Less than a week before a highly anticipated National Football League matchup between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New England Patriots in Foxborough, Massachusetts, reports surfaced that Patriots Head Coach Bill Belichick rejected a meeting with Tom Brady before the “GOAT” made his move to play for the Buccaneers.
Belichick told the quarterback, whom he had coached to six Super Bowl wins, that he was the “best player the league had ever seen” over the phone but declined the opportunity to say goodbye in person, ESPN’s Seth Wickersham reportedly stated in his upcoming book, It’s Better to Be Feared.
The relationship between the two men, whom many consider the greatest coach and player duo in NFL history, deteriorated considerably despite continued success in the waning years of Brady’s time in New England, Wickersham wrote.
TOM BRADY SAYS HE COULD PLAY FOOTBALL UNTIL 50
In 2017, Brady said he did not “want to play for Bill anymore,” the book alleged.
“Tom Brady had been curious if there was another way of winning, and while nobody was arguing that Bruce Arians was a better coach than Bill Belichick, or even close, the seamlessness of Brady’s proficiency and performance was making his former coach’s methodologies look antiquated, even silly,” Wickersham wrote. “It was better to be feared — but was it necessary?”
Money also might have played a part in Brady’s decision to move to the Bucs, according to the book.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
He was “tired of taking team-friendly deals with no input into how the money saved was spent,” Wickersham said.
