LEGEND MOVES ON IN QB DRAW
Tom Brady highlighted the shuffling for some top quarterbacks on the second day of free agency
Tom Brady didn’t want to say where he will be playing football in 2020. But it won’t be in New England.
Brady officially ended the drama around 8:45 a.m. Tuesday, posting a goodbye message to Patriots fans on his verified Twitter account. He didn’t say where he will be playing, but multiple reports on Tuesday night said Brady will soon sign with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on a one-year deal worth roughly $30 million.
“Although my football journey will take place elsewhere, I appreciate everything that we have achieved and am grateful for our incredible TEAM accomplishments,” he wrote. “I have been privileged to have had the opportunity to know each and everyone of you, and to have the memories we’ve created together.”
Brady will officially become a free agent Wednesday. The Patriots and Brady agreed to part ways on Monday night, leaving the Bucs and the Los Angeles Chargers as Brady’s top suitors. Both teams reportedly offered Brady a financial package worth around $30 million per season.
Brady will count $13.5 million against the Patriots’ salary cap in 2020 as they search for his replacement. They have secondyear quarterback Jarrett Stidham and journeyman Cody Kessler on the roster.
“I don’t know what my football future holds, but it is time for me to open a new stage for my life and career,” Brady wrote on social media. “I thank you from the bottom of my heart and I will always love you and what we have shared — a lifetime full of fun memories.”
Humble start to electric run
Brady’s announcement marks the end of an incredible two-decade run in New England as part of the most accomplished dynasty in NFL history. Joining the Patriots as a sixth-round draft pick in 2000 — the 199th overall selection — Brady assumed the starting job in 2001 following an injury to Drew Bledsoe, and subsequently led the Patriots to nine Super Bowl appearances in his next 19 seasons, winning six.
Patriots owner Robert Kraft said in January, shortly after a playoff loss to Tennessee, that his hope was for Brady to return to the Patriots or retire. He expressed some disappointment Tuesday.
“Tommy initiated contact last night and came over,” Kraft told ESPN. “We had a positive, respectful discussion. It’s not the way I want it to end, but I want him to do what is in his best personal interest. After 20 years with us, he has earned that right. I love him like a son.”
One league source said the Patriots did make an offer to Brady for 2020, but that Brady didn’t like it.
Brady and coach Bill Belichick, who also joined the Patriots in 2000, took a woebegone franchise that had never won a championship to unprecedented heights. The Patriots were the most successful NFL organization in the 2000s and 2010s, winning three Super Bowls between 200104, and three more between 201418.
They were the first team to complete a 16-0 regular season. They made the playoffs in 17 of Brady’s 18 full seasons as the starter (he sat out almost all of 2008 with a knee injury), and won the AFC East 17 times.
Brady racked up individual accolades, as well: three MVP awards (2007, 2010, 2017), 14 Pro Bowls, four Super Bowl MVPs. He ranks second in NFL history behind Drew Brees in passing yards and touchdown passes.
“Tom was not just a player who bought into our program. He was one of its original creators,” Belichick said in a statement. “Tom and I will always have a great relationship built on love, admiration, respect and appreciation. Tom’s success as a player and his character as a person are exceptional.”
Cracks start to develop
Under Belichick, the Patriots have been known as a team that trades away star players before they hit their decline. In January 2018, team president Jonathan Kraft said that Brady would have say in when his Patriots career ended.
“I think Tom Brady’s earned the right to have that be a decision he makes when wants to make it,” Jonathan Kraft said then.
But there were cracks in the relationship the last few years, even as Brady and the Patriots continued to win. In a 2015 New York Times Magazine article, Brady’s father predicted that “it will end badly . . . It’s a cold business. And for as much as you want it to be familial, it isn’t.”
Those cracks deepened in recent years. Brady was upset that Kraft didn’t fight harder on his behalf during the “Deflategate” controversy that resulted in a fourgame suspension in 2016.
Brady has been upset at various times — particularly in 2019 — when he regularly took belowmarket contracts and didn’t believe the Patriots were spending enough money on the pieces around him.
And the divide deepened again in 2017 when Brady’s training guru and business partner, Alex Guerrero, had his special privileges with the team revoked by Belichick.
Last year, while the Patriots were winning games but struggling on offense, Brady told NBC broadcaster Al Michaels that he was “the most miserable 8-0 quarterback in the NFL.”
Brady’s Patriots career ultimately ends with a whimper. First they lost at home in Week 17 to the lowly Dolphins to cost themselves a first-round bye. Then theylost at home to the Titans in the wildcard round, the first time since 2010 that they didn’t reach at least the AFC Championship Game. Brady’s final pass as a Patriot was an interception that was returned for a touchdown by Titans cornerback Logan Ryan.
Relatively few quarterbacks last their entire career with one team. Joe Montana finished his career with the Chiefs. Brett Favre played for the Jets and Vikings. Johnny Unitas went to the Chargers, and Joe Namath to the Rams.
Montana, Brady’s boyhood idol, said in January, “Don’t (leave) — if you don’t have to. It’s not easy to go to another team and get accepted, no matter how much success you’ve had and how many years you’ve played.”