When’s the last time you’ve seen Tom Brady goof off?
It’s a rare occasion, especially on the gridiron, where the New England Patriots quarterback is one of the NFL’s fiercest competitors. But what if we told you Brady not only has a funny side but actually is a ruthless prankster behind closed doors?
Thanks to Kevin Faulk, we now have evidence of the latter. The former Patriots running back published a piece Friday for The Players’ Tribune giving fans insight into New England’s much-ballyhooed “Patriot Way.” But the best part of Faulk’s article was his tale of Brady’s prank war with backup quarterback Matt Cassel, and how TB12 took things to a new level during the 2006 season.
“One day in 2006, we all walked into the locker room after practice,” Faulk wrote, “and there were three tires — like, car tires — stacked up in front of Matt Cassel’s locker. We were all looking at each other like, What the hell is this?”
“… So come to find out, that day Tom Brady had hired somebody to take the tires off of Cassel’s car, put three of them in front of his locker and then hide the fourth somewhere around the facility.”
That’s pretty cold-blooded, but it created a pretty hilarious scene in the Patriots’ locker room.
“I mean, picture this: Cassel comes in from practice, and he’s sitting in front of his locker on top of his own car tires, unwrapping the tape from his ankles,” Faulk continued. “Meanwhile, his car is out in the parking lot on cinderblocks. And guys are just walking by, laughing.”
Brady wasn’t immune to other shenanigans, though. A few days after the tire prank, Brady’s teammates got him back by dumping several bags of Styrofoam packing peanuts into his car through the sunroof.
“Every nook and cranny of Tom’s car was filled with Styrofoam peanuts,” Faulk recalls.
We’d say Brady still got the upper hand in that prank-off — then again, he’s used to coming out on top.
Thumbnail photo via Greg M. Cooper/USA TODAY Sports Images
