The New England Patriots have a slew of tough decisions to make during free agency this offseason.
Tom Brady, Kyle Van Noy and Devin McCourty sit very high up on that list. One player who isn’t much of a household name outside of New England that deserves to be recognized also is Matthew Slater. He’s been the special teams glue for 12 seasons, holding a monumental role in the locker room and culture.
Slater, 34, has no intentions of retiring and he wants to remain a Patriot for entirety of his career.
“I definitely feel like my family and I thought about it a lot,” he said. “I still love to play and want to continue to play. I guess as of now, I want to keep playing. We just have to see how things go from here. There are a lot of things up in the air that I don’t know, but I’m going to approach it as though I’m preparing to play next year. We’ll kind of go from there. That’s where we’re at.”
I think I’ve expressed several times my desire to play the entirety of my career (in New England). When you play 12 years in one location, it’s hard for you to imagine playing anywhere else. I’ve certainly expressed that publicly. I’ve expressed that privately. But again, ultimately, sometimes that decision isn’t always in your hands. We’ll see how things go moving forward.”
He’s put together a Hall of Fame resume with the Patriots — tallying three Super Bowl wins, eight Pro Bowls and five First-Team All-Pro honors. He didn’t show any signs of slowing down in the 2019 season and his positive attitude helped provide perspective for his teammates. He’s the glue in the locker room and the Patriots would lose out on a foundational piece without him.
So, how would his contract situation work? Slater could’ve left New England in the past to chase a larger paycheck, but he stuck around — making less than $20 million in his career. While speaking about his future, he didn’t mention a desire for a big-time salary going forward.
Slater simply wants to finish his career out in New England and it’s very possible he’d take a team-friendly deal to stay around. The Patriots signed Pro Bowl special teamer Justin Bethel, 29, to a two-year deal that’s worth around $2.5 million. This could be the one complication, if they feel Bethel could replace Slater’s production — with youth on his side.
The Patriots have many tough decisions to make this offseason, but retaining Slater shouldn’t be one of them — he’s worth the effort to negotiate and move some cap space around.
[vertical-gallery id=80305]