FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Houston Antwine, one of the Patriots’ top defensive players in their early years, and his wife, Evelyn, have died, the team said Tuesday.

Antwine, 72, died Monday in Memphis, Tenn., of heart failure, and his wife died Tuesday of lung cancer, the team said.

A member of the Patriots’ 50th Anniversary Team, Antwine played from 1961-71 with the franchise before spending the 1972 season with the Philadelphia Eagles. In 142 regular-season games for the Patriots, he had 39 sacks, leading the team in that category during the 1967, 1968, and 1969 seasons, although sacks were not an official statistic then.

“For those of us who grew up watching the Boston Patriots, this is a really sad day,” Patriots owner Robert Kraft said. “In the 1960s, the defensive tackle tandem of ‘Twine’ and Jim Lee Hunt were as good as any in the league and helped propel the Patriots to the franchise’s first division championship in 1963.

“I loved hearing Houston’s stories about those early days in Boston. It was such a thrill for me, personally, to spend time with the players from that era.

“I am saddened to learn of the deaths of both Houston and Evelyn and want to express my deepest sympathies to the Antwine’s daughter, Regina, and all who mourn her losses. Let us all cherish life and remind loved ones how we feel about them daily.”

Antwine attended Southern Illinois, where he became a multiple sport athlete, a defensive tackle and an NAIA wrestling champion.

At 6-foot, 270 pounds, he was drafted by the Houston Oilers in the eighth round (64th overall) in 1961, then traded to the Patriots before ever playing a game for the Oilers. Antwine became a defensive catalyst for the Patriots, making the all-star team from 1963-1968.

In addition to making the Patriots 1960s All-Decade team, he was chosen to the all-time All-AFL team.

Services and burial information were not yet available.

What do you guys think about this.

Feel free to leave your comments below.

Read More: Logan Mankins (G – NEP), New England Patriots

Logan Mankins isn’t going anywhere for a long time. Mankins has reportedly signed a six-year deal to remain with the New England Patriots on Wednesday afternoon, according to a report from Adam Schefter of ESPN.

Earlier in the day, Patriots owner Robert Kraft had hinted that the team was close to resigning Mankins and that he hoped to have Mankins retire as a Patriot. This extension is not a foregone conclusion, as Mankins held out for half of the season last year, and at was ultimately not expected to resign with the team.

Mankins has played with the Patriots since he was drafted No. 32 overall in the 2005 NFL Draft.

For more New England Patriots coverage, visit our team page and blog, Pats Pulpit.

Running low on time today, i’ll be back tomorrow hopefully with some more news.

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. (AP)—The New England Patriots are honoring the memory of
Myra Kraft by wearing her initials on their uniforms during every game this
season.

The wife of Patriots owner Robert Kraft died July 20 after a battle with
cancer. She was 68.

The team announced Tuesday that to recognize Myra Kraft’s charitable efforts
a patch with the initials MHK will be placed on the upper left chest of its
uniforms starting with Thursday’s preseason opener against the Jacksonville
Jaguars.

She managed the Robert and Myra Kraft Family Foundation and was president of
the New England Patriots Charitable Foundation, which contributed millions of
dollars to area charities.

The organization will honor her with a moment of silence before the
regular-season home opener on Sept. 18 against the San Diego Chargers.

Feel free to leave your comments below.

APNFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith looks on at left as New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, second from right, is hugged by Jeff Saturday of the Indianapolis Colt during a news conference at the NFL Players Association in Washington, Monday, July 25, 2011, after the NFL Players Association executive board and 32 team reps voted unanimously Monday to approve the terms of a deal with owners to the end the 4½-month lockout. From left are, Smith, New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson, Kraft and Saturday.

Winners and losers are still to be determined.

But the lockout – at last – has a hero.

That would be Robert Kraft, the soft-spoken, silver-haired Patriots owner who fought back tears and nearly disappeared while wrapped up in that memorable hug from XXL-sized player rep Jeff Saturday.

“A special thanks to Myra Kraft, who even in her weakest moment allowed Mr. Kraft to come and fight this out,” Saturday, who plays for AFC rival Indianapolis, said moments earlier.

“Without him, this deal does not get done. .¤.¤. He’s a man who helped us save football.”

Kraft is hardly the only guy who deserves credit for ending our long National (Football League) nightmare. But there was a reason his was the name people on both sides of the labor divide kept coming back to while the TV cameras rolled. Kraft’s brief turn in front of the microphones had barely begun Monday when it became apparent why.

“I’d like to apologize to the fans, that for the last five, six months we’ve been talking about the business of football, not what goes on on the field,” he said.

From that thoughtful first note, what followed was mostly standard fare. Kraft said the league would flourish, current players would be better protected, and the retirees who built the league’s foundation would not be forgotten. He praised Commissioner Roger Goodell, players association chief DeMaurice Smith and player reps Domonique Foxworth and Saturday for not losing sight of “what was good for the game.” About the only contribution Kraft didn’t get around to mentioning was his own.

Last Friday, he buried Myra, his wife of 48 years, after a months-long battle with cancer. For much of that time, Kraft had been shuttling back and forth between her hospital bed and the bargaining table, largely because he was one of the few owners the players felt they could trust. There was good reason for that, too.

Kraft has riled fellow owners before, and more than a few guys who played – and still play – for his Patriots. He likes to win and makes few bones about it. That explains why he didn’t flinch when he forced Bill Parcells out of New England and handing over day-to-day control of the entire operation to his cold-hearted coach, Bill Belichick.

But it was also Kraft who stepped up and took responsibility when Belichick – remember Spygate? – got caught wanting to win by any means necessary. Though few people remember it now, he also relinquished the draft rights to Christian Peter, a fifth-round pick from Nebraska, in 1996 because of a checkered past involving violence against women. What even fewer people knew is that Kraft made the move because of Myra’s persistent intervention.

Yet nearly everyone involved in the talks knew something about his wife, and grew to understand what the Krafts meant to each other. That’s why so many of the bargaining sessions were held in the Northeast corridor – close to Kraft’s base in Boston – but also why Kraft’s presence at most of them strengthened the resolve on both sides to get a deal done.

It didn’t hurt, of course, that Kraft already had a reputation as one of the few owners willing to speak his mind. And his quip, “We need to get the lawyers out of the way,” probably did more to bring about a resumption of face-to-face talks between a select group of owners and players than all the threats of legal action. So it came as little surprise that Smith, the NFLPA’s executive director, felt it necessary to echo what Saturday had said only moments earlier.

“We couldn’t have done this,” he told Kraft, “without you.”

“Grace” is a term we throw around in sports with little more thought than some of the lazy spirals that will be arcing over practice fields in 32 towns when training camps open later this week. Remember that when footballs start filling up the air again.

Getting a labor agreement, considering how much Kraft, his fellow owners, his players and everybody else connected to the NFL will profit, hardly qualifies as an unselfish act. But make no mistake: at a time when he had much more important things tugging at his heart, just by showing up, Kraft taught everyone else sitting around the table that some sacrifices are worth making.

Not much else going on in the NFL world today.

Read More: Tom Brady (QB – NEP), Logan Mankins (G – NEP), New England Patriots

The NFL Lockout could be over in a matter of hours. Owners approved a new CBA by a vote of 31-0 (with the Oakland Raiders abstaining), meaning that it’s all up to the players association to approve, and then football will return.

For the New England Patriots, team president Jonathan Kraft was in attendance in place of his father and team owner Robert Kraft, who is morning the loss of his wife Myra Hiatt Kraft, who passed away at age 68 on Wednesday.

The Patriots owners and players have had a strong presence all throughout the lockout. The antitrust lawsuit filed by the players against the owners lists two Patriots players – Tom Brady and Logan Mankins – as plaintiffs.

Mankins was reportedly holding up a new deal early on Thursday, as reports surfaced citing that he had demanded $10 million or unrestricted free agency in order for him to sign off on the new CBA.

For more NFL Lockout coverage, visit SB Nation and follow our StoryStream.

That’s all the news for today.

Thanks for reading! .

Myra Hiatt Kraft, wife of New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, died Wednesday morning after a battle with cancer.

She was 68.

“Words cannot express the deep sorrow that we feel in learning of the passing of Myra Hiatt Kraft,” the Patriots said in a statement. “Myra passed away this morning after a courageous battle with cancer. We are all heartbroken. The global philanthropic community and the New England Patriots family have suffered a great loss.”

Kraft was known for her tireless devotion to philanthropic work. She was chair of or served on the boards of the Combined Jewish Philathropies of Greater Boston, the Boys & Girls Club of Boston, Brandeis University, the United Way of Massachusetts and others, according to The Boston Globe.

Patriots past and present reached out to the Krafts on Wednesday via Twitter.

Comment Below!.

NEW ORLEANS — New England Patriots president Jonathan Kraft said Monday morning that the team has not had any layoffs as a result of the NFL’s lockout.

“We believe there is going to be a season in 2011 and we’re preparing for it,” he said. “We need our entire staff to be focused on preparing for the 2011 season and you can’t do that if you’re laying people off.”

Kraft was entering a meeting as owners are convening in New Orleans. His father, owner Robert Kraft, is absent due to a family medical situation.

NFL teams have varied in establishing employee plans during the work stoppage. Some teams, such as the Buffalo Bills and Arizona Cardinals, have announced pay cuts. Others, like the New York Jets, are having staff take unpaid furloughs.

Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Isray said this week that his team is another that won’t be affected yet by the lockout.

Mike Reiss covers the Patriots for ESPNBoston.com. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

Follow Mike Reiss on Twitter: @MikeReiss

There is the quick update of the day.

The NFL’s league-wide game of franchise tagging began Monday, and New England Patriots All-Pro guard Logan Mankins is the first official “it,” according to ESPN.

The move was expected, even though Mankins expressed last week he wouldn’t be happy about it after holding out through eight weeks of the 2010 season. Despite playing only from Week 9, he was named the starter in the Pro Bowl for the third time in four years.

The New England Patriots officially applied the franchise tag to guard Logan Mankins today.

“Logan Mankins is one of the best players on the team,” owner Robert Kraft told reporters last week. “I just personally want to say: I hope he’s with us for a long term, and we’re going to try to do whatever we have to do to make sure that happens.”

The franchise tag for Mankins’ position comes with a one-year tender worth about $10.1 million. By tagging Mankins, the Patriots would have the right to match any offer he receives in free agency or receive two first-round picks as compensation.

Thanks for reading! .

The Boston Herald reported the New England Patriots will put the franchise tag on Pro Bowl guard Logan Mankins, who sat out seven games last season in a contract dispute with the team. Mankins has gone on record as saying he wouldn’t be happy about receiving the tag.

Guard is one of the lesser-paid positions in the NFL, and Mankins would make about $10.51 million in 2011 as a franchise player, which is the average of the top five salaries at his position last season. In an interview at the Pro Bowl a couple of weeks ago, Mankins said he was pessimistic about his chances of getting a long-term deal with the Patriots.

The New England Patriots are reportedly set to place their franchise tag on Pro Bowl guard Logan Mankins.

“I wouldn’t be happy about (being franchised), if that’s what they chose to do, to be dealt that kind of hand,’’ Mankins told The Herald at the Pro Bowl. “But we’ll see what happens. I would never say the door is totally shut. But the way it’s looking right now, I don’t see them trying to keep me, unless it’s with the franchise tag.”

The period to apply the franchise tag period opened on Thursday and ends on Feb. 24. With the collective bargaining agreement coming to an end March 3, nobody is sure whether a franchise tag will have the same stipulations in a new CBA.

Last week, Patriots owner Robert Kraft said the team is intent on keeping Mankins. “Logan Mankins is one of the best players on the team,” Kraft said. “I think there has been a little misunderstanding about some things that have been written. I just personally want to say I hope he’s with us for a long term, and we’re going to try to do whatever we have to do to make sure that happens.”

What do you guys think about this.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said he felt “deceived” by Bill Belichick in the wake of the Spygate scandal in 2007, telling Sports Illustrated recently that the New England Patriots coach did not fulfill his obligation to “tell his side of the story” after the league handed down its punishment for illegally videotaping opponents.

After he issued fines of $500,000 to Belichick and $250,000 to the team, and docked the Patriots a first-round draft pick, Goodell said he told team owner Robert Kraft that, as another part of the penalty, that Belichick would have to make a verbal apology in front of reporters. Belichick issued only a printed statement apologizing for his actions and refused to answer questions in a subsequent news conference.

“I was given assurances that [Belichick] would tell his side of the story,” Goodell told Sports Illustrated. “He went out and stonewalled the press. I feel like I was deceived.”

Belichick denied the allegation to SI.

“I did not make any assurances about thoroughly discussing the subject publicly,” he told the magazine. “I said I would address it following the league’s review. I then did that in a way I thought was appropriate. I don’t think that was deceptive.”

Thanks for visiting our blog =).

What do you guys think about this.

Feel free to leave your comments below.

Running low on time today, i’ll be back tomorrow hopefully with some more news.