It’s the end of the 2013 regular season, and the New York Jets have just clinched their 13th AFC East title in 15 years thanks to superstar quarterback Tom Brady, whose eventual retirement send-off could rival that of fellow New York legend Derek Jeter.
OK, New England Patriots fans, you can awake from your nightmare now. But according to a report, Tom Brady in Green and White wasn’t too much of a stretch.
The Jets had already taken quarterback Chad Pennington with the 18th overall pick in the 2000 NFL draft. But as Gary Myers of the New York Daily News reports, one team scout was very high on a certain University of Michigan quarterback who was still on the board as the draft entered the sixth round.
Myers, citing a source who was in the Jets’ draft room, wrote that the scout “had such a conviction on (Brady) he nearly stood on a table shouting his name to general manager Bill Parcells.”
The scout failed to convince Parcells to take Brady, and New York selected defensive back Tony Scott with the 179th overall pick. Brady was still available twenty picks later, and the rest is history.
Scott went on to play a grand total of 23 games in the NFL, including, ironically enough, a brief stint in New England. Brady, thanks once again to Mo Lewis and the Jets, took over for Drew Bledsoe in 2001 and developed into the one of the most prolific quarterbacks in NFL history.
We’ll give Parcells the benefit of the doubt for passing on Brady, since he’d already taken Pennington three rounds earlier. Still, as the Patriots get set to welcome the Jets on Thursday night, it’s hard not to think of what could have been.
Photo via Greg M. Cooper/USA TODAY Sports Images
