I’d imagine Tom Brady hasn’t had a lot of experience with rejection over the last twenty-plus years of his life. When you’re the greatest quarterback in the history of football, you probably don’t hear “no” all that often.
So it’s no surprise the seven-time Super Bowl champ was a little shocked when at least one NFL team decided to pass on him when he was available in free agency last offseason. In a teaser for the new season of HBO’s The Shop, there’s a short clip of Brady recounting his dismay when one team passed on him in order to, presumably, stick with their starting quarterback.
Tom Brady on his free agency last offseason: “One of the teams, they weren’t interested at the very end. I was thinking, ‘You’re sticking with that mother*****?’”pic.twitter.com/JVVfNaGiUq
— NFL Update (@MySportsUpdate) June 21, 2021
Without having seen the full episode, it’s safe to assume Brady doesn’t reveal that team or the quarterback he was talking about, but that doesn’t mean we can’t throw out some educated guesses.
Based on what was reported last season, we can whittle down the group of teams that would have been interested in Brady to a select few. The Patriots and Buccaneers were obviously in the discussion, as well, but Brady was not talking about his previous team nor was he talking about his current team.
So that leaves us with the Titans, Raiders, Chargers, Colts and 49ers.
Let’s do some sleuthing…
We can eliminate the Colts and Chargers
Brady was talking about a team that stuck with its starter from the previous season, and neither the Colts nor the Chargers did that. Philip Rivers left the Chargers for the Colts so, obviously, both teams had new starters and were not “sticking with that motherf*****.”
We can cross both teams off the list.
The Titans' "MFer" at quarterback was coming off a pretty good year, so it probably wasn't them, either.
Now, maybe Brady doesn’t believe Ryan Tannehill is/was as good as his stat line implied after his breakout 2019 season, and maybe he was talking about the Titans, but I doubt it.
For one, Tannehill led the NFL in basically every efficiency metric in 2019 and, two, he was fresh off a playoff victory over Brady’s Patriots. It would be hard to talk trash about a guy who just outplayed you.
Tennessee ended up paying Tannehill a week after Brady announced he was headed for Tampa, which leads me to believe they were waiting on the GOAT to tell them no before committing to Tannehill.
We can’t rule the Titans and Tannehill out entirely, but the signs point elsewhere.
The 49ers were coming off a Super Bowl
A year ago, Jimmy Garoppolo’s reputation around the league was a lot stronger than it currently is, so the 49ers probably aren’t the team Brady was referring to. San Francisco was coming off a Super Bowl appearance, and there were only a few people (it me) wondering aloud if the team should think about moving on from Jimmy G.
It was probably the Raiders
Ever since Jon Gruden returned to the Raiders, there’s been discourse about Derek Carr’s future with the team. That was certainly the case last offseason, as Carr was coming off his sixth season with no postseason wins on his resume.
The Raiders were initially linked to Brady but nothing ever came of it and they elected for a seventh year of Carr … which ended the same way the other six seasons ended.
If the Raiders were the team that wasn’t interested in Brady’s services, he exacted a little revenge in October when his Bucs beat Las Vegas by 25 points as Brady threw four touchdown passes and no interceptions.
