by By RON BORGES , The Boston Herald

Next time Patriots management talks about not wanting to negotiate in the media, Wilfork and his teammates should remember what just happened to him. Anyone who doesn't know who leaked the threat of the team going after $500,000 of bonus money if Wilfork doesn't report to a mandatory minicamp today has their hands over their eyes.

The clause in the collective bargaining agreement the Pats threatened to invoke is no longer in effect. It was judged so onerous it was changed in 2006 when the CBA was last extended. But because Wilfork signed his six-year deal in 2004 he is not protected from the wording in effect at that time, which said the portion of a signing bonus attributable to a player's remaining years is at risk if he refuses to perform.

These days, according to three sources familiar with the CBA and NFL policy, failure to show up at a mandatory minicamp would not likely qualify as a refusal to perform. Under the new wording, a team only can get money forfeited back if the player shows a substantial refusal to perform.

This change went into effect because teams had begun to seek forfeiture of already paid bonus money pro-rated over the length of a contract for nearly anything they could think of, including talking critically about a head coach.

Under the system in place today, a holdout in preseason would risk only 25 percent of the remaining pro-rated sum upon a first offense, and missing minicamp would not likely qualify as such an offense. But Wilfork is covered under the old rules because he signed in 2004, so the Patriots began their saber rattling early, leaking this ``threat'' 48 hours before the player even had the opportunity to miss anything mandatory.

Although he has been pilloried in some corners for ``refusing'' to attend the team's voluntary OTAs, Wilfork hasn't done anything wrong. He hasn't violated his contract. He hasn't been MIA. Under the CBA, the Patriots just threatened him with neither he nor any of his teammates have to attend a single OTA. Truth be told, many of the e-mailers, twitterers (does that make an individual twitter a twit?) and talk radio callers who have attacked Wilfork probably use every vacation day, sick day, personal day and mental health day (well maybe not the mental health days judging from some of the calls) available to them. All Wilfork has done is stay on his legally sanctioned vacation while expressing a strong desire to be fairly paid for being one of the best nose tackles in Football.

Wilfork clearly has outplayed his rookie contract, starting 67 of the 77 games he's played and not missing a game the last two years despite playing one of the nastiest positions ever invented. A year ago his representatives were willing to take a deal similar to one received by Richard Seymour several years ago, but the club was not interested in extending him early.

Now he enters the final year of his contract under the threat of being hounded for $500,000 of his rookie signing bonus if he holds out this week or during the summer. Meanwhile, the asking price for players at his position has gone through the roof.

Wilfork already has said he's not looking for the kind of deal the Redskins' Albert Haynesworth got - seven years for $100 million with $41 million fully guaranteed - but wants to be ``comfortable.'' The $2.3 million he's set to earn (a portion of which resulted from performance bonuses earned in the past) is hardly that under the present pay grade of his peers, so, naturally, he'd like to get an extension before he becomes a free agent or faces being tagged by the team as its franchise player in March.

Seymour, for one, has been through this and stared down Patriots management, quietly but stubbornly fighting for himself. He never asked to be the highest paid defensive end. He asked for what he accepted, which is what Wilfork wants - fair compensation for outperforming his contract.

``It's like Frederick Douglass (the American abolitionist) said, ``There is no progress without struggle,' '' Seymour said of Wilfork's situation. ``Vince is a guy I'd like to have on my team because he stands for something.

``If you're a guy who always lays down for anything they throw at you, that's a guy who will lay down on the field. There's a way to stand up and still be respectful. You want to be smart about how you talk about your situation. I'm smart about the people I talk to. I talk to the ones who don't mind speaking the truth.

``I don't mind someone asking me a question but ask the coach the same question. If you don't, that's a coward to me. Just be fair all the way across the board.

``Hopefully they can handle things like gentlemen. You can disagree. The problem comes when there's a lot of misleading . . . or threats. Then the player has to understand the situation he's in.''

It's likely Vince Wilfork does, which is why he'll be in Foxboro today. Let's hope he's here in September, too.

- rborges@bostonherald.com

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