Halfway not Patriot Way
Brady’s actions anti-Belichick
It was Sunday, Jan. 30, 2005, and the script called for Bill Belichick to stand next to the Lombardi trophy and ... and ... well, just stand there.
It was going to be one of the dozens of photo ops that head coaches get asked to do during the fun-filled, week-long, boxersor - briefs, who’ s-your favorite super-hero run-up to the
Super Bowl.
Maybe the earnest camera person was planning to ask Belichick to ham it up a little — have him wrap his arms around the trophy like a lovestruck teenager, or hold up three fingers to note that in a week’s time his Patriots would be looking to win their third Super Bowl in four years.
But Belichick would have none of it. Literally. Nothing. He declined the opportunity to do cheesecake with the Lombardi trophy for the simple reason that nothing had been won yet, nothing had been settled, nothing had been earned. If the Patriots were to emerge victorious against the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl XXXIX at Jacksonville’s Alltel Stadium (spoiler alert: they did) that’s when Belichick would pal around with the Lombardi trophy. Until then … no thanks. As for the notion that, golly, the Patriots were defending
Super Bowl champions and therefore entitled to be in the presence of the Lombardi trophy . . . no thanks again. That was a different Lombardi trophy from a different Big Game, and at the time it was probably sitting on the lap of Pats owner Robert Kraft’s along with its big brother from Super XXXVI. (I have this recurring vision of Kraft taking all five of his team’s Lombardi trophies to the owners meetings and walking into the room and saying stuff like, “Whoaaa, Nelly! If we win any more Super Bowls I’m gonna have to grow a third arm!!!”)
Belichick doing the justsay-no bit to a Lombardi trophy photo op is one of the great Patriot campfire stories, guaranteed to be passed down through the generations, Pats fan to Pats fan to Pats fan. And it’s a story that has particular relevance this week, in light of quarterback Tom Brady’s decision not to attend one of Belichick’s voluntary OTA sessions.
Pats fans must be horribly chafed from all the fence-straddling they’ve been doing in their quest to remain neutral in this ongoing Belichick-Brady Cold War. But while Belichick may be many things, in no way is he a fraud. It’s time, then, for Pats fans to come to grips with the sobering reality that the old buzzard happens to be right. (Just to be clear, that’s Belichick the old buzzard coach, not Brady the old buzzard quarterback.)
Belichick has been blessed to be in possession of Brady all these years — duh — but I’m not sure TB12 would be a five-time Super Bowl-winning quarterback without the two decades of Coach Bill’s attention to detail. We all get it: Bill’s no fun. And we all get it: Bill wins. But now the greatest quarterback in the game’s glorious history has an alternate playbook in his other pocket, and that runs against the grain of everything football is supposed to be about.
What football is supposed to be all about ain’t pretty. It’s why any player who has satisfied his NFL wanderlust and made enough dough to secure his and his family’s future should get the hell out.
In his Facebook documentary, released after New England’s 41-33 loss to the Eagles in Super Bowl LII (pretty sure Belichick didn’t canoodle with the Lombardi trophy in the run-up to that one, either), Brady hit on such themes as life and family. We can all identify with his concerns over his mother’s health issues. On Media Night six days before Super Bowl LI, Brady’s voice cracked as he talked about the role his father has played in his life. And Brady, in his own role as a dad, appears to be a chip off the old block.
There’s also this: Brady wants to let his hair down a little. (Literally so, depending on which ritzy salon Gisele Bündchen has suggested.) Thanks to social media and the gossip pages, we get glimpses of Brady going to cool places, hanging with cool people, wearing cool clothes.
Cool. Would that we could all live like that.
But what Brady seems to be doing is getting only halfway out. He’ll keep playing, but only on his terms. He’s earned it, right?
Well, no, not if you buy into Belichick’s stand when asked to stand next to an unearned Lombardi trophy.
The way Belichick sees things, the 2018 New England Patriots are no different than the 2018 Cleveland Browns: They have won nothing.
And yet here’s the quarterback of the 2018 New England Patriots, daring to smell the roses beyond Gillette Stadium.
If Brady were all in, he’d be saluted, once again, as the ultimate Patriot.
If he walked away, he’d be poised for a life of breathtaking adventures, financial security and all the time he wants to dabble in business, to do charity work, to take the kids down to Toscanini’s for an ice cream cone ... really, whatever he wants, even if it’s as simple as sleeping in.
For now, Brady has opted to do a little of both. Halfway in. And it’s OK for you to be OK with that, so long as you remember that Tom Brady, 2018 edition, has won nothing.