Week 6 Blog Post

PATRIOTS:

New England Patriots three time SuperBowl Champion Quarterback Tom Brady recently agreed to a three year contract extension which will essentially ensure that he will retire a Patriot. The contract extension runs through the 2017 season when Brady will turn 40 years old.  Amazingly, according to a source, the deal is for an eye-poppingly conservative $27 million, which is less than half his worth by any measure.  The extension will pay Brady a $3 million signing bonus immediately, in addition to salaries of $7 million in 2015, $8 million in 2016 and $9 million in 2017.  A real bargain if you look at the current salaries for NFL Quarterbacks, never mind a perennial All Pro like Brady. Brady appears to be signing this deal to help out the Patriots with salary cap relief to hopefully ensure that they remain competitive and in the hunt for the Championship for as long as he is with the team.  Before you feel sorry for Brady just know that he will receive 30 million dollars as a "signing bonus" which is money that does not count against the salary cap. I think he will be able to survive on that salary. If not he has a rich wife so I think they will be just fine.

CELTICS:

The trade deadline has come and gone and the Celtics still have Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce on their roster.  My previous blog discussed the potential deals that were being tossed around regarding the trades of Garnett and Pierce.  Apparently the Celtic's GM Danny Ainge ( a former player for the Celtics) decided to give it one last go with this Celtic's team.  The lack of a move did surprise me because the Celtic's have been decimated with season ending injuries to Rondo, Sullinger and Barbosa and they do not appear to have the depth that they once had to make a serious run at a NBA Championship.  I thought this was the perfect time to make those trades discussed previously, to get younger and more athletic in the hopes that this team could once again be rebuilt into a contender.  Obviously Ainge knows more about basketball then I will ever know so I will trust that he has a plan not only for this year but for the years to come as well.


BRUINS:

The Boston Bruins are riding a four game win streak into the TD Garden tonight when they return home to face the Ottawa Senators.  The Bruins currently are in second place in the Eastern Conference with 26 points just 3 points behind Montreal who have played four more games. But
after playing their first 16 games over 40 days, the Bruins will now face an end of February-March stretch in which they will play 18 games over 33 days, and a total of 32 games over the final 58 days of the regular season. For a team that has played back-to-back games only one time this season. That is in dramatic contrast to the rest of their conference opponents.  So the second half of this shortened season will be the true test of whether or not this team has what it takes to win another championship