the Pats cap has to offer. Anything related to Foxborough Finance, this man is on it almost immediately, and he's never wrong, folks. And that's the one thing that I can always tell you. He is as good a person away from the microphone, away from the Twitterverse, and away from the spreadsheets as he is on them. So it is my honor, my privilege, to share the microphone with you. Thanks so much, Miguel, for joining me today.

But I want to thank all of you for taking time out of your busy schedule to join me here on Locked On Patriots each and every day. And tomorrow here on the pod, we continue our positional previews. Do not want to miss the most show folks of download, subscribe to follow wherever you get your podcasts.

In the meantime, on behalf of my good friend, the Pats cap himself, the Pharaoh of Foxborough finance, Miguel Benz on I'm Mike debate, reminding you to stay safe and to stay well and to be the change that you wish to see in the world. Have a great day, everyone.

We'll see you again back here tomorrow on Locked on Patriots.