FOXBOROUGH - About halfway through his first press availability since suffering an ‘injury’ at the end of practice two weeks ago, Christian Gonzalez had to stop in the middle of an answer as Robert Kraft’s helicopter glided down from the blue sky to make a landing at the helipad between the lower and upper practice fields.
In that moment, it was hard not to be struck by the inanity/absurdity of it all. A billionaire owner (many times over) at a standstill with his millionaire cornerback over a new contract, one that threatens to chip away at the strong foundation Mike Vrabel, his coaching staff, and that locker room established a year ago. And make no mistake about it, any rumblings that a deal was close to being done should be flushed from whence they came.
For the first time this summer, Gonzalez admitted to being “frustrated” that he remains without an extension, now 11 days since friend/Seahawk Devon Witherspoon got his record-setting deal in Seattle.
Earlier in the day, Eliot Wolf reiterated Kraft's statement at the start of training camp that the team was offering Gonzalez a contract that would make him the highest-paid cornerback in football, adding, “I'm confident that we're continuing to work on it, and we're positive that we're making momentum.”
Safe to say, the fourth-year pro doesn’t agree.
“I mean, there's certain things that go into a contract that, you know, my team knows what we want,” Gonzalez said of that contractual claim. “So it kind of depends how you put it.”
In other words, the way the Patriots have presented their idea of highest-paid does not jibe with