Tom is getting upset.
The man who said he’ll retire when he sucks but who didn’t retire immediately after Monday night’s suck-filled loss to the Chiefs wasn’t ready to embrace the man who replaced Brady following a pick-six that pushed the score of last night’s game to 41-7.
Via Ben Volin of the Boston Globe, Brady passed out plenty of high fives and other congratulations to offensive players following the seven-play, 81-yard scoring drive engineered by rookie Jimmy Garoppolo. But Brady steered clear of Garoppolo.
It’s probably nothing personal against Garoppolo, even though he managed to immediately do something with the same offense that Brady has had a hard time doing anything with all year long. A broader sense of frustration likely lingers for Brady given the decision to not use the second-round pick that landed Garoppolo on, say, an offensive lineman or a tight end.
Still, Brady isn’t playing well. He has a career-low 79.4 passer rating and a career-low yards-per-attempt of 5.8. While the situation can be blamed on any of the other 10 offensive players, franchise quarterbacks usually find a way to play well despite flaws in those around them. Brady isn’t.
“Everything should be on the table now with Brady and the Patriots,” Volin writes, “if [coach Bill] Belichick truly wants to do what’s best for the team, as he constantly stresses.”
For Belichick, the real question becomes whether Brady gets special treatment given those 10, 11, and 13-year-old Super Bowl rings, or whether the head coach will rip the name off the back of the jersey and make a cold, dispassionate assessment of whether the current starter at the quarterback position should continue to be the starter, for the balance of 2014 and beyond.
Or maybe Belichick is just biding his time for another Mo Lewis moment.