Tom Brady in December, 2007. Photograph by Keith Allison.
Paging Gisele.
Because Ms. Bündchen – a tiger wife if there ever was one – is all that stands between hubby Tom Brady and his squishy balls on the one hand and ignominy on the other.
As even the horses that ran the recent Kentucky Derby now know, a report issued by the Manhattan law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison on behalf of the NFL has concluded that Brady was probably aware that two lower-level employees of the New England Patriots were deflating balls.
Probably? Here are excerpts of text messages between Jim McNally, the longtime locker-room attendant responsible for the air pressure in Brady’s balls, so to speak, and John Jastremski, an equipment assistant who seems to have served as a go-between:
McNally: Tom (expletive)…im going make that next ball a (expletive) balloon
Jastremski: Talked to him last night. He actually brought you up and said you must have a lot of stress trying to get them done…
Yep, it’s positively Shakespearean – without the poetry. And so it must be played as farce or soap opera.
Tom-not-so-Terrific, speaking at a previously scheduled event at Salem State University in Salem, Mass., said Thursday that he was still digesting the report and would address it once he did. His agent, Donald Yee, called the report “a significant and terrible disappointment” – which is how many feel about Brady. Fans came to his defense, using the well-traveled ooh-ooh-teacher-someone-else-is-misbehaving argument, noting that Green Bay Packers’ QB Aaron Rodgers likes his balls hard and overinflates them.
Then in the case of another country heard from, super-fan Gov. Chris Christie said Deflategate is “overblown” – even though the problem would appear to be a case of things being under-blown.
There is an element of tragedy in all this that is if not exactly Aeschylean at least Nixonian. The problem of Deflategate, which may have begun last year, certainly goes back as far as the close playoff game earlier this year against the Baltimore Ravens, a worthy rival. The Ravens then tipped off the Indianapolis Colts, who were overrun by the Pats and who discovered the underinflated balls.
There is a certain logic in cheating against an opponent who might defeat you. But to cheat an opponent who is much weaker (and, let’s face it, despite QB Andrew Luck, the Colts were basically deer caught in headlights against the Pats), to want not merely to win but to dominate and crush, well, that shows an ego of the most damaged kind.
Some have suggested that the league needs to punish Brady with a two- or four-game or even one-year suspension. I say that in one sense it hardly matters, because it won’t make a difference. Nothing will change.
But in another sense this will haunt Brady much like steroids do Alex Rodriguez.
My care is like my shadow in the sun, Elizabeth I wrote in her poem “On Monsieur’s Departure,”Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,Stands, and lies by me, doth what I have done.
Try deflating that.