A free agent ahead of his age-43 season, Tom Brady‘s decision produced numerous headlines four years ago. Nearly a third of the NFL was connected to the all-time QB great, with the passer-turned-broadcaster’s final decision believed to be a Buccaneers-or-Chargers call.
That may well have been the case, but Brady — doing his fourth regular-season broadcast for FOX (h/t FOX Sports’ Ralph Vacchiano) — confirmed the Bears were part of his decision-making process. We heard in September 2020 the Bears made an offer to the then-20th-year quarterback but lost out due to multiple factors, but Brady said Sunday he gave “serious consideration” to choosing Chicago.
When the Bears-Brady connection surfaced four Septembers ago, the NFC North team was described as “in the running.” A cold-weather city did not appeal to Brady at that point, and the quarterback was intrigued by throwing to Mike Evans and Chris Godwin while playing closer to his oldest son, Jack, whose mother is actress Bridget Moynahan. Brady also mentioned Bruce Arians playing a key role in convincing him to sign with Tampa Bay, which gave him a fully guaranteed $50MM deal over two years.
The Bucs and Chargers were both agreeable to Brady’s terms by the end of the process, pointing to the Bears potentially finishing third here. The ageless passer had been interested in his hometown 49ers, who stuck with Jimmy Garoppolo, and replacing Drew Brees — had he chosen to retire, which the future Hall of Famer did not — as well. Among realistic options, Chicago joined L.A. in needing to take another route after the high-profile FA’s decision.
At that point, Chicago was coming off an 8-8 season — a step back from its 12-4 2018 showing — and had begun to determine Mitch Trubisky was not going to be the franchise option they’d envisioned. The Bucs and Chargers did not have starting QBs under contract, with Jameis Winston and Philip Rivers each free agents. This Bears’ pursuit also differed from the Raiders’ effort, as Las Vegas then bowed out early — as Brady has famously discussed — and had a second-contract QB (Derek Carr) rather than a former first-round pick playing on a rookie deal.
That Bears edition rostered Allen Robinson, who was heading into his third season with the team; Darnell Mooney arrived weeks later as a fifth-round pick. Chicago had Matt Nagy calling plays with an offensive line that included the likes of Cody Whitehair, James Daniels and veteran tackles Charles Leno and Bobby Massie. Pieces from Vic Fangio’s defenses still comprised much of Chicago’s depth chart on that side, with Khalil Mack, Roquan Smith and Akiem Hicks anchoring the unit. The Bucs, however, checked more boxes and were quite willing to accommodate their free agency prize in free agency and trades.
Brady undoubtedly would have elevated the Bears’ setup, with Rob Gronkowski — and, for better or worse, Antonio Brown — presumably following wherever his Patriots QB went. But it is safe to say his Bucs decision was correct, seeing as he piloted Tampa Bay to its second Super Bowl title that season and earned second-team All-Pro honors at age 44 in a statistically superior campaign a year later.
The Bears are now multiple starting QBs removed from that what-if, having drafted both Justin Fields and Caleb Williams after letting Trubisky walk in 2021. After Brady’s decision, Chicago traded for Nick Foles as a player to push Trubisky. Although the latter opened the season as the team’s starter and reclaimed his job from Foles down the stretch — en route to an 8-8 season that did produce a playoff berth — the former No. 2 overall pick has been unable to prove worthy of a starting job since.
Does anyone else think Brady is horrendously generic and blah. I was hoping to get mad Tom Brady who’d call players out for lackluster performances and missed assignments. Instead we’re getting the basic “good old boys club” analysis.
Literally no main media in game commentator does that…in any sport. The local commentators may but that is why they are local. Brady is also trying to be apart of the ownership for a team so he really wouldn’t be allowed to. He would be hurting the team in acquiring players too.
I just want them to call out bad officiating, personally.
That’s all you would be hearing. The officiating is horrible, Inconsistent , and ridiculous. I’m not saying, I’m just saying. Just in the Bears game( Not sour grapes just fact), The Bears offense was struggling and Caleb completed a nice dump off to Roschon for a first down. All of the sudden here comes the flag for illegal formation, Wright wasn’t close enough to the line. Meanwhile every play the Rams RT was basically playing Wing Back the whole game- ZERO FLAGS. It’s a joke. It’s not COMPLETELY their fault. This has to be the hardest sport to referee because of all the stupid rules they’ve added. Like this hip drop tackle nonsense. You have a RB in the arms of a defender and they’re both fighting for position. The defensive guy wins and throws him back and either gets a penalty or a fine. What’s he supposed to do? Let him go? If you want to protect the player Blow the freakin whistle, Don’t be stupid. If a guy is stopped he’s stopped. There are like 6 refs, You think one would figure it out and blow the whistle. My God.
I completely agree with you , but the emphasis on illegal formation penalties are in response to the shenanigans that Mike McDaniel was pulling with having hill as tight end and then having double motion so as too obscure the db’s view of him. And the league (mainly the Mike shananhan tree of coaches and I’ll throw in Ben Johnson and Bobby slowick too) also started pulling that shtick too.
@Unclemike / I’m glad our Bears won but how do they not get called for roughing Matty on that interception he threw at the end of the game?
How does that guy from Indy not get called for punching Roschon in the head on the sidelines when all he was doing was standing there right in front of the referee? Just my point the referee’s have so much stupid in their head that it gets lost in there. I see WR’s getting hit 10-15 yards downfield when that’s supposed to be a penalty. You could literally call holding on just about any play. It’s horrible. You put your arms up to try and knock down a pass and hit the QB in the head and it’s 15 yards? Should be like punting 5 for nothing and 15 for blasting him.
Wow! 4 years ago he considered something. It really puts the world into a new perspective.
Even though he didn’t go, the act of considering them puts Tom firmly within the top 5 Bears QB’s of all time list.
For lunch I considered a salami sandwich. I opted for turkey.
Bears suck and would still have sucked with Brady.
Thanks for in-depth rant.
Who cares about what Brady did yesterday let alone 2020. Please move on.
Biggest cheat in NFL history. Maybe he can relate some stories about that.
Keep crying bro. Youre just mad he dominated whatever team you root for for the better part of 2 decades.
Inside Out • 33 mins ago
Who cares about what Brady did yesterday let alone 2020. Please move on.
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Inside Out …. The ability to reply to your post has been disabled. I personally could not agree with you more. Well stated.
I agree with you and him ..my ability to agree wasn’t disabled. Thought I’ve noticed it’s happened to me s few other times…hmm maybe the site is prejudiced against certain posters
Markdavisbarber-Means he’s muted you. He can’t see what you posted.
Actually glad that Brady went where he did. A 43 year old Brady wasn’t what that team needed. It needed a better GM and ended up with one. Brady saved Pace from making yet another stupid mistake.
Yeah, Tampa was probably the best of those teams at that time. Brady obviously elevated the QB play, but people forget that the Buccaneers were only a game under .500 the year before-with an offense that turned the ball over about 40 times. Jameis Winston accounted for 35 of those turnovers on his own (as a comparison, he accounted for 33 touchdowns passing).
Tampa did also sign an entire starting cast of All Pros and former All Pros (at one point, all four of Brady’s starting targets were All Pros-Evans, Godwin, Brown, and Gronk, not to mention the absolute plethora of others spread around both sides of the ball-Barrett, David, Sherman, Suh, etc) and there’s no telling whether Chicago would have been willing or able to provide the same roster. No team outside of the Rams has matched that roster acquisition effort. I don’t think that Brady-to-Chicago would have turned out the way that it did in Tampa, especially with Pace and Nagy running the show in comparison to Arians on the other side.
Key words being Pace and Nagy.
Sick of his look@ me have to be center of all attention persona. So u say he pondered something 4 years ago briefly, huh. My real main concern is what did he have for lunch. Por favor, less of the full court press of Brady news most of us could live without.
Tom should consider going to Chicago to join the White Sox. He would fit in perfectly with the other dead arms that helped set a new MLB record for losses in a season.
He would probably hit as well as most of the guys on that Sox roster anyway..
Would like to see a guy like that in an ownership group to BUY the White Sox those, either him or Mark Cuban, or a Mark Cuban type.
Who cares!!!!! This article is total garbage. It’s 2024 not 2020. Brady now is a color announcer and he’s terrible
Brady is like every other high priced FA that brings up Chicago, they use it as a bargaining chip and nothing more than that. Brady had no intention of going to Chicago, just wanted to get another team, in this case Tampa, to ante up.