FOXBOROUGH, Mass.—In the mess of a rain-soaked postgame, Buccaneers general manager Jason Licht had to scramble to find two game-worn balls from the imperfect 19–17 win his team had just delivered. Eventually, he got them, then got to the locker room and handed them off to the team’s longest-tenured player, and defensive captain, Lavonte David.
David immediately knew where he’d go with both of them, as he started his address to the team. The first was going to Bruce Arians, who got his 17th victory as Bucs coach on his 69th birthday. The second was for the man of the hour, and the greatest football player of all time.
One problem—Tom Brady, in the moment, was nowhere to be found.
“Man, Brady’s out there with his people,” David bellowed. “But this one’s for Tom!”
Truth is, very few things on Sunday night went according to plan. Forecasted scattered showers became a pretty constant downpour. The NFL’s script to honor Brady's passing Drew Brees (who happened to be in the building with NBC) as the game’s all-time passing leader was disregarded in a pretty hilarious way. And the idea that Brady was going to come into Gillette Stadium and settle all family business in a pretty emphatic way?
Yeah, that didn’t happen either.
But in other ways, Brady’s first game against the franchise he took to dizzying heights was probably exactly what we all should’ve hoped for. His old coach brought, and called, a defense that gave No. 12 all he could handle, and in the end, Brady’s ability to summon a few more plays than Bill Belichick’s guys could when it really mattered perfectly illustrated the lasting legacy he’s left in Massachusetts.
Bottom line, the Bucs came into this one still smarting from a convincing loss to the Rams on the other side of the country, and they just needed a win. They got one, if barely. And that was the point of all this, even if it was dressed up differently from any regular-season game we’d ever seen, just like it was the point of all the games he played for Patriots here.
“It really wasn't for him,” Arians told me, contradicting what David said, before explaining himself further. ‘It was for us. We don't want to lose two in a row—we want to get back in first place. It just happened to be here for Tom. And Lavonte did a great job giving him a game ball after the game. But this game wasn't about Tom Brady. This was about the Bucs and the Patriots. There was way too much bulls–t about Belichick and Brady.
“This is a team sport, and our team beat their team.”
It took more than 59 minutes of game action for the Bucs to be sure of that, but they wind up getting there. So, as Arians had hoped, Tampa Bay’s back in first place, even with Carolina after the Panthers’ loss in Dallas on Sunday. And clearly, for Arians, that was plenty to take from the Brady-Belichick showdown.
But if we’re being honest here, there was a whole lot more to this night for most people than just that—Brady himself included.
