Welcome to an Alternate Reality, Where Tom Brady Never Left the Patriots
The MMQB NFL Podcast
SI NFL
3.9 • 944 Ratings
🗓️ 29 September 2021
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
You are in the same place. You are in the same time. But this world is very different. Different because of one thing: Tom Brady is still the quarterback of the New England Patriots.
What would have happened if Brady re-signed with the Patriots in the winter of 2020? Travel the multiverse and find Jenny Vrentas, Gary Gramling and Conor Orr (with the help of alternate reality host Mitch Goldich), recapping the adventures of the Brady-led 2020 and ’21 Patriots, their success (or lack thereof) with their aging quarterback, the fate of Rob Gronkowski, and how it all would have played out heading into Sunday’s Week 4 home game against the Tampa Bay Bucs.
After the exercise in sci-fi is through, an earnest discussion of why the Brady/Belichick split made the most sense for all parties, even as Brady lifted the Lombardi for the seventh time. In short: Why the greatest coach-QB pairing the league has ever seen had run its course.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, I'm Mitch Goldich, and welcome to the MMQB podcast, the show I host every week. |
| 0:11.8 | Today is September 29th, 2021. As you know, the Patriots are one and two coming |
| 0:18.9 | off a lopsided loss to the Saints. It was one of the worst performances of Tom Brady's career. After the game he told reporters it was |
| 0:27.0 | disappointing to play so poorly in front of his home fans who could not attend games in Foxborough last year. |
| 0:34.1 | The Patriots are now staring at their second straight disappointing season since Brady ended |
| 0:39.3 | his whirlwind Free Agency tour of 2020 by resigning with New England the only |
| 0:45.0 | professional franchise he's ever known. It's left the football world asking |
| 0:49.4 | does Brady regret returning to his longtime team? |
| 0:53.3 | And will that fateful decision to spurn the bears, bucks, |
| 0:57.2 | and raiders, among others, make for an ugly ending |
| 1:00.5 | to his historic tenure in Foxborough. |
| 1:03.0 | Jenny Vrentis, Gary Grambling, and Connor Orr |
| 1:07.0 | recap how the Patriots and their embattled six-time champion 44-year- old quarterback got here. The truce came through an unexpected source. |
| 1:25.0 | In March 2020, New Englanders were in nearly as much denial about the possibility that |
| 1:30.0 | Tommy could leave the Patriots, as most of our country was about the pandemic |
| 1:34.2 | about to seize our lives but it was on the verge of happening. Brady was set to |
| 1:38.6 | become a free agent for the first time in his career. He downloaded the encrypted app Signal before the |
| 1:44.3 | start of the newly gear, allowing him to communicate with top brass from his |
| 1:48.1 | most interested suitors without the risk of tampering charges. Intrepid |
| 1:52.2 | reporter signal apps were suddenly flooded with notifications. |
| 1:56.2 | Tom Telesco is on signal. Jason Light is on signal. |
| 2:00.1 | Then everything changed. |
... |
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