Tom Brady probably hasn’t signed on the dotted line yet, but he is indeed going to a member of the Tampa Bay Bucs in 2020.
After two decades of leading the Patriots, Brady stated on Tuesday that he would be continuing his career somewhere else. But how and why did this even happen?
Brady’s decision was likely made well before this week, and quite possibly three years ago, sources told Bleacher Report’s Matt Miller.
In 2017, the Patriots had a then-25-year-old Jimmy Garoppolo waiting to take over the franchise with a aging Brady,so the 49ers came calling at the trade deadline. General manager John Lynch claims he jokingly asked about Brady before both sides agreed to send Jimmy G to the 49ers.
But the conversation didn’t go down like that.
Even though the 49ers called about Jimmy G, Bill Belichick reportedly offered up Brady instead. A Patriots source confirmed to Miller that this is what happened, but team owner Robert Kraft squashed the idea of trading Brady.
“Kraft shut that s–t down fast,” a source close to Belichick told Miller. “So, instead, Lynch gets Garoppolo, but Brady, Belichick and Kraft haven’t been the same since Tom learned that Bill was ready to get rid of him. And that lit a fire under his ass.”
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“You have to remember, this guy has a chip on his shoulder the size of Mount Everest,” says a former player who knows Brady well.
Even though the Patriots lost the Eagles in the Super Bowl, the two sides still agreed to a new contract that would expire after the 2019 season.
After the Patriots were eliminated by the Tennessee Titans in the AFC wild-card round this past year, Brady made zero attempts to contact the Patriots front office about a new deal and Belichick wasn’t making any moves to smooth things over either.
The writing was on the wall and Brady would soon announce that he was leaving.
