PureDWTS Conspiracy Theory – A Case of Schrödinger’s Gronk…?
In a blaze of clarity, I opted to take half the day off in order to blog the cast announcement this morning and handle the subsequent traffic at Pure. I’m glad I did, because it gave me time to ruminate after the flurry of the GMA announcement died down – and I realized some stuff just didn’t add up. Namely, why get rid of the troupe completely, then bring 14 pros in to couple 12 celebs? It makes little to no sense. Then, slowly, I started to remember stuff from the past 24 hours, and I formulated what I (and Heidi, and Vogue, and @justinweible, all of whom were gracious enough to listen to me ramble) think is a pretty sound (and potentially exciting) theory. Ladies and gents, I give you “Schrödinger’s Gronk”.
First, background: Rob Gronkowski of the New England Patriots retired back in March of this year, after a season full of injuries culminating in a Super Bowl win. Gronk took a beating – I don’t blame him if he retired for the sake of his health. But did he TRULY retire…? A lot of “insiders” say no – they think he’ll announce he’s coming back to the Patriots before long, and Justin had a good theory that he may have retired in order to get out of the NFL preseason and training camp, only to rejoin the Patriots once the preseason is over. I casually threw him (and his gf, a model and dancer) out as a good casting possibility for season 28, as he had expressed interest in doing DWTS numerous times in the past but had given the excuse that he didn’t want to get injured in the off-season. Nobody seemed to think much of it until yesterday, when suddenly numerous outlets were reporting Gronk & Camille as being part of the cast. I assumed that they had simply gone swimming in our previous rumor/prediction posts and comments sections (as some outlets have been wont to do, in order to get hits in the absence of any real rumors), and they were just regurgitating what we were saying…but now I’m not so sure those rumors were completely unfounded. Stay with me…
This morning, we saw 14 pros announced as being part of this season, but only 12 celebrities were announced on GMA. Insert “monkey confusedly punching buttons on a calculator” gif here 😉 This doesn’t make sense, especially when you take into account that the troupe was disbanded – why bring on two extra pros if you’re getting rid of all your “extra” dancers? My answer: you don’t…unless you’re possibly waiting on two additional celebs to maybe join the cast 😉
Miner pointed out that Gronk is holding a mysterious press conference next Tuesday, Aug. 27, to announce “the next chapter” in his career. Some have interpreted that as being an announcement that he’s returning to the NFL…others think he’s writing another book. Me? I’m thinking it was intentionally left open-ended, because even Gronk wasn’t sure at scheduling time what he was going to announce. Stay with me, I promise this starts to make sense soon…
As Justin pointed out to me, the NFL deadline for teams to finalize their active rosters is ten days from now – Aug. 31. The Patriots’ last preseason game is Aug. 29. I’m guessing that Gronk retired to give himself time to heal and get out of having to participate in the pre-season/training camp, and was possibly planning on returning to the Patriots after the preseason, ideally well-rested and healed up and ready to go full throttle. HOWEVER – injuries are unpredictable, and Gronk being Gronk, he likely wanted to hedge his bets a bit…enter DWTS. If there was no possible way his injury would allow him to play in the regular season, what’s the next best thing to do if you’re Gronk? Answer: the reality TV show you’ve talked about wanting to do for several years, but never had the chance. And given the relatively dismal lineup we saw this morning, I’d guess DWTS was ready to play ball with Gronk (pun intended). He’s a big get (and his gf is just a bonus – good dancer, famous in her own right, and they can exploit the couple angle), so they may have agreed to a conditional deal with Gronk & Camille: if Gronk decides not to return to the NFL, he’ll do DWTS; but if he does do the show, you have to wait until the week he makes his decision about the NFL in order to make the announcement. I’m thinking Gronk knew for awhile that he was going to make some sort of announcement on Aug. 27; he just didn’t know whether it would be “I’m returning to the NFL” or “I’m doing DWTS!” until recently. Or maybe he’s known for awhile, but Patriot fans are in such a fervor over his possible return that waiting until the last possible week to make the announcement is a shrewd PR move. I can’t find the link now, but the NFL shop released a shirt not long ago that had the names of some of the main Pats players (Brady, Edelman, etc.) with “…Gronk?” at the bottom. Money is being made on the hope that he’s gonna return to the Patriots – so I think it makes sense to wait as long as possible before possibly bursting their bubble. As Justin pointed out, he’s still contractually obligated to the Patriots – so who knows, this could be coming from upper management at the Patriots organization.
Now, all this is not to say that he and Camille are definitely doing the show – you’ll notice the title of this post, Schrödinger’s Gronk, is a nod to the famous Schrödinger’s cat, a thought experiment in which a cat in a box is considered both alive and dead due to a subatomic event that may or may not occur. Don’t worry about the cat too much – just know that until we see the outcome of his press conference on Tuesday, we’ve got a case of Schrödinger’s Gronk: he’s both on this season and not on this season.
But I do think there’s a couple things working in favor of Gronk doing DWTS – there was the sudden surge in reports just yesterday that he and Camille were going to be on the show, as if someone had heard some fresh, recent intel; and then Camille posted this on IG last night – look at the comments…
“Written in the stars” sounds like Camille knowing that something she has wanted to do for awhile is going to happen – perhaps Gronk has made a decision? 😉
Regardless of whether we see Gronk & Camille or not, DWTS doesn’t have to make many changes: if they don’t do the show, the two extra pros (whoever that may be) can function similarly to the extra pros on Strictly, who fulfill the same roles as a troupe (filling in if another pro is sick/injured, helping out with group dances and bumpers, etc.). If they do get Gronk & Camille, I think the cast just got less dismal, more current, and a lot more interesting…and all the pros announced this morning get a partner 🙂
Discuss.
Everywhere I’ve looked people have been calling Daniella and Pasha pros. I agree it makes zero sense that they just randomly add two extra dancers (especially newbies) but get rid of the troupe. And once the pros start getting eliminated, they usually film the bumpers and act as extra dancers, so it’s not even like Daniella and Pasha are needed for that.
So my question is, are the pros not even going to meet their partners until after this supposed announcement, if DWTS is in fact waiting on them to decide? Or will Camille and Gronk just go to Pasha and Daniella? What a great first get for Daniella if so. I think it will definitely liven up the competition, so I hope it ends up being true. I don’t know anything about Camille, but I’d expect Gronk to be a huge front runner to win.
Vddy interesting! Good to know how you managed to get all of this blogging in so quickly!
As for DWTS, frankly, I’ve decided their perennial “best/biggest stars ever” is for the benefit of the contestants, not really the audience. Who wants to think they are D-list celebs? So they have to make a deal out of their being “stars.”
For the conspiracy – You guys know far better than I. What will be, will be.
Maybe. Will make for a fun announcement from Gronk. I think he’s going back to the NFL.
I kind of think they aren’t announcing any more people because they would have hinted at it. I know that this is all based on many moving parts though so it’s possible they have something up their sleeves. I do know gronk being on the show would be a very welcome addition
A couple of interesting things I found since talking to Courtney that may muddy the waters even more:
1) NFL.com is still selling official Gronkowski jerseys, and it’s not the “you have to order custom because he wasn’t one of the five we allocated this year” jerseys. You can actually buy one.
2) Brady went on record about a week ago on WEEI and made comments about Gronk being happy and how Brady’s looking forward to seeing what Gronk does in his future career.
So I’m really not sure what his decision will be, particularly since he can technically unretire and join the Patriots until October, provided he passes a physical and they still have the cap space to honor his contract.
As for how he’d do, I think expectations might need to be tempered with Gronk. He’ll be entertaining, for sure. But his body has taken a beating.
He’s torn two ligaments in his right knee, had a history of herniated discs in his back, and missed a season because of a fractured vertebra. I’m not sure how well he can still move, but he’ll be entertaining.
I think it’s not gonna happen. Christie Brinkley already mentioned that they’ll meet their partners on Monday in a recent interview post GMA, and honestly if that’s the case then it would be unfair to Gronk and Camille to have one less week of practice.
On the other hand who do you think could’ve been revealed on the 5th? None of these folks have any connections with one another. Makes you think ????
It’s not letting me link the article on my phone, but it’s an article labeled “Christie Brinkley on dwts has her kids laughing “
One less day*
One less day of practice is NOTHING, Nick.
WELL DONE, Court! I LOVE IT!!!! Makes total sense to me now!
Adding: And well done to Justin too!!!
Thanks for the mention, Courtney
They have done late reveals before. Think: Sean Lowe
Don’t want gronk on for personal football fan reason. However I do see your point and also someone mentioned the whole mysteriously canceled gma announcement. I wonder if that could have been for gronk and camille but maybe they changed their minds and the terrible news that day made it easy for DWTS to use it as an excuse to push the announcement. Of course maybe it was someone else all together who was cast and backed out so the announcement got pushed. Because you’d think even if the news for that day pushed the announcement if they still had something to announce they’d do it later in the week.
Now i’d also wonder with Peta coming back I figured maybe she was getting someone big. Because a lot of times when the pros leave seemingly retire and come back its for a big name. So I’d wonder if Peta was actually brought back for Gronk but with his status up in the air they will pair her with Lamar for height. Because it’s not like they couldn’t pair someone shorter with Lamar they don’t need Peta for him ie witney and von, Lindsay and kareem and I’m sure there’s more. Plus seems weird for them to give a newbie such a big name. I know Brandon got tinashe but Brandon was established on DWTS not someone totally new. Then again they fired the troupe and two pros who were very well liked so things a crazy who the heck knows.
Anyways that’s my rambling thought process on this. A part of me hopes Gronk doesn’t come back to the NFl because it will benefit my football team but I don’t want to watch him on dancing every week either. So I guess it’s a loose loose either way. Unless he announces something else all together. Like I think you mentioned he was possibly moving to Miami. Maybe he’ll go play with the dolphins which would not be likely but would cause a big stir in the division. It will be interesting to see how it all shakes out.
If not Gronk, do you think someone else might be added?
I’m new here. The new pros aren’t claiming at all for any partners if uI look at the Instagram ! Just happy to be on. All veterans are asking fans for their partners? Clearly new dancers aren’t expecting any partners and know their roles as reserves. I don’t think any extra celebs R coming! My 2 cents.
What the hell are you talking about? We don’t know anyone is “reserves” and neither do you.
Didn’t I see somewhere on this site that Gronk lived in Florida. I just notice on Daniella’s IG that her and Pasha are in West Palm Beach, FL!!
@Elle – Gronk has a condo in Miami, which is roughly an hour drive away from West Palm. But as far as I can tell, neither Gronk nor Camille is there right now – Gronk appears to be hanging out with his brothers in TX, and Camille was in NYC and mentioned an “exciting casting” in her IG story. Not quite sure what to make of it. Could be that Pasha & Daniella are there for either business or pleasure (I know there’s some fairly prestigious studios in West Palm, maybe they’re teaching), or who knows – they could be posting up to do a clandestine meeting with celeb partners. I’m keeping an eye out…
I think it’s like strictly ‘ where they are all called Pros but not all have partners. The extra pros dance in group numbers and result show.
The t-shirt was on Julian Edelman’s (Patriots WR) site:
https://julianedelman.com/collections/apparel/products/hey-tom-im-open-tee-youth
Unless he plans on announcing it later today I think the announcement itself was his partnership with a CBDoil group.
Yes, Nick – I too have the internet, well aware of what Gronk’s press conference was about. I know it’s hard for some folks here to believe, but I actually do follow the news!