Tom Brady Gushing About Bill Belichick Has Me in a Glass Case of Emotion

Maddie Meyer. Getty Images.

If there's one kind of couple worse than the couple that can't quit arguing, it's the one that lives in a constant cycle of arguing, then making up, then arguing again. They're the absolute worst. Toxic, co-dependent relationships that stay together through thick and thicker, instead of doing the decent thing for themselves and everyone around them and simply break up. 

Courthouses around the country are crawling with these nutjobs on a daily basis. At least the ones I worked at were. An infinitesimal percentage of the population who have turned their bipolar relationship into performance art for all to enjoy. And made a lifestyle out of airing their private matters in court instead of simply parting ways. She calls the cops on him. They arrest him. She demands the police let him go because he didn't do anything wrong. He takes a restraining order out on her for threatening him. They hook up. She gets arrested for violating the order. He's before a judge the next day asking it to be vacated. As a veteran prosecutor once put it to me, "For some couples, it's foreplay." Fighting and verbal abuse as part of the mating ritual, like birds doing an elaborate dance or monkeys showing each other their big red butts. 

I bring this up because there has been no breakup that has affected me more than the marriage between Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. (Sorry to all my divorced friends. But with very few exceptions, I think you're better off. And as a guy who'll be monogamous for the rest of my life, I'm living vicariously through your divorcee sexual escapades. Keep up the good work.) That divorce was long and drawn out. We children of their relationship didn't get two Christmases and two birthdays out of the deal. We just suffered. We spent years interpreting their body language to gauge how badly they were getting along. Watched Brady skip out on optional workouts while Belichick was left to answer questions about getting work done without his quarterback. Every interview they gave was analyzed according to word usage, tone, and subtext to figure out how they really felt. It was as tedious as it was ugly. 

Obviously Brady went off to a better life without his coach and us. He got a ring. He's worn the pants in his new relationship. It's been all Instagrams with heart hands around a sunset at the beach with his new love and a "Live, laugh, love" caption. And while not as successfully, his ex moved on as well. Found someone new. And began putting the pieces of his/our lives back together. So I think I can speak for most Patriots fans (I always do) when I say we're in a good place right now.

What we don't need then is this:

CBS Sports - Tom Brady has publicly praised Bill Belichick before, but seldom has Brady offered it himself without the prodding of questions from the media. …

Brady did go out of his way to sing Belichick's praises this week while crediting his former coach for helping to inadvertently inspire his motivation to get into broadcasting. Brady, in case you haven't heard, is slated to begin his broadcasting career whenever he decides to hang up his cleats for good. 

"I love football and I care a lot about football, too. I'm always going to be involved in it one way or the other," Brady said during a roundtable interview with TNT's Ernie Johnson that aired after "The Match" golf event. "I was thinking about the opportunity to travel around and see these guys on different Friday afternoons and watching them practice and saying, 'Hey, here's a couple of things that worked for me.' 

"[Talking to] different coaches. I was around the most amazing coach, in Coach Belichick, the most amazing coaches over a period of time." 

And then after praising some of his New England teammate added, "I feel like I have a lot of knowledge."

Look, I enjoy a subtle dig at Bruce Arians as much as the next guy. But by showering Belichick - unsolicited - like this, all it does is cause pain. It brings back old feelings of a time when these guys truly admired each other and worked together better than any two such distinctly different personalities ever have. But the wounds are still too fresh, the hurt is too real, to pick this scab right now. 

Besides, it begs the obvious question, "Then why did you leave?" I know a lot of people who took the GOAT's side in the split will point to his last contract and say he didn't leave; he was dumped. I don't buy it. He was the guy who took less money than the others. It was a point of pride. Part of his persona. It not only made the team around him better, it separated him from the Peyton Mannings and the Aaron Rodgerses. It made him unique in all the football world. Then by 2017, it became an issue. He has every right to manage his finances any way he pleases, of course. But you can't say the team's approach changed. Only his did. If it didn't, he'd still be here. 

But that's going back down that old path, and I don't want to do that any more. I want to move on. For good. Which is to say, when he retires, signs a one-day deal in New England, and says goodbye the right way. Then and only then do I want to hear him making sweet, sweet verbal love to the one he walked out on. Until then, keep my coach's name out your fucking mouth. 

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P.S. This would never have been New England Tom Brady. Tell me again that Tampa hasn't changed the man.

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