FOXBOROUGH - A day after throwing a very public and what appeared to be a very passionate on-field tantrum, Matthew Judon was not seen at Patriots training camp Tuesday. There's a good reason for that. Judon was not at the facility this morning — it remains unclear if he was told to stay away or if he did this by choice. Regardless, he could face disciplinary action from the team for his behavior on Monday.
At the heart of the matter is Judon's contract. He's scheduled to make just $6.5 million this year and another $1 million in per-game roster bonuses (per Spotrac). The soon-to-be 32-year-old edge rusher has been openly campaigning for a new deal, but as I reported yesterday, the two sides aren't remotely close to agreeing on a price. My understanding is that the gap between Judon and the Pats has made conversations almost null and void, which helped trigger some of the frustration we saw on the field Monday between the player and both head coach Jerod Mayo and later GM Eliot Wolf. That doesn't make it right, not in that setting, but what's done in done.
This situation now becomes an early inflection point for the new brain trust. Does management continue to hold the line with a player who is arguably their best, knowing he is capable of what we witnessed? Per league sources, there hasn't been significant interest in Judon, but perhaps this public show of discontent gets the vultures circling their wounded potential prey? Or does Wolf go back to Judon and his agent and come to a compromise to get him back in the fold? Talk about a precedent-setter...
Wolf stood mostly silent when Judon returned to the field Monday to converse about what was on his mind. Silence is not golden in this instance. His inability to find common ground with Judon led to this flare-up, putting his first-year head coach in a difficult spot. We won't hear from Mayo again until later in the week (the team is off Wednesday after three straight on-field days, as mandated by the CBA). He will be asked questions he'd rather not have to answer about the incident. But that bleep show has put him in an unenviable position, and how he responds - ditto for Wolf - will be a moment we'll all look back on at some point and say, "Nailed it" or "Screwed it up." No biggie...
STILL GOT IT?
JuJu Smith-Schuster stood about four feet to my left, pants soaked from the sweat of over two hours in full pads on the practice field. Reporters were dancing around the veteran's status, how he was feeling physically, the competition at wide receiver, etc. The standard fare. Now, maybe it was the heat, or the lack of sleep, or my overall disposition, but I decided to cut through all the filler and ask the veteran pass catcher if he's still the same 1,000-yard receiver (2018) or near 1,000-yard receiver (2022) Bill Belichick was hoping he signed two off-seasons ago.
"Oh, most definitely, he smiled. "It's always in me - that dog, that competitiveness. I've been in a lot of situations, tough situations - where, you know, making those hard catches and being able to convert and move to sticks. (That's) something I've taken great pride in, so yeah, for sure. I got that dog in me. For sure."
Despite having a healthy salary guarantee for this season, Smith-Schuster is far from a lock. In fact, over the weekend, I wondered why he was still here. He wasn't creating any separation and had zero burst when the ball was in the air. To his credit, the 27-year-old showed a little juice in those stems Tuesday, including a low red zone rep where he deftly avoided a jam and scored off play action, with rookie Joe Milton hitting him in stride (Milton turned as soon as he threw the ball, raising his finger in the air a la Larry Bird back in the day).
The problem remains the lack of consistent separation and, surprisingly, some difficulties catching the football. Jacoby Brissett had Ja'Lynn Polk downfield during one team period but opted to drift in the pocket. He saw Smith-Schuster open about 15 yards down the field and tried to push the receiver further away from trouble, throwing more toward the sideline (JuJu was near the hash). It should have been an easy completion and a nice gain. Instead, Smith-Schuster's feet seemed stuck in neutral for a beat too long, and - forced to extend his hands as far away from his body as he could - the ball clanged off his hands, a missed opportunity. One of the more spry young receivers gets that, assuming they could read their QB's cues.
"When the opportunity comes, you've got to make the best of it," said Smith-Schuster of the couple plays he did make. But after a 29-catch campaign last season, he doesn't have this treasure trove of goodwill built up within the organization. That, along with questions about how much gas he has left in the tank, has shown how he's being used this summer. He's seeing reps behind K.J. Osborn, behind Pop Douglas (he finally got to participate in 7-on-7s today), and even getting equal looks with Kayshon Boutte (more outside than inside).
"I feel like every training camp, I have something to prove," he said. "I think that's part of my nature, part of my game. You know, the older I get, the younger the guys get."
And right now, it's been hard for Smith-Schuster to keep up.