Tom Brady admittedly is a grouch during the football season, especially when things aren’t going the way he or the New England Patriots want.
That was the case Sunday night in Baltimore, where the Patriots were run out of town by the Ravens. Baltimore’s rush-heavy offense was too much for New England’s vaunted defense, and the Ravens’ defense did just enough to stifle Brady and the Patriots offense.
Penalties also were an issue for New England, and while most of them were self-induced, one call midway through the second quarter truly miffed Brady. The Patriots quarterback thought his offense was about to benefit from an illegal contact penalty, but after a brief conference, the officials instead called an intentional grounding infraction on Brady. That surely didn’t sit well with Brady, who passionately pleaded his case to anyone willing to listen.
Given a few hours to reflect, Brady was far more measured during a Monday morning appearance on WEEI’s “The Greg Hill Show,” but he still didn’t agree with the ruling.
“(Phillip Dorsett has) got a choice to go either way. You know, he ran down there and the (defensive) guy drilled him at 8 yards,” Brady explained. “So I said, ‘Isn’t that illegal contact?’ And he’s like, ‘Well, no.’ And I’m like, ‘I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know what you’re looking at.’ Or something like that.”
Obviously, it was to no avail.
“It was very polite. It was like, ‘Excuse me, Mister, I thought there might have possibly been a penalty, actually by them,'” Brady joked. “Which when I looked at the film — I don’t know. I thought they jammed him pretty good.”
Intentional grounding penalties have become a bit of a trend for Brady, as he’s now been called for the infraction more than any other QB.
“Sometimes you get ’em, sometimes you don’t. That was a fun one,” he said Monday morning with a very obvious sense of sarcasm. “That was a fun one.”
