First of all, if you haven't listened to Bill Belichick's appearance on Tom Brady's podcast, you absolutely must give it a listen ... before you read any comments, even these, about it.
Personally, I'm glad they did this, and I can envision this being the first of many public comments by these two together in the coming years. I'm not even a Patriots fan, and I enjoyed it to the point I wished "Robby G" didn't arrive and stop the groove that Personable Bill had gotten into. Belichick had finally slipped out of his default mode and was really starting to get into what can make him so interesting, when he wants to be. If I'm a Patriots fan, I would be giddy about it.
We'll get into some of the specifics that stood out to me in a second, but I wanted to start with the section that has received the most attention — especially by the media, because we were the target.
The question, from Jim Gray, was about being linked with Belichick for basically eternity due to their shared, amazing accomplishments together.
"I think for me, there’s nobody I’d rather be associated with. And I think that, from my standpoint, I think it’s always such a stupid conversation to say, you know, ‘Brady vs Belichick’ because in my mind, that’s not what partnerships are about. Coach couldn’t play quarterback and I couldn’t coach. And I think the best part about football is, and coach says it a lot, ‘Do your job,’ and he asked me to play quarterback, he didn’t ask me to coach. You know, I didn’t want him playing quarterback, I just wanted him to coach. I had seen him throw, so he definitely wasn’t playing quarterback.
"I think it’s such a stupid, in my view, it was just people always trying to pull us apart and I don’t think we ever even felt that with each other. We never were trying to pull each other apart. We actually were always trying to go in the same direction. And I think when we were in New England for 20 years together, they get tired of writing the same story. Once they write all the nice things and championships and this, and then they just start going, ‘Well this works, let’s try starting to divide them.’ And I think I never really appreciated those ways that people would try to do that.”
Of course, the media being the dolts that we are ... we got our backs up a bit about that comment. And there were some continued comments like ...
"He and I always had a great relationship and we met all the time.
"It was never intolerable. I mean, but it was always just, I would say, healthy debates about certain things, and we always talked about them face to face and I think there’s one thing I appreciate about coach Belichick in life is he’s not afraid to have a hard conversation too.
"And when you have someone that believes in winning as much as you do, you want to be a part of that. And when people try to get in the way of that, they become the enemy. So I always think the people that tried to drive us apart actually brought us closer together.”
... that had the appearance of whitewashing the factual, well-documented history (thanks Tom vs. Time, Tom Brady Sr.'s comments) and results — namely, Brady finishing his career in Tampa Bay like Joe Montana did in KC and Brett Favre did in Minnesota after similar fallouts with their signature franchises.
But most of the media — and I'm including myself with some of my immediate comments on Felger & Mazz — missed the mark on the crux of Brady's comments. Namely, I think — obviously I don't know because I'm not in Brady's head — his comments were about Brady vs. Belichick in terms of who was more responsible for the great run of success.
And on this, I wholeheartedly agree with Brady (and have since the beginning). Brady and Belichick would have been great in their own ways apart. But together, in that partnership that Brady referenced, they were transcedent. Brady would not have been pushed to be the greatest to the very end (does he win title No. 6 if Belichick gave him that extension in 2017?) and even in Tampa. Belichick wouldn't have six Super Bowl titles without Brady.
That argument, pitting Brady vs. Belichick has always been stupid, and I've tried to stay out of it.
I certainly have some thoughts on why I think Belichick agreed to do this, and struck the chord of appreciation for Brady that he did — Belichick knows legacy better than anyone, and did not want to get the Jerry Krause treatment from Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen (Gronk?) in the Patriots' version of The Last Dance ESPN documentary 20 years from now. Robert Kraft is already chomping at the bit to avoid the Jerry Reinsdorf treatment.
I don't really care for the reasons, to be honest. When we shuffle off this mortal coil, no one is really going to remember the end or Brady on the Bucs.
I just care about good stuff like this:
Tom, what did Bill do to bring out the best in you?
TB: “I think it’s more what did he not do to bring out the best in me ...
Brady said that getting emotional, and he barely finished his thought. This was Brady hearing from his football dad, one who was very sparing with his praise, that Belichick was proud of him ... and that should hit hard.
TB: "His leadership, which is really one of his great, great, qualities, he showed up every day with a purpose. There was, when he always joked ‘no days off’, he meant it. There was his ability to sustain even what he’s still doing, 23 years with the Patriots, beyond that, so many years in the NFL. But he’s in there working in the office right now. He’s not out there golfing. I’m sure he has his moments for those things, but they’re a lot fewer than what he could be doing. You look at his stature and who he is, and what his level of performance has been over a long period of time, he could be retired years ago. The reality is, he loves the sport, he loves teaching, he loves coaching, he loves competing, and nobody’s done it better than him. And I think what a blessing for me. There’s no way I have the success that I’ve had personally without him, and I’m very grateful for that.”
To me, this was Brady saying, "I didn't really realize it until I played for some clowns in Tampa, but Bill was really, really, really good at his job and I didn't fully appreciate it at the time."
BB: "Tom talks about how much I taught him in those meetings but I learned so much from Tom because I never played quarterback, and I never saw the game through the quarterback’s eyes. I saw it through a coach’s eyes. And when Tom would tell me what he saw and how he saw it, it was incredible. ... We had a really good relationship, especially in the film room and talking football and all that, that I’ll always treasure, and I learned so much from. Because nobody sees the game better than Tom Brady sees it or saw it and I was so lucky to learn from him and his vision, no other coach will get that experience because it was, I mean, it was incredible.”
This whole section was good stuff, and it went on for a while.
BB: “You know, for me, I’ve always said this, Tom’s heard it every year time after time, players win games. Players win games. You can’t win games without great players, and coaches can lose them. And if coaches don’t give the players a good opportunity to give them a chance where they can have a fair fight and can win on their ability, then great players can’t overcome bad coaching. So I always tried my best to put the team in position to win."
After this past season and what went on, I thought this was pretty rich.
BB: "Tom always found a way to make his players productive. So it didn’t matter who the receiver, who the tight end was, he could understand what would make Rob [Gronkowski] more successful. What made Troy Brown more so? What could Wes Welker do? Not, what did I do with Troy that I want to do with Wes Welker, but how do I make Wes Welker successful? How do I make Randy Moss successful? Those players were all great players but they were all very different and they had different skills, and Tom could always bring out the best of their skills. ... And so, ultimately, again, of all the things that Tom was great at, I think that was, really his top quality was he made everybody around him better and utilized the skills that those players had and avoided the ones, maybe, they weren’t as good at.”
This is what separates the truly elite (Brady, Patrick Mahomes, Joe Montana) from the merely great. Doing great things with less. Brady did that more than most, and it was really nice to hear Belichick acknowledge that.
BB: "That was as much a part of Tom as it was me because there were a couple of meetings, you know where I would say something to Tom after the meeting like, ‘Hey, you know, I didn’t really think that was that bad, but I just wanted to include you in there with everybody else.’ And Tom would say, “Coach, you have to. If you don’t yell at me, then what am I going to do with all the rest of my teammates? I’ve got to be in there with all the rest of them and say, ‘Hey, he’s yelling at all of us and, like, we all got to do better.’ But if you leave me out of it, then I don’t really have a platform to work from. So yeah, go ahead and rip my ass too. Go ahead.’
If you coach your kids, they better get it worse than anyone or else you are headed for big trouble. No difference with the best player on the team. Brady made things much easier for Belichick in so many ways, but this did grate on Brady near the end — especially when he didn't have contract security. To Brady, the partnership was over then.
THE PEBBLE BEACH STORY WAS JUST PHENOMENAL ... YOU NEED TO HEAR IT FOR YOURSELF
TB: "I love the sport, I love everyone, man, that came into my life, certainly, coach Belichick was right at the top of the list. So, thanks, coach.You know how I feel about you. I love seeing you out there coaching and I think every coach in the world should watch as much of coach Belichick as you can and learn because that’s what they should do. Because if they want to see what a real coach can do, and what he’s capable of, and the consistency and dependability and the trust that you have in the people that coach you, then there’s nobody I love more than coach Belichick."
BB: “Appreciate that, Tom.”
I'm getting all the feels now.
Good stuff by all. Looking forward to more.