As we enter another week of the soap opera that has eaten the NFL offseason, the guy who’s writing the script says he’s not finished with it yet.
Via Mike Reiss of ESPN.com, SiriusXM NFL Radio co-host Charlie Weis said last week that Brady texted him with the following important update about the constant updates about his free agency and future.
“I do have one bit of scoop for us. I’ve been texting with Tommy,” Weis said (and somebody should help Charlie pick up that name he just dropped). “I don’t [usually] pass along these conversations, but one thing he told me — ‘Nobody knows anything. So anyone who is telling you they know, they don’t know.’
“I’m not going through any other part of the conversation [but] I followed up and he said, ‘Clean it up.’ So I’m cleaning it up.”
The simplest interpretation (which longtime NFL insider William of Ockham told us is often the best one) would be that Brady himself doesn’t know, with the CBA yet to be ratified and firm financial details yet to come his way.
He could also be sending a message to those on the periphery of his circle (say for instance the people who text with him and relay those conversations in broadcast or simple gossip form) that he’s grown weary of the speculation of a future which he and only he controls.
This week will mark an important milestone in that future, since the union vote on the CBA will be completed by Friday, and there will be a clear sense of the financial structure teams are working with when they can (officially) begin legally tampering with the free agent on March 16.