After a season during which, at times, it appeared that receiver Randy Moss wasn’t interested in being a member of the Patriots any longer, Moss said Saturday that he thinks 2010 will be his last season with the team.
Reading between the lines, we think Moss is hoping that 2010 will end up being his first season with a new franchise.
Moss spoke candidly regarding his situation to reporters at a charity softball game in Florida organized by former New England teammate Heath Evans.
‘I don’t think they going to extend my contract here,” Moss said, per Christopher L. Gasper of the Boston Globe. “I understand the beast, the nature of it. I think that just with what I think and what I know I don’t think they’re going to re-sign me back. So, after this season if there is not a lockout I’ll be looking for a new team. I got a lot of respect for the Patriots and what they did for me and my family. So, the only thing I can do is just play this year out and see what my future holds after that. "
It’s not surprising, but it’s still jarring to see the words. And it makes us wonder whether Moss is speaking out now in the hopes that the Patriots will decide to divert his $6.4 million base salary to defensive tackle Vince Wilfork and cut Moss loose now.
Actually, we don’t need to wonder it. Moss essentially said it.
“You know the Patriots don’t really pay, so when I got my second contract from them that was a blessing in disguise. I understand the business. I don’t think they’re going to re-sign me back. I’m not mad. I’m not bitter. It’s just the way things are in this NFL, so like I said after this year I’ll be looking for a new team. I think so. . . .
“That’s not a knock on them. That’s just how they run their organization,” Moss added. “That’s how it is. Put it like this, I guess that before I came there the philosophy was believing in their system. I think that’s where they really don’t pay guys because they have so much faith in their system. I didn’t mean it as a knock against the organization. They just don’t pay. If as an individual I’m not really in their future plans I would like to go elsewhere.”
There it is. “If as an individual I’m not really in their future plans I would like to go elsewhere.”
Though Moss was still careful to say he plans to play for the Pats in 2010, why would he want to be there if he thinks that he won’t be there beyond the coming season? The genius of his comments could be that he’s making it known now that, once he enters his lame duck year, he’s going to play like a limping dog.
So where might “elsewhere” be? Feel free to call us crazy, but we continue to believe he wants to take care of his unfinished business in Minnesota, where he’d finally hook up with Brett Favre.
And what better way to get Favre to commit early to the 2010 season than to bring to town the guy for whom Favre pined before Brett’s final season as a Packer?
So don’t be shocked if the Pats decide that they don’t want Moss around this year if he’s going to have a stick buried in his butt, and don’t be surprised if he trades in his 81 for the 84 he made famous a dozen year ago.