DANNY PICARD: I did not expect to be talking about the Patriots trying to trade for Brandin Cooks. Have you heard anything on this interest that the Patriots reportedly have interest in trying to acquire New Orleans Saints wide receiver Brandin Cooks?
MIKE GIARDI: That’s not something that would surprise me at all. You look at the report from earlier this offseason that the Patriots had offered Jamie Collins — when they were shopping Collins around — to the Texans for DeAndre Hopkins. They look at the age of their wide receiver corp. And then when you look at Cooks, he’s a guy that Bill Belichick has seen up close and personal a couple years now in the summertime with the joint practices, both in West Virginia and here in Foxboro. And he raves about the guy. He says, “I’m glad we don’t have to play him two times a year like some of these other teams do.” So, I think it’s definitely one of those situations, where, it doesn’t surprise me. It doesn’t surprise me that they’d be one of those teams that would be inquiring about Cooks.
DP: If I’m the Patriots, I would be interested in Cooks too. I guess where the surprise comes for me, is that it does seem like New Orleans is willing to move Cooks. And I look at his contract, and they have him under control I think for two more years. He’s 23 years old. Why would the Saints even be listening?
MG: For starters, they have two other quality receivers down there that they like. And Cooks is a little bit of a — he’s one of those No. 1 receiver types that can be difficult to handle at times. He’s complained about his role a little bit. And he’s complained about the number of touches that he’s had. So you kind of add all that up together, and they need help elsewhere on that team. They need some help defensively. They probably look at Cooks as a guy who has some value out there, and they’ll see if they can get what they want for him. And if they can, they don’t feel like they’re in a situation where their offense is going to suffer all that much, even though he is a very talented receiver.
DP: Now I’m thinking crazy. Because I see this Cooks report, and I start thinking about Adam Schefter’s report that Jimmy Garoppolo won’t be traded. How are you piecing all of these rumors together?
MG: My intel on Garoppolo and the Patriots remains the same. And I’m not casting shade on Adam Schefter, because there is nobody more plugged into the league than he is. But he’s also the same guy, when it came to Garoppolo, who reported on the Monday after his injury against the Dolphins that he had a chance or he was being told he had a chance to play that Thursday night against the Texans. And that was never going to happen. I wonder sometimes about when you’re trading information in this league, and you’re taking people’s word; sometimes you can get burned. So he’s not without, I think, having been used by the Patriots and having that happen to him. And with this, I don’t think they’ve received the offer that they’ve wanted yet. So therefore, they’re going to make it sound like, “Well we don’t have any intention of trading him.” I think that’s just more or less, “Look, what you guys have thrown our way doesn’t even come close to what we’re asking for, and until you want to meet that price, we want everyone to know that we are more than content to keep this guy on the roster and on the team.” And what the hell, you control him for the year anyway, and you can control him for two more years, if you want to. I know the franchise tag is a significant amount of money following next year, but, it’s not unfair, and it’s not unfair to think that way, because they did it once before with Matt Cassel, albeit a little different situation because Brady had the post-knee infection and all that. But you’re looking at a quarterback who’s going to be 40 years old, come training camp. And that’s not bad insurance to have. So I don’t have a problem with them putting the report out there and kind of feeding it. But I still think they’re just letting everybody know, “What you’ve thrown at us so far doesn’t mean crap.”
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