The Ringer NFL Show - Tom Brady Says Goodbye to the Patriots. Where Will He Land? | The Ringer NFL Show

Episode Date: March 17, 2020

Tom Brady has said that he will no longer be a Patriot and that he wants to continue his career elsewhere. He will have a handful of teams to choose from. We give our first impressions of Brady’s announcement, speculate where he will land, and work through what the Patriots will do next. Host: Kevin Clark Guest: Justin Sayles Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Liz Kelly and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. We hope The Ringer can provide you entertainment and companionship during this time. So as always, feel free to check out The Ringer.com, where we're still covering the latest in sports, pop culture, tech, and media. And the Ringer's YouTube channel can provide endless amounts of entertainment. You can find that at YouTube.com slash The Ringer. Is the Ringer NFL show part of Ringer Podcast Network? I'm Kevin Clark joining me today. Justin Sails.

Justin, how you doing, buddy? I'm doing okay under the circumstances, Kevin. How are you doing? Let's unpack this. You're talking about the big quarterback news that came early Tuesday, which is that Chase Daniel has signed a $13 million deal with the Detroit Lions. It's been really tough. I really enjoyed his work on the beers.

Listen, man, all this quarterback news, Cam Newton's on Instagram. Tom Brady is announcing he's not coming back and Chase Daniel just collecting the bag while we all watch those guys. All right. So Tom Brady is no longer in New England Patriot. He announces on Tuesday morning that he is going to go elsewhere. continue his journey. He thanks the Patriots. He thanks the crafts. He thanks Bill Belichick. But the scenario that I think was increasingly likely in the last couple of months, but seemed unfathomable, has happened. He will choose from a handful of teams. We know a couple of them.

We know the Chargers. We know the Bucks. I think there's probably going to be some mystery teams now that emerge and sort of make an offer for him because the market is a little thin. I think there's some opportunity there for a random owner to step up. But first impressions, Justin, you've been writing about this for a couple of months on our site. You are from New England. You're a Patriots observer. You've been listening crucially to Boston Radio this morning. That's for the journey.

Yeah. What's going on on Boston Radio exactly? Honestly, it seems like there's a lot of anger at Belichick. I mean, there's been a little bit of anger directed Brady's way. It seems like Kraft is kind of getting off the hook on this. But it seems like a lot of people are upset that it got to this point. And I think that people kind of anticipated over the past few days that this was going to happen more so locally than in the national media because if you looked, they were, they franchise tag Joe Thunei. They re-signed the McCordy twins. It seemed like they were getting a band back together, a little tiny bit.

But they were running out of the cap space necessary to sign Brady. And I know that you can make whatever work with the cap, but it certainly looked like they were prioritizing these other guys over Brady. So I think this was a little more expected in New England than it was. nationally, but it's still, it's an immediate shock. And I think a lot of people are reacting with sadness, but there's also a lot of anger out there. And it seems like most of that anger is being directed at Bill Belichick right now. So let's take a step back. So a couple, in the last couple of weeks, now the first report that he really could leave, New England came out around November or December. And in December, it really ratcheted up. And then by the combine, it kind of reached a fever of pitch. A source close to Brady told the Boston Herald,

that they had not, the Patriots not even made an approach to Brady and the quota wasn't looking good. And there were a lot of those reports in the Boston media, quite frankly. But it seemed like it was, it was a slow play. It seemed like some of those reports were to get the Patriots to show, to shower Brady in both attention and cash. And it was a test of Belichick, quite frankly,

because he doesn't like to do either of those things. And he ended up not doing either of those things. I think it's a bit of a football tragedy just in the sense. I mean, Tom Brady won the division every year from 2003 every time he started his season and ended the season. Okay. The Matt Castle here, by the way, still won 10 games, but they did. 11. 11 games.

11, excuse me, 11 games. Thank you, Justin for that. So I'm here for it. Yeah, of course. Matt Castle. I was erasing Matt Castle from one win. Okay. So I think that it's a bit of football.

tragedy in the sense that I wanted to see how long on this could go. Tom Brady's going to be 43. Tom Brady Sr. told New England, the New England, the New York Times magazine in 2015 that this will end badly. And that's sort of been the rosetta stone of this whole thing, that they've sort of always known that the guiding principles of the Patriot Way are people leave too early instead of too late, that they're not going to, as I said, shower people on intention and cash. They're just going to be business as usual. And at one point, that would get Tom Brady. I think we all thought Tom Brady would be different. I think that the options out there for both parties, for both Belichick and Brady, I think that finding each other again for one more season was probably

the best option for the both of them. I understand from an offensive standpoint, maybe you want to throw to Mike Evans or Keenan Allen or whomever, but just infrastructure wise, defense wise, coach wise, New England was the best infrastructure for him with the exception of the weapons. And I felt like maybe they could have worked something out with the weapons. Now, it would have been hard to swing a trade for a Gianjadre Hopkins or Stefan Diggs in that I don't think Bill O'Brien would have traded DeAndre Hopkins New England and, you know, obviously a huge threat within the AFC, although who the hell knows what's going on with Bill O'Brien? And then beyond that, I don't think they would have given up a first for Stefan Diggs. So I think it would have been

hard for them to upgrade. A.J. Green obviously, franchise. There, there is no real star tight end in the market. You're drafting late. So it would have been hard for them to capitalize on this wide receiver class. I understand the limitations of weapons, but I just thought New England made so much sense. Justin, what do you think? I mean, I wanted to take a step back for a second, and you were talking about the idea of letting players leave a year or two early versus a year or two too late.

And I always thought that Tom Brady was going to be a Robert Kraft decision more than a Bill Belichick decision. It just seemed like with that type of relationship, I mean, you see the statements today where Robert Kraft saying that he loves Tom Brady like a son. That's not new. Robert Kraft has said that many times over the past 20 years how he views Tom Brady as family. But Bill Belichick is never going to grant a player sacred cow status. And that even comes to the greatest quarterback of all time. As far as the roster building goes, I really expected the Patriots to try to do something at some point this offseason.

But it quickly became clear that it didn't have really have. the means to. But this isn't to say that they haven't tried. Like, if you look at last year, they really tried to get the Brady the necessary pieces to compete on office. They brought Josh Gordon back, and that, of course, didn't work. They tried to bring in Antonio Brown. Right. They brought an Antonio Brown. Even the Mohammed Sunu trade, people were very down on that. He was not great except for possibly that first game, the one, his first game was the one they they lost to Baltimore. But one of the undertold parts of that story is that Muhammad Sanoo played every game for the Patriots

besides that one with a high ankle sprain. So the Patriots did try. It just wasn't good enough. And I had expected them to make some kind of move this offseason, but there just weren't any options. Hunter Henry was franchise tagged. He was linked to the Patriots a lot. You know, somebody like even O.J. Howard and Tampa, who the Patriots said,

have been rumored to try to trade for a couple times. I don't know if that was like just conjecture by fans or if that was actually legitimate. AJ Green franchise as well. Yeah. You just, there just wasn't anything available for them. So you'd have to imagine that played a big factor in Brady's decision. But I think beyond everything,

I think they could have still worked it out. It just seems like both, it seems like both sides had kind of just had kind of just had enough. Yeah. And that's a strange thing because it seems to me announcing you're going to leave before you announce your destination, all that stuff, leaving like this, he wanted to leave. I mean, this is the reason that Jeff Darlington reported on ESPN a month ago that he was quote, really looking forward to free agency. Darlington also reported that he'd be shocked to the return to the Patriots. Darlington was absolutely right. I think that there's

there was just a little bit of he just wants to see another situation. And there's been reporting on this the last couple of years that Brady's been frustrated, a lot of things. We talked about this before we started.

I mean, obviously this had Pickersham story. I mean, something as simple as Brady wanted to do Patriot of the week and he wasn't. Probably some lingering deflate gate hostility, I guess you could say. The drafting drafting Jimmy Garoppolo. Drafting Jimmy Garapolo and all the drama that went along there

and all the smoke around that trade and what that meant for the future of the Patriots and who was picking who and all that. I think that this was just Tom Brady deciding it was time. You said something incredibly grim about 10 seconds before we started recording, which was, I just wish Brian Hoyer wasn't tied up in Indianapolis.

I didn't say, I wish. I said that it's... It's too bad. It's too bad. And it just seems like Brian Hoyer... It seems... So, do we want to talk about the Patriot Next Options? Because that's what I was bringing up in the sense of... That's what I'm segueuing to, because I wanted to bring up how grim the options might be, because you're already... It's 9.59 on the West Coast, and you're already in Brian Hoyer land.

The Patriots were rumored to be in play for Teddy Bridgewater, but it looks like he's going to sign with the Panthers. That deal might have already happened. So the options for the Patriots, it now looks like Andy Dalton or rolling with Jared Stidham. And you would have to believe that... Well, I mean, your James Winstons are out there. I love the Bill Simmons theory that Belichick's last act will be turning Jamis Winston to a winning accurate, safe quarterback.

Kevin, I spoke to Tom Curran last week for an article that I wrote about Brady potentially leaving before this happened. And I brought up James Winston and Tom Curran said Belichick would rather create a five-car pile-up on Route 95 to prevent James Winston from getting to Foxborough than let him anywhere near the stadium. So five-car pile-up is a pretty good way to put it. Yeah. Well, James Winston is, if nothing else, the quarterback equivalent of a five-car pile-up.

Yeah, exactly. Is you've got a rubberneck and look at it, but you don't want to be any part of it. I can't stop watching it. But again, I don't want to be on that highway. Okay. So where do the Patriots go? I think somebody like Andy Dalton could make sense. I mean, I'm sure they could sign an extension that will, um,

get his salary cap to work. I think they could spread the money out because that's the other thing. The Patriots don't have a lot of salary cap room left. So it's a matter of what veteran they can get that fits. But I don't think they're bringing in this whatever veteran they bring in to be the guy. I think they're bringing it in as a bridge either to Jared Stidham or whatever quarterback they may draft this year or next year. There's a lot of talk that the Patriots are actually really high on Stidham. So there was a report that came out last week that Jeff Howe wrote. He spoke to Jordan Palmer who has worked with Jared Stidham for the past few years. Jordan Palmer believes, according to this piece, that Jarrett Stidham is the next guy in New England and that he has a bright future as a franchise quarterback.

And you have to believe, and there's been other rumors, other rumblings coming out that the Patriots are very high on Stim. Like, at the end of last year, there was a lot of talk about how great he was performing in practice. I'm sure some of this is spin to kind of help the fan base kind of process this a little. But, like, Jarrah Stidham is not going to make the fan base feel better about losing Tom Brady. But even taking this all with a grain of salt, you have to believe that they're high on Stidham. So there is a chance that they bring in someone like Dalton to maybe be the quarterback this year, or maybe they bring in someone like Nick Foles to compete for the job. I mean, I don't think if they trade for Nick Foles, and I don't think they would.

It doesn't seem like giving up assets for Nick Foles is something the Patriots are likely to do. But if they were, I'm not sure he would immediately have the starting job. I think that Stidham or the next quarterback that they draft is probably going to be the solution here and not whatever free agent or veteran quarterback they trade for. Yes. I think that the actions will tell us pretty quickly how they feel about Jared's did them. Okay. And so I don't think he's Gropolo 2.0 in the sense that he would have pushed Brady out if Brady were still playing at his peak.

I think that's one thing that I think is really interesting about this particular decision. And maybe if Gropolo stayed, this happens a couple years ago and everything's a little different. Maybe if the 28 to 3 thing doesn't happen, everything plays out differently. But when great quarterbacks moved on and almost every quarterback, every elite, elite, you know, top Hall of Fame quarterback ends with a different team. But usually it's because they were forced out by another option. Peyton Manning was cut loose because the culture about to draft Andrew Locke. Steve Young pushed Joe Montana to Kansas City.

Aaron Rogers and his emergence in practice was really the reason that Brett Farb was deemed expendable once Brett Farv kept trying to come back for the 33rd time, right? And so I think that what's unusual about this is that there were just no other options. And that's kind of why the, you know, Brady just wants to leave thing is probably surprised a lot of people, quite frankly, including myself. I just thought that something would just happen just because, again, he just has so much familiarity there. And I feel like if he wanted to leave, he could have done it a couple of years ago. So I, this is one of the more intriguing things maybe in the last five years of teams is where the Patriots go from here. Because this is something I've talked about, Robert Mays has talked about it, we've talked about in the office. where essentially Belichick is such a, I've compared him to sort of MacGyver,

in the sense that he is able to craft, he's able to get out of whatever situation is put in front of them, whether that's Jacoby Brissette starting on a short week against the Texans, where that's Jimmy Grapolo starting, whether that's, oh, we don't have any wide receivers, we'll figure this out with, you know, exploiting the middle of the field with tight ends and the slot receiver or whatever. He's been able to figure out almost any problem. And I don't, I don't know how he views the 2020 season now without Tom Brady. This is really probably the biggest problem he's ever had to solve, probably. I mean, he had Matt Patricia's defensive coordinator, and that wasn't as big a problem as this.

And so I, I'm intrigued to see where he goes, whether he goes to quote unquote safe option, does the Andy Dalton, whether he tries to sort of reimagine the position, whether he does almost a Taysom Hill type thing where he tries to have change of pace guys or who that might be. I don't know. But what I do know is that I think football fans in a weird way, and this is not a Patriots thing, this is a football fans thing, football dorks thing. I think football fans win when Bill Belichick is presented with a problem like this. Oh, absolutely.

I mean, it's exciting in some way. I mean, it's not exciting for me as somebody who grew up a Patriots fan to envision a life without Tom Brady, but it is exciting as the football. fan to think about what Belichick can do. I mean, you've brought up that percent game, which is, you know, I think we joke, but I do think there is some part of Belichick that considers that his masterpiece. Yeah. And listen, there's a reason he signed Tim Tebow, right? Like, he has been intrigued with reimagining that position in the past. Okay. So for Brady now, is there anyone you can think of outside of the chargers and the bucks who you say, okay, that could be appealing? Or do you like

the Chargers and the Bucks from a football standpoint as fits from a from just a fan base standpoint and a I don't know a vibe standpoint I don't like either um I just don't want to see him playing in empty stadiums in either place and I think that you know I saw a headline the other day from I think it was Tampa Bay times where they were just like you know the bucks are making this push because the Bucks have tens of thousands of tickets to sell and I just it kind of bums me out that the two teams chasing Tom Brady are both in that position. And I don't necessarily want to see that. See, I cannot think of a weirder jersey for Tom Brady to end up in than those Tampa Bay Bucks jerseys. I can picture him in a charges, they are. They are,

but like they're not, I saw a preview of them. I think what I think it was a preview. I don't think they're going to be as radically different as we hope. I think there's, I mean, maybe they're they won't look like alarm clerks anymore, but who's to say? It's a low bar. I cannot think of a weirder jersey for him than a Tampa Bay Bucks jersey. I mean, I can squint, I can close my eyes, and I can picture him in a Chargers jersey. I can picture him in a Raiders jersey. I can picture him in almost any jersey.

I just have difficulty with the Tampa Bay Bucks. With that said, I think the Bucks make a lot of football sense. They have a decent offensive line. they have, which is very important to Brady. I mean, he played with a lot of instability on his offensive line last year. His center went out before the season. His left tackle was injured for large parts of the season. He's always needed a clean pocket to do well.

And I think the Bucks can offer him a better version of that than a lot of other teams that may be possible. For example, the Chargers, which don't offer anything on the offensive line. But more importantly than that, it's... they have probably the best one-two receiving combo in the league, especially now that Stefan Diggs is in Buffalo. Chris Godwin and Mike Evans would instantly become the best, I know you're a Wes Welker fan, but they would instantly become the best one-two wide receiver duo

that Brady has ever thrown to. We know that Brady likes tight-at. Now we're angry. Now we're in a different conversation. So last night on Slack, I suggest we were talking about the best free agent wide receivers ever. And I mentioned Wes Welker was a free agent after back to back.

One season of 1,500 yards, one season of 1,300 yards. He had over 1,000 yards every time he started more than 12 games for New England. And you said, someone else asked the question. And then you jumped in, you were like, oh, add Amandola too. And I had to just, I had to just point out that Amandola and Welker are not on the same planet. West Welker is not appreciated enough. Well, okay, I was being completely facetious about comparing Amadola to West Welker. But I do think that we're talking about a different class of receiver when we go from Wes Welker to someone like Chris Godwin, who is the number two in...

Randy Moss was pretty good. That's why I'm using Randy Moss as the Mike Evans as the Randy Moss of this situation, and then Chris Godwin as the number two, right? So I disavowal this conversation, but keep going. Okay. But with the possible exception of 2007 and 2009, because if you remember, West Welker was coming off an ACL injury in 2010 and Randy Moss was traded after, I believe, week four. So with the exception of 2007 and 2009, possibly, this would be the best wide receiver duo

that Brady has ever worked with. he would also get an athletic tight end. We know that Brady had his really, his sustained success came when he had, when he was working with Rob Grunkowski. We saw what happened this past year without Grunkowski. We saw what happened in 2013 when Grunkowski lost most of the season to injury. Tom Brady has always been better when he has that tight end to work with. Now, O.J. Howard is not Rob Gruncalfrey. And he, you know, we've been waiting for him to break out since Tampa Bay drafted him.

But you see the pieces here. You see those three guys. You see the decent offensive line. You see Bruce Ariens who had, who did some great work with Carson Palmer at the end of his career. And it feels like a really good football fit. Now, the question is, does Bruce Ariens system work for Tom Brady? Because I think Ariens could make that work. I think Arians makes it work.

You make it work with Tom Brady if you get Tom Brady. But there is the question because Ariens likes for his quarterback to throw downfield. I think James Winston had like three extra average intended air yards per NFL next-gen stats more than Tom Brady did last year. Some of that is probably systems because McDaniels runs a system that relies on precise routes, very tight, very short throws. And Brady's worked well in that. But I think Ariens can find a way to make this work when you have that kind of talent and this and you throw the greatest quarterback of all time into it. Who do you like, Kevin? From a football standpoint, I kind of agree with you.

I mean, I think the one thing that that has been a constant in my reporting with New England over the years is just how much he likes trust in his receivers. And I think that that's really hard to guess on that. But my guess is if you have someone like Mike Evans, you could just go up. get passes and dominate, you're going to have trust really quickly. I mean, chemistry is really important with him. Work ethic is really important, just the ability, you know, him and he and Peyton Manning are kind of the kings of just getting every, getting chemistry down to a science, even though that seems chemistry is a science, obviously, but it is also a, you know, I think that it's probably overlooked a lot in football and football, and those two guys kind of pioneered,

telling receivers where they needed to be and not trusting anybody who doesn't get to where they need to be, right? That's sort of the simplest way to put it. And so I agree Tampa has the weapons. Again, that's just a weird place, man. That's just a weird place. I know. If I were to guess that's where he goes, but I could also see the field. I mean, if you wake up right now and you're a McCasky and he say, why aren't we making a run at Tom Brady? I understand that not every team has the cash or the cap space. or whatever, but I just think that the, the, the, if this goes on for a couple days, I think more teams might start making calls.

Yeah. I mean, it's, it's, we all thought the Titans were a possibility. They obviously resigned, uh, Ryan Tanna Hill. Um, the Raiders have been long rumored to be in this. Um, they signed Marcus Marriota last night. I don't think that for, which by the way, was long rumored to be a patriot. Right. Potential, uh, you know, tool in the toolbox.

Well, that was that was kind of like the the half joke, half like, oh, God, this is going to happen, right? Bill Belichick gets Marcus Marriota and reinvents him and, you know, the Patriots go 11 and 5 for the next 10 years or 12 and 4 and went, you know, but I don't think the Raiders signing Marcus Marriota precludes them from going after Tom Brady. I have not seen the money on the Marioata contract. I've just other stuff has happened in the world, but I can't imagine that it's prohibitive from. making a move for Tom Brady, should they want to. You have to feel like Derek Carr is not the long-term solution there. I know that him and Froodin have worked it out to a certain extent, but those tensions always seem to bubble up.

I don't know. It's hard for me to envision other teams. San Francisco did the smart thing and said that they're not going to pursue anything. What other teams are potentially out there? You mentioned the Bears. Most teams are set at quarter. I think they're set of quarterback. And that's one of the reasons

his market is a little more thin than you would anticipate because, I mean, obviously, I don't think Carolina would rather sound like someone like Teddy Bridgewater or not. They're not in the market to win now. And so I think that there's, there's a lot of moving parts.

But I don't know, man. This has been a very weird week for everybody and now it's a weird week for football people. We got to get back to our coverage. You heard of here first. Justin Sales wants the Patriots to sell the farm for Brian Hoyer. Bring them back.

Let's get the band back together. Let's do it. All right. Thank you so much, Justin. This has been the Ringer NFL show and the Ringer Podcast Network. We'll be back for the next big news, which might be Tom Brady signing.

We'll be back later in the week for a huge sort of catch-all pod. Thanks for listening.