The strange and terrible saga of the Fixer

Stunning.  Incomprehensible.  Angering.

Patriots’ nation is in collective shock this evening over the departure of Wes Welker, but they really shouldn’t be – the impetus for this event was conceived 9 months ago.

The gestational period is over.  Wes Welker is gone.

Jan 20, 2013; Foxboro, MA, USA; New England Patriots wide receiver Wes Welker (83) carries the ball after a catch against the Baltimore Ravens in the second quarter of the AFC championship game at Gillette Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Stew Milne-USA TODAY Sports

But it’s not a surprise, not stunning…it’s what was supposed to happen last season, but Patriots coach Bill Belichick wasn’t going to implement his grand scheme without a backup plan, and that backup plan was a franchised Wes Welker.

Bill Belichick used someone for his own ends?  Belichick?

Lawd, have mercy…

Last summer, The Patriots gave their two-headed tight end monster shiny new contracts which, in their own way, were NFL records for the position.  Why?  Simply because Belichick was planning on building the offense around Aaron Hernandez and Rob Gronkowski…

…especially Hernandez, whose unique hybrid skill set was set to make him the Patriots’ X-factor – in the slot, lined up out wide, in the backfield or as an in-line traditional tight end, fluidly doing all extremely well.

Gronkowski presented another intriguing skill set.  More of the traditional tight end in that his blocking skills, particularly on the wham block, are on a level reserved for the finest run blocking tackles – and a combination of size, speed and freakish athletic ability makes him nearly impossible to cover and a huge safety blanket for Tom Brady underneath.

Add those two together with Visanthe Shaincoe on the non-season ending IR and the Patriots had the perfect plan.  Newly signed Brandon Lloyd was to play outside of the numbers, taking a corner out of the play horizontally, far away from Gronk up the seam, making the safeties and linebackers have to cover what were essentially very large wide receivers.

The 13 personnel package was to be featured, with Gronk, Hernandez, Lloyd and Michael Hoomanawanui up on the line with a stable of young greyhounds to plug and play as running backs, with Shiancoe coming off the IR for the stretch run as insurance in case the ranks suffered another injury, like Gronk’s ankle injury that contributed mightily to the Super Bowl loss to the Giants.

The idea was – and is – to isolate Hernandez on the best possible mismatch.  Utilizing the 13 Personnel as a base package and switching back and forth between up-tempo and standard play calling, Brady could scan the defense, the up-tempo designed to keep them in their stances for long periods of time while Brady looked for clues to tip him off if something funky was about to go down…

…and at the same time using audibles to move the offense around to whatever formation would take advantage of the best mismatches – and the beauty of it was that if the defense by some miracle had the proper players on the field to match up with the audible, there was still plenty of time to do a little last second shifting.

Welker found himself to be the odd man out despite his huge franchise tag salary, with Julian Edelman taking his snaps, meager as they were, in the 1st game of the year – and in reality Welker was only on the team as an option to fall back on in case something went wrong.  If things were going well, the Patriots may or may not have moved Welker at the trade deadline…

…and something did go wrong.  Hernandez suffered a severe ankle sprain in the second game of the season that kept him out or hampered his performance for half of the season – and just when he came back, Gronkowski suffered the broken forearm.  Shiancoe turned out to be a bust and was released,  Kellen Winslow Jr. was signed, then cut after the first game – and the entire time that all of this was going on, the Patriots reverted back to their offense from the previous year with Welker at the point.

It took a few games, but once the offense started clicking in the 4th quarter of the overtime game against the Jets at Gilliette, it was pure smooth hell.

Belichick was using Welker as an insurance policy, which turned out to be a shrewd investment as Welker posted typically productive numbers.  As the team did last off season, they again offered Welker a contract…but this year’s numbers were far below what he was offered last season and Welker and his agent felt humiliated and insulted by the Patriots offer.

So Welker and his agent went to the Broncos, whom had obviously shown some interest, Welker armed with the Patriots’ puny contract of 2 years, $10 million and said beat this and I’m yours – and they beat it, alright…

…By a number that should have made them feel even more humiliated, because not even the Broncos, who have seen up close and personal what Welker can do on a football field many times, were willing to pay him what Welker’s agent thought the market was going to bear.  And with Welker being the preeminent slot receiver in all of professional football with six years of having one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time throwing him the rock, Bill Belichick is the authority on what slot receivers are worth.

Two years, ten million dollars.

Which is crap, of course, but it goes far beyond that.  In one transaction Bill Belichick has set the price for the receivers that he wants, working the greed factor to manipulate Welker’s agent.  It’s called price fixing, and apparently Belichick is a master at it.

Price fixing: Establishing the price of a product or service, rather than allowing it to be  determined naturally through free-market forces.

Antitrust legislation makes it illegal for businesses to decide to fix their prices under specific circumstances – so fortunately, setting the price for slot receivers in free agency isn’t covered so stringently, and usually the only way that price fixing breaks down is because of the power of large  buyers to negotiate the price they are willing to pay.

In the NFL that means teams with lots of cap space overpaying for free agents.

Belichick dragged the process out for 24 hours, thinking all of the suckers would be weeded out before low-balling Welker.  By then Welker and his agent had no choice.  It was either take the Broncos two year 12 million dollar offer, wait to see if another team came forward with bigger money or go crawling back to the Patriots, who already had Danny Amendola in town taking a physical.

Welker really had no choice, sad as it is.  After all of the great performances, jarring hits and spectacular touchdowns, Welker’s decision last off season to listen to his agent and play hard ball with the Patriots ended up costing him millions – had he signed New England’s 2 year $16 million offer last summer, and after the season that he put together, he would have been in line for an extension that would have taken care of him for the rest of his career while being cap friendly for the team.

But now he’s going to a new team, catching balls thrown by Peyton Manning for essentially half of what he earned last season and a fraction of what he could have earned by signing his contract last summer.

So Wes is gone, and the market that Bill set the price for – which affords a little wiggle room – brings in Amendola with a five year, $32 million dollar deal.

But, you may be asking, if the Patriots are going to a tight end-centric offense and Welker was the odd man out last season, why bring in a guy that is widely considered to be a Welker clone?

Why Danny Amendola?  Why indeed..

Tomorrow, Part 2 of this shameful saga – what the Welker and Amendola deals mean to other receivers in free agency.