Tom Brady may be retired from the NFL.
But Brady certainly hasn’t retired from controversy.
And Tom Brady got caught up in one illegal scheme that you won’t believe.
Fallout continues from the roast of Tom Brady
Lavonte David played 12 years in the National Football League as a linebacker for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
David also developed such a closer relationship with Brady that he earned a seat on the dais for Netflix’s celebrity roast of Brady.
Prior to the roast, David appeared on NFL Network’s Rich Eisen’s radio show where he discussed how Brady ended up with the Bucs back in 2020.
David said that in his 2019 exit interview – a season where the Bucs went 7-9 and finished a dismal third place in the NFC South – head coach Bruce Arians hinted that a major move was on the way at the quarterback position.
“I just remember in the exit meeting, talking to Coach BA,” David told Eisen. “You know, you have a one-on-one with the head coach. I just remember him saying, ‘If we don’t get Jameis [Winston] back, we are going to get someone in here for you to get us over the hump . . . get us to the Super Bowl.’ And he literally said this, ‘And it might be The GOAT.’”
This comment opened the door to speculation that the Bucs tampered with Brady’s contract by having secret backchannel discussions with Brady during the 2019 season while he was still a member of the New England Patriots.
NBC Sports’s Mike Florio said Arians also talked about signing Brady at the February Draft Scouting Combine.
And Florio also incredulously said the Bucs then tried to make it seem like their interest in Brady was spur of the moment once he hit free agency.
But Florio also wrote that the Bucs potentially tampering with Brady fit a pattern.
Miami Dolphins caught tampering with Brady
Brady is coveted around the NFL that teams will risk valuable draft picks to try and get him on board.
Florio wrote that the Bucs weren’t the first team involved in a Tom Brady tampering scandal.
The Miami Dolphins got caught trying to bring Brady on as a minority owner while he was still under contract with the Bucs.
Florio also reported that Brady was also “exploring options” with other teams during that 2019 season.
“Multiple teams have tampered with Brady in recent years, in part because Brady directly involved himself in those communications. He tried to finagle a path to the Dolphins while still under contract with the Bucs, and the Dolphins got whacked for it. Also, he was exploring his options with other teams while still under contract with the Pats,” Florio wrote.
The NFL came down hard on the Dolphins for tampering.
Commissioner Roger Goodell stripped the team of its 2023 first-round draft pick as well as a third-round selection.
The league also fined Miami owner Stephen Ross $1.5 million and suspended him through October 17 of that season.
Dolphins Vice Chairman/limited partner Bruce Beal received a $500,000 fine.
Beal also got banned from attending any league meetings for the rest of the 2022 season.
“Investigators found tampering violations of unprecedented scope and severity. I know of no prior instance of a team violating the prohibition of tampering with both a head coach and star player, to the potential detriment of other clubs, over a period of several years,” Goodell stated.
