Patriots release captain and Super Bowl champion

Story by

Story by
Patriots release captain and Super Bowl champion

Mark Daniels · MassLive

Wed, Apr 30, 2025 ·

2 min read

About Our Ads

The leadership inside the Patriots locker room is going to look much different next season.

On Tuesday, the Patriots released longtime snapper and 2-time Super Bowl champion Joe Cardona . This comes three days after the Patriots drafted Vanderbilt long snapper Julian Ashby in the seventh round.

Cardona, 33, is coming off one of the best seasons of his career. He tied a personal high in tackles with four and also had a forced fumble on special teams.

A fifth-round draft pick out of Navy, Cardona played 10 seasons in New England where he provided a steady presence at the long snapper position. During his rookie year, Cardona also worked at Naval Academy Preparatory School in Newport, R.I. He won't two Super Bowl titles (LI and LII) and was among the highest-paid long snappers in the NFL.

After releasing Cardona, the Patriots now don't have a single player on the roster who won a Super Bowl in New England. The longest-tenured player on the team is now safety Kyle Dugger .

Last season, Cardona was named a Patriots team captain for the first time in his NFL career. With him being released, it means most of last year's captains won't return under Mike Vrabel's new leadership.

The Patriots started last season with six captains – Jacoby Brissett , David Andrews , Ja'Whaun Bentley, Deatrich Wise, Jabrill Peppers , and Cardona. On that list, Andrews, Bentley, and Cardona were released and Brissett and Wise signed elsewhere. Peppers, after his arrest, also lost captain status.

Cardona was in the middle of a 4-year extension when released on Tuesday. The Patriots won't incur much dead money and save a little under $1 million each of the next two seasons with the move.

The Patriots now move on with a new long snapper in Ashby. After the Patriots drafted him, Eliot Wolf said the Patriots scouted him as the best long snapper in the class.

"Julian Ashby was a player that we liked. We felt like he was the best long snapper in the draft," Wolf said. "Through some of the conversations that we had, we felt like he might not be someone that would be available post-draft. Again, wanting to add some competition to the roster, we decided to pull the trigger there late."

More Patriots Content