Thank you, Chris Schad. I’ve been thinking the same thing. Move Will Campbell to guard. He seems too small for tackle, as shown last evening in the Pats’ semi-blowout loss to Seattle. … How bad was Will? From Nick Goss at NBC Boston: “He allowed 14 pressures in the Super Bowl, per Next Gen Stats, which is the most by any offensive lineman in a game this season.” That’s any lineman in all NFL regular season and playoff games. … So Drake had an injection for his shoulder before the game. But a HB reader writes: “Forget the shoulder. Maye had to run for his life because his team couldn’t protect him. It was hard to watch.” At the Globe, Dan Shaughnessey agrees. But … I respectfully disagree. Drake’s performance throughout the playoffs wasn’t overly impressive. So this rang true to yours truly this morning, via CBS Sports: “Drake Maye’s superstar rise hits speed bump.” … Carlton Davis is still confident – and has a hunch the Pats will be back next year, as the Herald reports. I’m not as confident. But they’re already running 2026-2027 power rankings over at ESPN. And guess what? The Pats remain at No. 2. … And, finally, there’s always the NYT. The screenshot below is from its website an hour or so ago. Three of five highlighted Super Bowl stories are on Bad Bunny. Well, I guess they know their readers!

Update — 2.10.26 — From Karen Guregian at MassLive: “Solving the Will Campbell conundrum top priority for Patriots.” … And the Globe’s Joan Vennochi has her own post-Super Bowl thoughts, including her reaction to Bad Donny’s typically obnoxious reaction to Bad Bunny.

So Pete Hegseth has announced that the Department of Defense is severing academic ties with Harvard University, ending all military education, fellowships and certificate programs because its officers are returning from university-sponsored classes as brainwashed woke zombies. … What a small, ignorant man. … Well, at least he acknowledges the U.S. Army’s historic ties to the university, like how the U.S. Army literally got its start at Harvard back in the day. … Ah, right-wing political correctness. Don’t you just love how the right mimics the left while criticizing the left? In this case, Hegseth is not only canceling Harvard. He’s creating reverse safe zones for the easily triggered on the right.

Update — 2.10.26 — At The Atlantic, Tom Nichols writes that he actually helped design and teach some of the Harvard courses that military personnel took — and that our dense DOD secretary is trying to kill off:

“After many discussions, we approached Harvard, and the result was new course offerings on the Cold War, nuclear weapons, arms control, and deterrence. Harvard grouped these courses into a Nuclear Deterrence Graduate Certificate. I was proud to teach in this program. … No one was trying to indoctrinate students with Marxism or globalism. … We did not spend our time on ‘woke’ terms and concepts, unless such things as ‘circular error probable,’ ‘post-boost vehicles,’ and ‘blast overpressure’ count as woke. “

As mentioned above, right-wing political correctness is literally trumping national security.

— Well, this certainly changes the narrative about why he retired: “Newly released court records reveal misconduct inquiry into federal judge” (GBH)

— Has the office market gotten this bad? “BXP Seeks Housing at Waltham Office Parks” (B&T)

— It’s not a lot but it’s still encouraging. Every little bit helps: “Healey Says 1.2K ADUs Permitted in Law’s First Year” (B&T)

— Jill Abramson nails it: “Don Lemon’s arrest was wrong, but his reporting raises questions” (Globe)

— Sounds a little too esoteric for most employers’ hiring tastes: “Monster.com founder is back, launching a new job-board company” (BBJ)

— This is disturbing to all those rooting for a strong U.S. manufacturing base: “I Test Drove a Chinese EV. Now I Don’t Want to Buy American Cars Anymore” (WSJ)

— Basically, they’re making pot entrepreneurs offers they can’t refuse: “Why the black market is beating legal weed trade” (Washington Post)

— Competition is always good, but what we really need is more quality mid-market supermarkets: “Upscale grocer Sprouts get green light for debut New England location” (BBJ)

— Answer: no. But their glory years are over: “The Army Just Unveiled its Latest Tank. Will It Be the last?” (NYT)

— Another story for all you military-history buffs: “A Wargame Shows Just How Vulnerable Europe Is to a Russian Attack” (WSJ)

OK, a lot of people are down on the Massachusetts economy these days – and, to an extent, rightly so, as high prices here drive away both workers and companies. But the state is still producing some incredibly innovative companies, such as VulcanForms, which touts itself as “the first fully-integrated digital metal manufacturing platform in the U.S.” The MIT-born firm recently raised $220 million in funding and plans to add yet another factory and more than 100 jobs in Devens, as the BBJ reports. … Manufacturing? In a post-industrial state that can’t even hang onto a potato-chip factory? Yep. … 

By the way, Commonwealth Fusion Systems — yet another cool local company with a big Devens presence – is also looking to add 100 workers in Massachusetts, as the Worcester Business Journal reports.

Are you paying attention, Maura Healey campaign staffers? There’s actually some good non-Trump angles out there to exploit.

Here’s something shocking: Congress has actually defied the president by passing a bill that increases funding for the National Institutes of Health and rejects proposed billions of dollars in cuts to research overhead costs. The Globe has more. … Obviously, future funding is still up in the air as long as the current band of neo-Luddites occupy the White House. But local scientists, who are among the largest recipients of NIH dollars in the U.S.,  are at least “breathing sighs of relief now that federal funding levels have largely returned to the status quo after months of turmoil,” the Globe reports.

Ah, but then there’s Cambridge-based Moderna, which recently announced it’s curbing investments in late-stage vaccine trials largely due the anti-vax policies of President Trump and RFK Jr. et gang. The Washington Post isn’t mincing words for a change: “Moderna’s chilling announcement is a symptom of a deeper sickness.”

Update — 2.6.26 – Two steps back? From the Globe: “Mass. lawmakers seek answers after apparent effort from Trump administration to wind down Cambridge research hub.”

You have to read this Herald story to believe it. It starts off describing how Stefon Diggs always seem to take a No. 2 bathroom break before, during or after Pats’ team meetings. “Diggs is extremely regular, something you wouldn’t know unless you’re a regular inside Vrabel’s team meetings,” writes the Herald. And it’s something we wouldn’t have known if we hadn’t read it in the Herald. … I’ve now seen it all. Literally pre-Super Bowl bullshit about bullshit.  … I was going to nominate this Globe story – about how Drake Maye likes pre-game peanut butter and jelly sandwiches – as the silliest scrape-the-bottom-of-the-barrel pre-Super Bowl coverage this week. But how can you possibly beat news about Stefon’s poopie breaks? I guess you could beat it if the Herald had reported on what Stefon reads or listens to while on the can. But I don’t think even the Herald would go that far. 

Distant silliest honorable-mention pre-Super Bowl story: Did you know that Super Bowl confetti is made right here in Massachusetts? It is! 

Update — 2.6.26. – A Hub Blog reader writes in, re ridiculous pre-Super Bowl coverage: “Don’t blame the poor reporters. (They’re) under constant pressure to produce something in the long two-week runup to the game.” … Good point. But still.

Thermo Fisher, Panera, Cape Cod Potato Chips, Zipcar. They’ve all recently announced job cuts and/or closing their headquarters in Massachusetts. And don’t forget all those people bolting the state for more affordable environs. So what does Gov. Maura Healey do? Hold a press conference about Trump’s immigration policies. The Globe’s Joan Vennochi has more. And so does, strangely, from a business-news standpoint, Howie Carr. 

Fyi: Re her ICE press conference last week, I should have made the obvious re-election connection, in addition to the obvious pandering-to-the-base connection. I didn’t. But Joan did.

Now this is a half-billion dollars well spent, as opposed to the corrupt half-billion dollars noted in the post immediately below. … Re the Pats’ half-billion, via the Journal:

“All told, the Patriots spent tens of millions firing a coaching staff and hiring a new one, doled out more than any other team in free agency and began construction on a new practice facility. And the scary part for the rest of the NFL is that this year’s success hardly looks like a blip. Belichick and Tom Brady are gone, but the conviction at Patriot Place is they are building for a new dynasty.”

Ah, dynastic music to our ears.

Btw: From a HB reader:

“(Re Mack Hollins piece at ESPN):  Reminiscent of the long gone long form stories that made ESPN The Magazine special. … I will avoid local news coverage of Drake Maye’s health boo-boos whilst acknowledging the reality that they have to write/talk about something. (But) I will not avoid analytics coverage from Barnwell and Aaron Schatz as long as we keep getting nuggets like this one. Not to get ahead of ourselves but I think two of the Patriot Super Bowl victories came against the teams on this list.”

They know it’s wrong. They know it’s corrupt. They know it’s far worse in scale than anything Hunter Biden ever did overseas. But you won’t hear a peep of protest about this among Trump supporters and Fox News watchers for obvious tribal/partisan  reasons. From the WSJ:

“Four days before Donald Trump’s inauguration last year, lieutenants to an Abu Dhabi royal secretly signed a deal with the Trump family to purchase a 49% stake in their fledgling cryptocurrency venture for half a billion dollars, according to company documents and people familiar with the matter. The buyers would pay half up front, steering $187 million to Trump family entities.

“The deal with World Liberty Financial, which hasn’t previously been reported, was signed by Eric Trump, the president’s son.”

Update — 2.5.26 –– Sen. Elizabeth Warren is calling for reversal of the controversial UAE chip sale following the Trump crypto deal.