Mayo’s cap hits for the next three years: 2015 – $10.6 million, 2016 – $10.4 million, 2017 – $9.5 million.
We all know Mayo is a coach and team favorite, at least off the field. As for on the field, I’ve been fairly critical of Mayo for a while now. I can remember tailgating with Erik Frenz in 2011 when we got to talking about him and how we kind of agreed that being a “tackling machine” isn’t really a great thing.
I don’t question Mayo’s smarts or speed, but I don’t think he has the kind of savvy in pass coverage that we’ve seen even out of the slower Dont’a Hightower, or that we saw out of the smaller and slower Tedy Bruschi.
Not to pin the blame on him but the defenses under Mayo’s leadership haven’t been very good.
And has anyone felt “if only we had Mayo” the last two years he’s been out? Not really. They’ve been fine with Hightower being the captain, if not better.
I tend to think the Pats will approach him about restructuring, because this year has proven that keeping McCourty and Revis is more important to the defense than Mayo.
You never know for sure, because everyone, including BB, seem to love him, but that doesn’t often count for much. It will be an interesting storyline to watch this offseason.