The Rumors Of Tom Brady Owning Part Of The Miami Dolphins Overlooked A Rather Significant Roadblock

By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston

BOSTON (CBS) -- Unquestionably, the biggest story of the NFL offseason was the drama surrounding Tom Brady. He retired, then he unretired, then his head coach conveniently stepped away from his position, then rumors of a wild move to Miami surfaced. And that's all without mentioning his role in a film with Jane Fonda and Sally Field. What a winter and spring for ol' Tommy Touchdown!

None of it is surprising. For the past 15 or so years, just about everything even remotely associated to Brady has become front page news, and the specifics and realities and details of certain rumors and reports often don't matter as much as the sizzle.

An oversight of that variety seems to have happened with the most recent reports/rumblings/innuendo that Brady and the Miami Dolphins had cooked up a grand scheme that would have given him an ownership stake in the team before coming out of retirement to play for the Dolphins instead of the Buccaneers in 2022.

While that speculation had enough hurdles in the foreground, a larger issue loomed in the background.

That issue, per Greg Auman of The Athletic, is that for an "active player" to take an ownership stake in a team, it would require a three-quarters vote of the league's 32 owners to be approved. And likewise, if Brady retired before acquiring that ownership stake, it would require a three-quarters vote from the league's owners if he wanted to come out of retirement to play for that team.

That minor issue would seemingly submarine any fantasies in Miami of minority owner Tom Brady quarterbacking the Dolphins to gridiron glory in 2022, wouldn't you say?

Interestingly, too, Auman added that if the Dolphins actually did broach this possibility with Brady (who's under contract with the Bucs through 2022), that contact "could be considered tampering." Considering some potential Miami tampering with Brady has already come to light in the Brian Flores lawsuit -- with owner Stephen Ross reportedly pressuring Flores to meet with Brady before he became a free agent in 2020 -- that seems to be one of several budding issues surrounding Dolphins ownership at the moment.

With Brady, as always, it's hard to know what's true, what's not, and why certain tidbits hit the mainstream. We likewise have no idea what to expect for him in the future -- both short term and long term. But in the case of Brady switching coasts in Florida to become minority owner/starting quarterback of the Dolphins in 2022, it's rather difficult to envision the majority of team owners signing off on that fantasy.

In:
• Tampa Bay Buccaneers
• Miami Dolphins
• NFL
• Tom Brady