Belichick and Brady

by Michael Holley

  Kraft was comfortable enough to applaud Goodell, even when scores of fans and even players were pointing out some of the commissioner’s obvious contradictions and conflicts of interest. Goodell swore by the letter of the NFL law when it was convenient, and when it wasn’t he’d go with something else. His handling of Rice was a perfect example. He made his ruling with the original two-game suspension. It was light, by most accounts, but it was his binding decision. When the video was released, a video that the Associated Press reported someone in the NFL had seen prior to its TMZ release, Goodell deflected the heat by “retrying” Rice for a case the commissioner had heard months earlier.

  Goodell was fond of saying that he would change his mind on penalties if he was given new information. In the Rice case, as disturbing as the video was, the information wasn’t new; the overwhelmingly negative reaction was. Rice and Janay, who had married since the incident, talked openly about that night and how it was a test of their relationship. They’d gone to counseling. Rice was in a domestic violence diversion program. Obviously something happened to warrant that.

  Even before the controversial fall of 2014, many players bristled at the inflexibility of Goodell. All any dissenting voice could do was lash out publicly because the seat of power was Goodell’s.

  “I have confidence in his judgment and whatever he decides is in the best interest of the game,” Kraft told the Globe. “I have a lot of confidence that Roger Goodell is doing that all the time.”

  Kraft’s early-season issue was public relations for the commissioner and the league. The on-field Patriots simply had an issue of execution. They were a raggedy 2-1 after beating the Raiders at Gillette, 16–9. Their next game, September 29, was a Monday Night Football special in Kansas City. America wasn’t used to seeing the Patriots play like this. They were so bad in a 41–14 loss that with just over ten minutes to play, a familiar symbol of winning was out of the game, standing on the sideline with his arms folded. That was the nice way of describing Tom Brady’s 159-yard passing day. In other words, Brady was benched.

  No one expected young Jimmy Garoppolo to make his debut so soon, under these circumstances. He threw seven passes, completed six, and got his first touchdown pass when the touchdown-creator himself, Gronk, converted a 13-yard pass into a score. For the first time since the early days of Brady–Drew Bledsoe, Belichick was asked about his quarterback after the game. He had made a reference to evaluating everything, to which a local TV reporter, Mike Giardi, followed up, “Do you consider evaluating the quarterback position?”

  Belichick stared for a long time and smirked. It was his visual way of saying that he wasn’t crazy enough to demote Brady. But the talk around his 2-2 team was imbalanced, and the combination of commentary and wild reporting had no limits. A few minutes after the game, former NFL quarterback Trent Dilfer stood on the field at red-clad Arrowhead Stadium and emphatically diagnosed the Patriots for his ESPN audience.

  “When you’re weak, when you’re the weakest kid and you go into a bully’s house, you get the snot beat out of you. We saw a weak team. The New England Patriots, let’s face it: They’re not good anymore.”

  There was more of that at the nearest media outlets, local and national. No one was spared. Three weeks earlier, during his weekly segment on WEEI, Brady had been asked a question about how long he wanted to play and he colorfully replied, “When I suck, I’ll retire. I don’t plan on sucking for a long time.” There were numerous one-liners on sports-talk radio about Brady, leading the twenty-ninth ranked offense in the league, and when that retirement announcement was coming.

  On and on it went, from former quarterback Boomer Esiason saying that “the Patriots have really big problems, and I don’t see the answer on their roster” to ESPN reporter Chris Mortensen citing sources claiming that Brady had “uncomfortable tension” with the coaching staff and was unhappy due to his lack of involvement in game plans. Mortensen went on to say that Garoppolo would be the Patriots’ quarterback “sooner rather than later,” but not in 2014.

  For players having a hard time ignoring the noise, the coach gave a primer in the middle of the chaotic week. At one point during his press conference, he was asked about problems in the Kansas City game. He answered, “We’re on to Cincinnati,” which was the next opponent. Again, a reporter asked about the offense. Again, Belichick responded, “We’re on to Cincinnati.” This time, a reporter wanted to know if Belichick felt that he’d given a thirty-seven-year-old Tom Brady enough support to be successful.

  “We’re on to Cincinnati…”

  When the 3-0 Bengals finally arrived for a Sunday Night Football matchup, they met a team that hadn’t been seen all year. Brady was well protected all night, was sacked just once, and threw for nearly three hundred yards along with three touchdown passes. Just to prove its versatility, the offensive line pushed the Bengals back all night and allowed Josh McDaniels to call a staggering forty-six running plays. Being on to Cincinnati was a good thing. The Patriots won 43–17.

  They won again the next week, too, easily defeating Buffalo 37–22. Games against the Jets were tough, despite the talent level, so the next win was a much-closer-than-expected 27–25. Brady threw three touchdown passes, which gave him a total of ten in the past three games. No one mentioned retirement, tension on the coaching staff, or young Jimmy Garoppolo anymore. Yet Brady was agitated during the Jets game, and the texting Patriots employees, Jim McNally and John Jastremski, thought they knew why. Jastremski, whom Brady often referred to as “JJ” or “Jonny,” was most responsible for preparing footballs so they had the proper feel for game day.

  “Tom is acting crazy about balls,” Jastremski texted to a friend about twenty-five minutes after the kickoff against the Jets. “Ready to vomit!” he added five seconds later.

  The friend replied two minutes later. “He saying they’re not good enough??”

  “Tell later,” Jastremski answered.

  The next morning, Jastremski texted his fiancée about the previous night’s footballs. “Ugh… Tom was right. I just measured some of the balls. They supposed to be 13lbs… They were like 16. Felt like bricks.” Later, he and McNally got back into their texting routine regarding the overinflated footballs. League quarterbacks are allowed to treat the footballs as they please, with the intention of reducing the new-football slickness by game day. The only restriction is that the air pressure in the football has to fall within range of 12.5 and 13.5 pounds per square inch, or PSI. In October 2014, it was a topic that rarely, if ever, came up during football discussions. The talking heads on TV didn’t mention it, nor did coaches, the commissioner, or the fantasy football crowd. It was the realm, presumably, of quarterbacks and officials.

  “Tom sucks,” McNally texted Jastremski. “im going to make that next ball a fuckin balloon.”

  “Talked to him last night,” Jastremski replied. “He actually brought you up and said you must have a lot of stress trying to get them done. I told him it was. He was right though… I checked some of the balls this morn… The refs fucked us… a few of them were at almost 16. They didn’t recheck them after they put air in them.”

  McNally responded, “Fuck tom… 16 is nothing… wait till next sunday.”

  Twenty seconds later, Jastremski replied, “Omg! Spaz.”

  Since the Patriots played the Jets on a Thursday night, they had ten days before their next game, at home against the Bears. It was a stretch of games where Darrelle Revis and the entire defense would be challenged because it featured some of the most prolific quarterbacks in the game. In succession, the Patriots would face Jay Cutler, Peyton Manning, Andrew Luck, Matthew Stafford, Aaron Rodgers, and Philip Rivers.

  Before any of that happened, leading up to the Bears game, McNally seemed to enjoy the text thread of screwing with Brady and the inflation of the footballs.

  “Make sure you blow up the ball to look like a rugby ball so tom can get used to it before Sunday,” he wrote to Jastremski five days before the game. Nine
minutes later, Jastremski’s reply was simply “Omg.”

  They resumed the conversation two days later, a full week after the Jets game. Jastremski picked up the thread this time with, “Can’t wait to give you your needle this week,” and included a smiling emoticon at the end. Seven minutes later, McNally wrote, “Fuck tom… make sure the pump is attached to the needle… fuckin watermelons coming.”

  “So angry,” Jastremski answered.

  “The only thing deflating sun. is his passing rating,” McNally wrote for his walk-off line.

  Once again, on Friday, two days before playing the Bears, there was more banter. Jastremski started it this time. “I have a big needle for you this week.” McNally responded, “Better be surrounded by cash and newkicks… or its a rugby sunday.” Thirteen minutes later he added, “Fuck tom.”

  Jastremski answered, “Maybe u will have some nice size 11s in ur locker.” To which McNally wrote, “Tom must be working your balls hard this week.”

  Sunday, it turned out, wasn’t as interesting as the exchange between the employees. The Patriots breezed through their first quarterback test. They had 38 points by halftime, and if McNally did anything sinister to Brady’s footballs, the Patriots quarterback had no problems with it. He threw a season-high five touchdown passes, three of them to Gronk, and the Patriots prevailed, 51–23.

  It had been just one month since the head coach was being asked about evaluating the quarterback; since many writers, fans, and former players suggested that Brady’s best days were behind him; since that shrill statement from Trent Dilfer, above the postgame din of Arrowhead Stadium, that the Patriots were “not good anymore.”

  After a surprisingly easy 43–21 win over the Broncos, their fifth straight win since Kansas City, they really weren’t good anymore. They were ascending past that, and they were unmistakably the best team in the conference. Before the Broncos’ game, or Brady-Manning round sixteen, there was a lengthy ESPN story comparing the quarterbacks. One of Brady’s friends, Kevin Brady (no relation), responded to the article in an e-mail to Tom, and part of the quarterback’s reply provided a hint into his mind-set: “I’ve got another 7 or 8 years. He has 2. That’s the final chapter. Game on.”

  Future aside, Brady and the Patriots had to go back in history to remember the last time they had seen a cornerback like Revis. In the ten-year space since Ty Law’s departure and Revis’s arrival, the Patriots had an assortment of corners with various quirks. Asante Samuel was a playmaker with good hands, but he wasn’t physical and wasn’t effective in all areas of the field. Devin McCourty had a great rookie season, but he lost confidence in year two, and by year three and now, he was a full-time free safety. A bunch of draft picks, from Darius Butler to Jonathan Wilhite to Terrence Wheatley, had track-star speed but struggled to track the football in the air. They’d all had frustrating episodes when they’d be facing the receiver, back to the ball, as the ball came zipping in past their earholes. The best corners had a quick clock in their heads, one thousand one, one thousand two, one thou—bam. Turn and look for that ball in about 2.6 seconds.

  Revis was even better than that. He combined instincts and study, so he paid attention to receivers adjusting their gloves before a play (This is his play, he’s pulling his gloves) and added that to his existing knowledge of the formation and the receiver’s tendencies. The Patriots used to be bullied by the best receivers. But now they had an ace fighter at their fingertips, a guy who could get it done with toughness and smarts.

  Going into Indianapolis on November 16, it wasn’t a game for a skilled player like Revis. It wasn’t even a game for Brady. When the Patriots played the Colts, it was elementary football, Big Kids versus Little Kids. Belichick was known for having different game plans for different opponents, and not being afraid to switch things up. It wasn’t that deep against the Colts. The Patriots believed that they could line up and overpower them, and that’s what they’d done since Chuck Pagano, a former Ravens assistant coach, took over Indianapolis in 2012.

  The first time the Patriots played the Pagano-led Colts, in 2012, they scored 59 points and ran for 115 yards.

  The second time they played, in 2013, they scored 43 points and ran for 234 yards and six rushing touchdowns.

  This was going to be the third time, and the expectation from the offensive linemen was that they were going to be doing a lot of run-blocking for someone. On this night, that someone would be an undrafted muscle man named Jonas Gray. He was five-foot-nine and ripped, and he naturally ran low without much flourish. His running style was Man Runs through Wall. He was raw, basic, and he tapped into the Colts’ biggest weakness. They were soft. They couldn’t do a thing about it when good teams ran at them repeatedly. Gray finished the game with 201 rushing yards and four touchdowns in a 42–20 win. The Colts were the best team in their division, the AFC South, so they were headed to the play-offs. One team they didn’t want to see in the postseason was the Patriots.

  Before the next game, against the Lions at Gillette, Brady did an interview with one of his former teammates in the media, Randy Moss. Like many Patriots in their playing days, Moss was hesitant in interviews. But as an analyst for Fox, his natural personality was on display. All of his New England teammates enjoyed him, none more than Brady, whose locker had been next to Moss’s.

  The TV session began with Moss teasing the Fox crew, saying they were preparing rose petals for Brady the same way royal attendants did in the Eddie Murphy movie Coming to America.

  “I heard that,” Brady said as he walked on the set, drawing laughs from everyone.

  The Brady-Moss interview captured the mutual respect between the men. Brady was extremely comfortable on camera, more comfortable than usual, and he gave Moss the most honest answer to date on the criticism he’d received earlier in the season.

  “Really, for my pro career, I’ve never really had a lot of criticism. We won the first year that I played. And then we won two more shortly after that. Then we had some unbelievable years where we went undefeated. So this is really the first time that people have come down on me.”

  The understanding between the two, and all of America for that matter, was that Brady would be scrutinized for what he did on the field. And since he and the Patriots were on a seven-game winning streak, after a 34–9 win over Detroit, there wouldn’t be much about which to complain.

  In a boon for CBS, the network got to televise the game of the year, Patriots and Packers from Lambeau Field. With the way both teams were playing, 9-2 for the Patriots and 8-3 for the Packers, a Super Bowl meeting in Arizona was possible. As it was, the network was ecstatic over the ratings magnet of star quarterbacks Brady and Aaron Rodgers. During the game, which was as competitive as promised, play-by-play man Jim Nantz set up his partner, former Giants quarterback Phil Simms, to share a story about Rodgers’s preparation of the footballs.

  “He said something unique,” Simms said, explaining that Rodgers told him, “I like to push the limit to how much air we can put in the football, even go over what they allow you to do, and see if the officials take air out of it.” Simms said that Rodgers has unusually large hands, and that he finds large footballs easier to grip. Simms didn’t name any other quarterbacks specifically, but he said most of them were the opposite of Rodgers in that they want the football “smaller and soft, so they can dig their fingers into it.” Simms added one more nugget: “You know, the officials do check those footballs. Sometimes they can get lucky and put an extra half pound of air in there to help Aaron Rodgers out.”

  The Patriots lost to the Packers, 26–21, and air pressure was not the reason. The bigger problem was air space, as Rodgers was able to artfully complete a key third-down pass to receiver Randall Cobb, who was well covered by Patriot Logan Ryan. That play effectively won the game, preventing Brady from another opportunity against the Packers’ defense.

  The Patriots collected impressive wins in San Diego and at home against Miami before going to New York to take on Revis’s old
Jets.

  The tone had changed considerably since Revis last played there. Head coach Rex Ryan used to be the loudest coach in the league, constantly bragging about the talent of his players and their abilities to frustrate anyone who challenged them. But he and John Idzik, the general manager, didn’t view the talent the same way these days. Both men were most likely out after the season, which meant that the organization would have its fifth different head coach and fifth different GM since Belichick got to New England.

  The Jets were 3-11, the opposite record of the Patriots. From a Jets perspective, there was something spiritually wrong about the best homegrown talent the organization ever produced going to New England and putting the Patriots in position to win another Super Bowl. When Ryan had arrived in New York promising to take down the Patriots, his words were backed up by the skills of Revis. Now there was number 24, in red, white, and blue, helping to steamroll him. The game was close, 17–16, but the Patriots were back where they always were: division champs, preparing for the postseason, forcing another divisional rival to clear out a regime and start over.

  As they began thinking about the play-offs, Robert Kraft and Bill Belichick also strategized on what to do about the words of Jets owner Woody Johnson. They believed Johnson was guilty of tampering when he answered a question about Revis at a press conference and said, “Darrelle is a great player. If I thought I could have gotten Darrelle, for [what the Patriots got him for], I probably would have taken him… I’d love Darrelle to come back.”

  It was one thing to say that about a player who was under contract for three or four years. It was just short of recruiting to say it about Revis, whom the league understood to be in a contract year. He also had history with the Jets and, in the NFL’s dark world of back-channel dealing, it wasn’t unrealistic to think that the Jets and Revis’s representatives had been in contact about options after the 2014 season. As it was, the case seemed to be unambiguous when Johnson’s comments were compared to the NFL’s tampering policy: “Any public or private statement of interest, qualified or unqualified, in another club’s player to that player’s agent or representative, or to a member of the news media, is a violation of this Anti-Tampering Policy.”