Tom Brady has publicly acknowledged that he thinks about life after football more now than he ever has, and you have to wonder if the New England Patriots would have operated differently with their highly-touted backup quarterback if Brady admitted that sooner. According to one report, not everyone in the organization is thrilled with how the Jimmy Garoppolo situation turned out.
In an appearance on “The Woj Pod” this week to promote his new book, ESPN’s Adam Schefter spoke about how the Patriots came to the decision to trade Garoppolo to the San Francisco 49ers.
“I’m sure there is some [regret],” Schefter said, as transcribed by Ryan Hannable of WEEI.com. “Jimmy Garoppolo is going to be a top quarterback in this league for the next decade or so. You don’t want to let a guy like that go when Tom Brady is at the tail end of his career.”
Garoppolo was set to become a free agent after last season. It’s still unclear how long Brady plans to play, but there has been plenty of speculation that it won’t be another four or five seasons like he initially promised. If Brady had told the Patriots he plans to play only another year or two, they could have either used the franchise tag on Garoppolo or found a way to keep him.
Instead, Brady has seemingly left the Patriots in limbo. Schefter said the team was initially adamant about not trading Garoppolo before having a complete change of heart at last year’s trade deadline.
“It happened very quickly, very suddenly and yeah, I think there are people that definitely would not want him traded, but that was the circumstance and situation that they were in at that point in time. … They did what they could and they took it as far as they could,” Schefter said. “They would have liked to have taken it further, but the circumstances were such that basically it had run its course.”
Bill Belichick showered Garoppolo in praise after trading him to San Francisco, which is out of character for a guy who typically says things like “we’re only worried about the guys who are still with our football team.” It seemed like the decision to trade Jimmy G. wasn’t Belichick’s, and that has also been reported.
Brady recently hinted at the exact age he plans to retire, and Patriots fans are hoping he plays at least that long. If he suddenly retires, it will be hard for them to feel like the team made the right choice in trading Garoppolo.
