Life without Tom Brady: For the first time since 1999, here are all the things we (thankfully) never have to think about again

I get it. It’s funny because he doesn’t look like an NFL quarterback. Do we really have to trot this thing out dozens of times, year-round, just to point out that sometimes great players don’t start out looking like Hall of Famers or that there is value in the lower draft rounds? At this point, this picture is as tired as the list of all the guys who have played QB for the Bears during the time Green Bay had Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers. WE GET IT ALREADY. And look. I’m not a Tom Brady fan (as will quickly become crystal clear), but no one should be subjected to the worst picture they took in college for the rest of their lives.

This might have been funny if this entire Super Bowl and parade hadn’t happened in the midst of a pandemic that killed millions of people. Anyway, here’s a drunken Tom Brady casually tossing the Lombardi Trophy off a boat. Oh, and guess who came down with COVID right after this? Tom Brady.

During the height of the COVID pandemic (which is not over, by the way, get your booster!), Brady struggled significantly with the concept of wearing a mask so as not to spread the germs in your mouth and nasal cavity into the mouths and nasal cavities of those around you. First, Brady got busted working out in a park that was closed to prevent the spread the COVID. Then, he got in trouble for not wearing a mask when arriving at Bucs’ workouts, for which he was deservedly dragged by Twitter. 

Even Brady’s dad said he tried to talk him into wearing a mask. And then, of course, there was Brady acting like he was at Spring Break during the 2022 Super Bowl celebration, with nary a mask in sight. And of course, Brady got COVID shortly thereafter.

In 2020 Brady, who is worth an estimated $300 million, took out a $960,000 PPP loan, which was intended to help small businesses stay afloat during the pandemic. The loan was to help out Brady’s TB12 company, and would seem to be unnecessary for someone who, though worth $300 million, wasn’t even the main breadwinner in his family (Brady’s ex, Gisele, is reportedly worth north of $400 million). So it’s hard to imagine that, between the two of them, Tom and Gisele couldn’t have come up with a measly $960k to keep TB12 going and, you know, leave the PPP loans to one of thousands of small businesses who didn’t get financial help from the government, but I digress.

What really raised eyebrows was when, days after receiving the PPP loan, Brady took delivery of a 40-foot yacht. What an outstanding look for a guy who seems to be super self-aware.

Hey, if you want to move Antonio Brown into your home after the dude has been caught on video harassing his ex in front of their kids and accused of various forms of sexual harassment and assault (Brown denied the allegations against him and settled the rape accusation in a civil matter in April of 2021), including forcible rape, knock yourself out. Like with most stupid things Brady does that are actively harmful to others (see the refusal to wear a mask, above), he was never asked to explain his actions, or why he believed a guy accused of harassing multiple women (and allegedly worse) should be playing in the NFL, which has an audience that is nearly 50 percent women. #NoMore, indeed.

1) This is the worst thirst trap I’ve ever seen. By thirst-trap standards, this is a school picture. 2) Who told you this was a good idea? And 3) Maybe get a hobby? Have you considered stand-up?

My wish for you is that you never have to think about Deflategate, Spygate, or anything else ending in “gate” related to the NFL ever again. I do, however, want all of us to remember the saga of Tom Brady’s destroyed cell phone and all the hilariously boring emails the NFL got their hands on, anyway.

Don’t get me wrong, this will never not be funny, but it is uncomfortable to look at after a while. The longer a look at it, the less Brady looks like Brady and the more he looks like that Orc in Osgiliath that was based on Harvey Weinstein. (Shudders).

As we all know by now, Tom Brady’s first attempt at retirement was a giant fake-out. Here’s what we had to say about Brady’s diabolical plan back when this story broke:

It seems that the Tom Brady retirement reversal wasn’t so much of a reversal as a plot gone very, very wrong. PFT, which initially reported part of the story in late February, revealed that Brady never actually intended to retire from the sport. He wanted to leave the Buccaneers to become a part-owner of the Dolphins, where, if all went according to plan, they would hire Sean Payton as their new head coach and Brady would negotiate a trade from Tampa Bay to start as Miami’s new quarterback.

Enter Brian Flores, the fired Dolphins head coach, who blew this plan to pieces with a groundbreaking lawsuit accusing the NFL of widespread racial discrimination in hiring practices. In the lawsuit, he also alleged that Dolphins owner Stephen Ross had attempted to bribe Flores to throw games, and had attempted to convince Flores to recruit another active QB, a violation of league rules that Flores refused to go along with.

The active QB in question? TB12, of course.

Forget the fact that Miami had one of the few Black head coaches in the NFL in Brian Flores, right Tom? Like with Antonio Brown, COVID, and PPP loans. all that seems to matter is what Tom wants, other people be damned. And Tom wanted to play for Sean Payton.

The big problem for Tom here is that Brian Flores was smart enough to know racial discrimination when he sees it, and Tom apparently doesn’t know what legal discovery is. At least this time he didn’t try to destroy his cell phone.

Smell ya later, Tom Brady. I’m going to live in bliss for an entire season without thinking about you once.