Tom Brady began flirting with the Dolphins as far back as August 2019, according to the NFL.
Robert Kraft must be seething. Brady was set on leaving Foxborough before his final season with the Patriots even started.
The NFL announced its conclusions Tuesday from the league’s six-month investigation into the Dolphins for tampering and allegations that owner Stephen Ross offered former head coach Brian Flores $100,000 per loss in an effort to tank the 2019 season. While investigator Mary Jo White says Ross’ comments to Flores were made in jest, she discovered that the Dolphins’ overtures to Brady began two years before they were previously reported.
Dolphins minority owner Bruce Beal, a real estate mogul and friend of Brady’s, was recruiting the quarterback to Miami throughout the 2019 season and postseason. Brady, of course, signed with the Buccaneers in March 2020, but the Dolphins didn’t stop. They spoke with Brady last December about joining their front office and potentially playing again. At the same time, Miami was also trying to lure Sean Payton away from the Saints (Payton stepped down from his position this offseason).
The NFL is stripping the Dolphins of their first-round pick in 2023 and third-round pick in 2024. Ross, the team’s majority owner, was fined $1.5 million and suspended for the first six weeks of the season. He’ll also be removed from league committees.
Beal was docked $500,000.
All said, those are pretty modest penalties for an owner who, as White puts it, “expressed his belief that the Dolphins’ position in the upcoming 2020 draft should take priority over the team’s win-loss record.” Flores didn’t go along with Ross, saving the billionaire in the process.
In a league full of unctuous oligarchs, Ross is at the top of the list. It’s unlikely that Kraft will greet him warmly on the sidelines anytime soon.
But what about Brady? As it turns out, he was so disillusioned with the Patriots, he was plotting his exit seven months before he even reached free agency. That may explain Brady’s sulking throughout the 2019 campaign. At one point, he referred to himself as the “most miserable 8-0 quarterback in the NFL.”
After those remarks, the Patriots went on a second-half slide, and Brady played a miserable game in their wild-card loss to the Titans.
The apparent rift between Brady and Belichick first became publicized in October 2017, when ESPN’s Seth Wickersham published his first piece about the matter. Brady was tired of Belichick’s austerity, and in the words of his wife, Gisele Bundchen, just wanted to be “appreciated at work.”
He didn’t feel like he had that respect from Belichick, who still chewed him out during film sessions.
Brady has been candid about his unhappiness on multiple occasions, including in an episode of his docuseries, “Man in the Arena.”
“Even though we were being very successful, even though I was playing great, it didn’t matter because I was still dealing with the constant negativity,” said Brady. “More and more I think the joy was being taken away because it wasn’t about my football performance anymore, it was about so many other things.”
Despite those hard feelings, Brady threw for 505 yards in Super Bowl LII, which the Patriots lost 41-33.
New England rebounded and beat the Rams in the following year’s Super Bowl. Soon after, Rob Gronkowski announced his first retirement.
As it turns out, that was the true beginning of the end for the Patriots dynasty.
Brady has spoken at length about his close relationship with Kraft, and vice versa. Yet, Brady still went behind Kraft’s back and communicated with a division rival about jumping ship while New England was still paying him.
That is some good ol’ backstabbing, brought to you by TB12 ™. Now, perhaps we have more context about why Brady originally left the Patriots out of his faux-retirement message, and didn't attend Kraft's birthday party.
Maybe Belichick nudged Brady out the door with low-ball contract offers. But now we know he was more than willing to walk right through it, without any regard for the Patriots.
