Despite the slow on-field start for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the nonstop chatter regarding martial problems, quarterback Tom Brady is not thinking about hanging it up mid-season like some talking heads will have you believe.
Pro Football Talk’s Chris Simms and Mike Florio speculated on that topic Tuesday with Brady’s Buccaneers sitting at .500 entering Week 7 of the NFL season. Brady himself, though, shot down those notions while speaking with reports during in mid-week press conference.
“That’s really why I’m here. I’m here to announce ‘Finally! You guys pushed me to the brink,'” Brady said with a smirk when a reporter told him of NBC Sports’ conversation, per the team. “No, I think a lot of it for me is us going out there, you know, I love the sport, I love the teammates and I want to go do a great job for this team like I always have.
“So, no retirement in my future.”
The talking point started with Simms and Florio discussing whether Brady or Aaron Rodgers could walk away from the NFL given lack of on-field success with the Buccaneers and Green Bay Packers, respectively.
“Normally I’d feel like it’s Rodgers that would be that guy. But because of this year and some of the off-the-field stuff that’s hitting home and personal stuff with Brady, this is the one year I feel maybe it might be Brady,” Simms said, as transcribed by the New York Post. “It seems like, and I don’t know this, that his wife is threatening divorce or going down that road by all due accounts of what you read. I think Rodgers is usually the guy to be more renegade and be like ‘Screw this, I’m out of here.’ But this is a weird year where we’re seeing Brady do weird crap and having personal issues.”
Florio added: “I have thought all along there’s a chance Brady checks out during the season and I still think that happens.”
One of the aspects that kicked the reported marital issues of Brady and his supermodel wife Gisele Bündchen was when the 45-year-old quarterback ended his brief 41-day retirement from the NFL this offseason. From there, the reports have snowballed with the couple nearing a divorce.
