Winter of discontent for Patriots, Red Sox

Picked-up pieces while waiting to watch Tom Brady in the playoffs on “Monday Night Football” ...

■ Things could not be much better for our winter teams. The Bruins and Celtics have the best records in their respective sports and we’re clearing June schedules for the Stanley Cup and NBA Finals.

But life is not perfect, and that brings us to the other two franchises in town: the Red Sox and Patriots, who have brought us an aggregate 10 championships in this century.

At this hour, both powerhouse New England institutions are in turmoil, facing crises of ownership, management, money, and roster construction.

It starts with the Red Sox, who are in far worse shape than the Patriots. They’ve finished last in two of the last three seasons, five of the last 11, and will go into 2023 as consensus favorites to land in the basement again. Ownership’s reluctance to pay/retain homegrown All-Stars such as Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts, and Andrew Benintendi, paired with front office malpractice, has left the Local Nine with a hideous everyday lineup and a starting rotation of Question Mark and the Mysterians.

“We’ll be back this year,” pledged Red Sox chairman Tom Werner at a goofy midweek news conference announcing Rafael Devers’s contract extension (a good thing) one day after it was learned that shortstop heir Trevor Story had elbow surgery and might miss the entire season.

The brutal timing of Story’s surgery (why not when they shut him down last September?) completed the crumbling of an everyday lineup that has suffered nonstop subtraction since the golden days of 2018. Good luck to the Sox selling their Triple A product to fans who are asked to pay the highest prices in baseball to attend Fenway Park.

It was something of a miracle that Werner spoke Wednesday, since neither he nor principal owner John Henry had done a news conference since trading Betts almost three full years ago. Henry, who also owns the Globe, was again unavailable Wednesday, but Werner said the Sox are not for sale, adding,

“Our heart and soul is with the Red Sox.”

Unfortunately, Chaim Bloom is also with the Red Sox, and the overwhelmed Boston baseball boss is on a losing streak not seen in these parts since the Rick Pitino regime on Causeway Street.

The New York Times recently characterized the Sox front office as “stubbornly pragmatic.”

Hall of Famer Jim Palmer, who has spent considerable time in New England over the decades, said, “It would be one thing if the Sox were a small-market team! They have become a small-thinking team. What an affront to arguably the best, most supportive, most passionate fans on the planet. Really embarrassing.”

Truck Day is Feb. 3. Boston baseball’s big rig will have a wheel in the ditch and a wheel on the track when it embarks for Fort Myers.

The Patriots are in better shape than the Red Sox, but that’s like saying the MBTA is run better than the NCAA (hello, Charlie Baker).

New England’s favorite team hasn’t won a playoff game in the last four seasons and is 9-13 since December 2021. Secondyear quarterback Mac Jones went backward in 2022 and landed in Bill Belichick’s doghouse. Meanwhile, owners Bob and Jonathan Kraft felt a need to apologize to fans and are engaging in awkward conversations with an intransigent coach/legend who has surrounded himself with family and friends instead of the best football minds.

The day after his 2022 season ended in Buffalo, Belichick touched the Foxborough third rail when he said, “Over a three-year period, we are one of the lowest-spending teams in the league . . . that’s the three-year average, we’re 27 th in cash spending.”

It was a statement that could easily be interpreted as Belichick saying he doesn’t have the support of cost-conscious owners. Sports talk radio immediately ran with this hot take, suggesting Belichick was putting the blame on the Krafts. Nothing frosts the windows of the Gillette owner’s suite faster than a charge that the Krafts are cheap.

Later the same day, Belichick responded to a Globe request for clarification, stating, “What I said has nothing to do with ownership’s commitment to spending fully. To take it as any kind of slight, when Robert and Jonathan have done nothing but support my recommendations on contracts, couldn’t be further from the truth.”

OK. But Bill had to have known how his remarks would be taken. So it looks to this veteran observer as if there’s super tension inside the walls of Fort Foxborough. As Paul Newman says in the opening scene of

“Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” when he happens upon an impending gunfight over a card game, “We seem to be a little short on brotherly love around here.”

It’s not a good climate as the ever-image-conscious owners seek change and better results from a stubborn, longtime coach who is in a serious post-Brady slump.

On Thursday, the Patriots made the unprecedented move of announcing contract extension talks with linebackers coach Jerod Mayo, and they said they are interviewing candidates for offensive coordinator. It’s hard to imagine Belichick signing off on this voluntarily.

Other than all this, everything around Fenway and Foxborough is just swell.

▪ Quiz: Name seven men who led two franchises to Super Bowls. Hint: Four coached either for or against the Patriots in the Super Bowl, and none won a Super Bowl with both franchises (answer below).

R Brady is 7-0 lifetime against Dallas and will be going for 8-0 Monday night when the 8-9 Buccaneers take on the always-ready-to-choke Cowboys.

▪ This is the 12th consecutive year the Jets failed to reach the playoffs. It’s the longest active drought in the NFL. The Jets lost their final six games in 2022-23. Will Jimmy Garoppolo be brought in to fix things?

▪ Here’s Bill Parcells talking to the New York Post about the New York Football Giants: “This is what we’re supposed to do. We’re supposed to get in the playoffs, and I’m happy, elated for my guys. I’ve been rooting for this team since 1949.”

Guess we know whom the Tuna was cheering for when the Giants beat Belichick’s Patriots in two Super Bowls during the Brady days.

▪ The death of Greek King Constantine II reminded Globe old-timers of the late John Ahern, who covered sailing and yachting when it was an important beat. As crown prince, the future king competed in sailing at the 1960 Summer Olympics and won a gold medal for Greece in the Dragon class. Veteran Globe scribe John Powers remembers covering America’s Cup races with Ahern in the 1970s and says, “Legend was that John would always greet the king as, ‘Connie, old boy, how are you?’ ”

▪ It gives me no pleasure (false) to report that Kentucky fans are booing John Calipari. The Wildcats started 10-6 without any quality wins. Cal had a fan ejected for carrying a sign that said, “Please go to Texas,” into Rupp Arena.

▪ Miami’s Jimmy Butler went 23 for 23 from the line when the Heat went 40 for 40 from the stripe Tuesday at home against Oklahoma City. James Harden’s 24 for 24 in 2019 is the NBA’s perfect best. In case you were wondering, Wilt Chamberlain went 28 for 32 when he scored 100 points in a game in 1962. Bob Cousy went 30 for 32 in a four-overtime playoff game in 1953.

▪ As of Thursday, the Heat’s home gym was still FTX Arena. The naming-rights deal was terminated Wednesday and change is expected soon.

▪ In a related note, the New York Post reports that, according to Forbes, Brady’s FTX stake was once worth $45 million, while Gisele Bundchen’s stake was valued at $25 million. Both are being sued by other investors as a result of their promotional work for FTX.

▪ Tony Massarotti won’t be back on NESN’s Red Sox telecasts in 2023. Too much truth, no doubt. The Sox can’t have that when they are pushing a narrative no thinking fan would buy.

▪ The five greatest players in NBA history are LeBron James, Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, Michael Jordan, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Hate LeBron all you want, he might be the best ever.

▪ Local running legend Dave McGillivray had a special moment with the great Bill Campbell, who died last week at the age of 74. When McGillivray ran across America for the Jimmy Fund in 1978, finishing his run around the warning track at Fenway, Campbell tossed his cap to McGillivray as he passed the Sox dugout.

“That actually was one of the most poignant moments in my life,” said McGillivray. “God bless Bill Campbell.”

▪ Told you last week that Paul Silas was a cousin of the four Pointer sisters and lived in a shared house in Oakland when they were all children. You reminded me that Houston Astros outfielder Aaron Pointer was another Pointer sibling and played on the McClymonds High School basketball team with Silas.

Now 80, Aaron played 40 games with the Colt .45s/Astros between 1963-67 and was part of Houston’s all-rookie starting nine in a 10-3 loss to the Mets in September 1963.

▪ How can a brilliant actor such as Paul Giamatti get roped into performing in those hideous Verizon commercials, playing Albert Einstein? Was David Ortiz not available?

▪ Quiz answer: Don Shula (Colts, Dolphins), Parcells (Giants, Patriots), Dan Reeves (Broncos, Falcons), Dick Vermeil (Eagles, Rams), Mike Holmgren (Packers, Seahawks), John Fox (Panthers, Broncos), Andy Reid (Eagles, Chiefs).

Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at daniel.shaughnessy @globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @dan_shaughnessy.