Tom Brady Talks About the Retirement Question
Tom Brady made his weekly appearance on WEEI this morning and was asked about Adam Schefter’s pregame speculation that this is his final year. In New England at least, if not his last year in football altogether:
Brady:
“That is the great part for me, I don’t know. I think that has been a unique situation that I have been in because I think when you commit to a team for a certain amount of years you kind feel like (there is) the responsibility to always fulfill the contract.
“For me, it’s been good because I am just taking it day-by-day and I am enjoying what I have. I don’t know what the future holds and the great part is for me, football at this point is all borrowed time. I never expected to play 20 years and I am playing on a great team and it’s just been an incredible 20 years of my life. To play for Mr. Kraft, and Jonathan and the Kraft family and for Coach Belichick and to have so much success is a dream come true.
“One day I will wake up and I will feel like, ‘OK, that will be enough.’ When that day comes, that day comes. I don’t know if it will be after this year. I don’t know if it will be five years from now. I don’t have to determine those things right now, either. That is kind of a good part of where I am at. Just take advantage of the opportunities that I have this year and do the very best I can do and then those decisions come at probably more appropriate times.”
I mention this for a couple of reasons. First, because this is word for word exactly how I want my 42 year old quarterback who’s playing at a level no one close to his age has ever come close to answering this question. He doesn’t know. I don’t know. You don’t know. God only knows, and He’s not telling.
I don’t mind for one second the question coming up today because Schefter’s speculation made it relevant. But in general, I’ve been baffled by this talk for at least five years now, if not more. Every time I talk to a group of Patriots fans, which is a lot, I get the “When is Brady going to retire?” question. Why? What’s the obsession? Some day we may live long enough to find ourselves in a world where Tom Brady is no longer quarterbacking a pro football team. That work will be carried out by 32 lesser men. That sadness will be our reality. Why not deal with it then? Why give it one more day than it deserves? Someday we’ll all be gasping our last breath. Does that mean we should spend every day until then obsessing over when, where and how it’s going to happen? Or should we just live in the moment. Appreciate the blessings bestowed upon us. And live each of them to their fullest.
Simply put, do you want to focus on what’s going to happen down the road at the cost of being able to fully enjoy moments like this?
Not me. Anything that happens in the offseason is Future Jerry’s problem. I’m living in the here and now.
Secondly, I defy anyone to show me one thing Brady has said – either in today’s interview I just quoted or at any other time – that has you convinced he’s done in New England at the end of the season. Just one. And yet somehow it’s become a given with some people that he is. People like Felger and Mazz, who make it part of every discussion. When they’re not bizarrely flexing on Kyle Van Noy like he bullied them in school or something:
They say it constantly. “Do Patriots fans really want, in Brady’s last year, for ____ to happen?” and so on. I know they’ll say anything just to push their listeners buttons, but I’ve never heard anything like this in a lifetime wasted listening to Boston radio. It’s surreal.
There’s a fallacy used in Philosophy and Logic referred to as Petitio Principii. It literally translates as “begging the question.” It’s to assume as accepted fact something you’re supposed be proven through argument. So for instance, “Because Thornton is so well endowed, women all want to be with him and men wish they were him.” As opposed to starting the discussion with, you know, a tape measure. This suggestion that Brady’s imminent departure from Foxboro is already settled science is just such a fallacy. Could it happen? Of course. But nobody has the first clue. Judging by what he said today, not even Brady. So you’re insane if you take the words of media types like F&M or even Schefter.
Instead I’ll suggest you do what I’m doing. Fully embracing the ride we’re on, every second of every day. And focus on the things Brady is focused on. Like Mohamed Sanu:
