Robert Kraft addresses "misconception" that Patriots don't spend money on players
BOSTON -- For the past several years, the Patriots have been one of the lowest cash-spending teams in the NFL. Bill Belichick made sure to let us know that information after the 2022 season.
Team owner Robert Kraft, however, doesn't want the fact that the Patriots haven't spent to suggest that the team won't spend when it comes to paying players to make the New England competitive again.
"I know there's a perception that we have held back on spending. Let me just say, for our fans, that's just not true," Kraft told reporters in Las Vegas on Thursday, according to The Boston Globe, The Athletic and NBC Sports Boston. "Look, we were blessed to have a coach in our system who was a great coach and also understood value. He ran a tight ship. They say we've been low spenders in the last 10 years, and that might be true, but we had a pretty good record. We won three Super Bowls. But we never held back with any of the coaches we've had over the last 30 years. They've been able to get whatever they want."
Kraft added: "I can assure our fans that spending will never be held back or the reason that we don't sign players. Winning football games, after my family, is the most important thing in my life. Whatever we can do to help make that happen, we're going to do. I'm sorry this misconception has been out there."
Notably, Kraft's conversation with reporters was off the record. Though on this particular topic, he opted to deliver on-the-record quotes to speak directly to the fan base.
"I think Bill was always thinking about the future and really understood value," Kraft said of Belichick's roster-building philosophies. "But we never held back with any of the coaches we've had over the last 30 years. They've been able to get whatever they want. If cash spending became an issue for our family, and we couldn't do it, then I would sell the team."
Clearly, some rumblings from fans and media critics have reached Kraft. And during this period of major transition from Belichick to Jerod Mayo as head coach and from Belichick to Eliot Wolf as de facto general manager, uncertainty is sure to infiltrate the region during these eight months without any games to be played.
Yet ultimately, the success of this new phase of Patriots football will be determined not by how much the Patriots spend in free agency but by how the Patriots spend in free agency. The spending spree of 2021 produced some significant hits (Matthew Judon, Hunter Henry, Kendrick Bourne) but also some major misses (Jonnu Smith, Nelson Agholor). This time around, the front office will have to hope for a higher hit rate in free agency ... before nailing the most important draft the franchise has had in decades.
It won't be easy, obviously. But according to Kraft himself, a willingness to spend money will not get in the way of the Patriots in their quest to get back to the top of the NFL mountain.
