Patriots roster moves this week

Watching the Patriots roster moves over the last week.  There have been a lot of players subject to multiple moves, such as being released and then brought back, or signed for a few days and then released.  It is clear the last few roster spots are intentionally kept open this week to allow flexibility to bring players in for tryouts or to claim them before another team does.  The table below can help visualize this process.  Players subject to more than one roster move are highlighted in red.

Why did Bill Bilichick cut Tim Tebow?

It is hard for Tebow fans to take an objective view of why the Patriots cut him.  Tim's future has become more of an emotional issue than a rational one for us.  To get through the noise, we must learn to see the decision from Bill Belichick's point of view.

Sprinting

Lately I have been sprinting a lot.  If you are an older athlete, you should be too.

Sprinting, and by sprinting I mean really hard running at 100% of your capacity for short distances, is a great exercise.  Sprinting is an explosive movement that demands max effort; you are generating every ounce of power you can for every step. Sprinting recruits the fast twitch muscle fibers you may not have used since high school sports.  As a maximal effort movement, it stimulates the production of natural hormones that build muscle and burn fat. Just take a look at how olympic sprinters are built.  They do a little weight lifting, but most of that is from sprinting.

In my opinion, sprinting is far superior to distance running for older athletes.  The biggest loss of physical capability due to age after 40 is loss of muscle mass.  Sprinting builds leg muscle, while distance running breaks it down.  Look at world class marathon runners: skinny legs, spindly calves.  Now look at world class sprinters:  legs like bullfrogs.  I rest my case.

All Hail the ruthless brilliance of Bill Belichick!

Bill Belichick is an open book.  He will do whatever is in the best interest of his team, without regard to sentiment or appearance.  That's why he is one of the great coaches of his generation and will probably make the NFL Hall of Fame one day.  When Belichick does something, you do not analyze his actions in the context of appearances, agendas, or narratives.  You interpret and predict Bill Belichick solely in terms of how his decisions may benefit the Patriots.

Yet when Tim Tebow was cut on Sunday, some in national sports media immediately interpreted that action in the lens of their own narrative, namely that Tebow stinks so bad he could never be an NFL QB.  According to them, not even Bill Belichick could fix Tebow, and the Patriots had closed the door on him for good.  The media leaped to the conclusion that Tebow might be done in the NFL forever.

Right away I had my suspicions that there might be more to the story.  There were just too many things that didn't add up.  Why would they bring him in for long term development, and then cut him loose before he had the chance to develop?  Why would they install a package of plays for him during training camp if they didn't think they would get return on the time invested?  It just did not make sense for the door to be permanently closed as the media narrative would have it.

Tebow may not be done in New England

All the media have assumed that Tebow getting cut means he is done forever in New England.  I'm not 100% convinced yet.  Possible evidence to the contrary:

1.  Tedy Bruschi said so:

"I could envision a scenario where he [Tebow] is initially cut and not on the 53-man roster, but he comes back at another point down the line. Maybe multiple times ..."