Patriots owner Robert Kraft insists that Tom Brady isn’t going anywhere, despite speculation in some quarters that the team and the player are far apart in their expectations for Brady’s next contract.
“He’s going to be here,” Kraft told Judy Battista of the New York Times. “I love the guy. We’re so lucky to have him. I have an emotional attachment because I remember him coming in as the fourth quarterback, being a skinny beanpole of a kid.”
But while Kraft obviously has a lot of affection for Brady and is willing to pay him a lot of money, Battista writes that the Patriots will not pay Brady the kind of money that the Colts are likely to pay Peyton Manning, who like Brady is going into the final season of his contract.
If that’s true, Kraft has no way of guaranteeing that Brady will remain with the Patriots. Brady could point out that he’s won three times as many Super Bowl rings as Manning and insist that he won’t sign for a penny less than Manning gets from the Colts, and that could lead to an impasse between Brady and the Patriots.
But Kraft insists that Brady will be in New England for years to come.
“In my mind, he will be,” Kraft said. “One way or another. I believe he wants to be here. We want him here. We have a complicated situation we’re dealing with. There are a lot of forces at work. One way or another it will work out.”