Belichick calls Malcolm Mitchell commercial rumors "media speculation"

FOXBORO – Malcolm Mitchell made a big effort in the final year of play.

After serving as a key in his team's victory on the return of the Super Bowl LI against the Falcons as a rookie, Mitchell treated the knee problems that limited her in the training camp of last year. He played only in the second pre-season game of the team against the Texans, but in this game he worsened his knee and was absent for the rest of the pre-season schedule.

He injured the reserve the night of the opening of the season. He had the opportunity to come back from the IR and trained with the team late in the season. Despite his progress, he was never activated

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Now, during the past week, reports have shown that: a) he had recently undergone surgery on his knee; he was bought from potential contenders via the trade.

Mitchell has not been moved yet. He was not released. He is still with the club on the first day of the training camp on the eve of his first training. And when asked on Wednesday when he was planning to move on to the third year, Bill Belichick made fun of him.

"I will not indulge in media speculation unless I have professional comments." Belichick said. "I certainly did not talk about Malcolm Mitchell to a mediator, but he would have to talk to anyone."

Belichick said that he could not exactly determine Mitchell's status in the training sessions at the camp. He continues to evaluate, he explained.

"This is part of the state of our early days of training camp," he said. "Physics, conditioning race and so on, really for all players." "Some of the players who have not had injuries or setbacks or who have not been treated, we know somehow where these guys are, but we have a number of players who are in various degrees of availability, or different stages of rehabilitation and preparation for the season.These guys have not been away from us for a month, but they have been treated.They have not been active on As we enter these exercises and periods, we will know more.

"We will place some players on the PUP / NFL lists, when they are ready, they will disappear. not to say that they are fully available, it means that they are not on these lists for one reason or another, and that we will do certain things with them based on their physical availability.

"Now, it's like that at this time of the year . There are many guys in different stages of post-season surgeries, off-season injuries and so on. Just need to see where everyone is. The first days of practice are not padded. The first training session is Saturday, so we are at two different stages of TC here. We will just have to see how it all goes.

"This is no different from what it is normally, call it 10-15 players falling somewhere in this net of conversation."

MORE PATRIOTS [19659005] Belichick was asked to characterize Mitchell's effort in returning from an injury. The reason commercial speculation was somewhat surprising is that the Patriots could, in theory, keep Mitchell on the physical plane, unable to play in the camp and rest for as long as necessary before another attempt to return [19659002] Pelissero tweeted this week that there was " growing frustration " coming from the Patriots with regards to Mitchell's health. This can be the case. The team would certainly have the right to be frustrated that a good player could not have contributed for them. But Belichick gave no indication that the team was frustrated with Mitchell's job to return to the field.