Hurley: Why Tom Brady Will Attend Super Bowl 50 Ceremony For MVPs In Santa Clara
By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- If Tom Brady were to describe his relationship status with the NFL using strictly Facebook terms, the future Hall of Famer would no doubt have to check off "It's Complicated."
Brady has, of course, been a loyal and hard-working employee of the Patriots, an NFL member club, for 16 years, and in that time he's made millions of dollars and established his own legend as one of the best to ever play football.
But, over the past year, the NFL turned on Brady quite a bit. Namely, commissioner Roger Goodell spared no expense in launching an all-out assault on the character of Brady for an alleged violation that at the very worst would have had a negligible impact on any game. It was a campaign which Goodell and other NFL executives manipulated from the very start, through a rigged appeals process and all the way into a federal court, where a flabbergasted judge swiftly and strongly ruled against Goodell and the commissioner's misbehavior. It's a fight that Goodell is still futilely fighting to this day, with a date in appeals court set for early March.
But even after the judge wiped out Goodell's preposterous punishment of Brady, the damage had been done. In the eyes of many who follow (or make a living by covering) the sport of football, Brady would forever be branded with the scarlet letter "C" for cheater. Despite building his career as the underdog sixth-round pick who ended up winning four Super Bowls and leading his team to an unparalleled stretch of success for 15 years, Brady was chewed up and spit out by the NFL.
A year later, we still don't really know why.
This all brings us to this upcoming Sunday afternoon in Santa Clara, where the NFL will honor all Super Bowl MVPs on the field prior to the Super Bowl between the Broncos and Panthers. It's the culmination of a year-long celebration of Super Bowl 50, an initiative that's included gold NFL logos and gold 50-yard lines across the whole league.
When Brady received his invitation last April, he seemed pretty excited.
That Facebook post was written in April. After that date, Brady was suspended four games by the NFL. Brady appealed the decision, a move which Goodell had already predicted and thus carefully gamed so that he himself could serve as the "neutral arbitrator" for the NFL's decision. In a complete stunner, Goodell ruled that Goodell had been right all along, and the suspension stuck.
In Goodell's written ruling, he actually lied about what Brady said during the appeal hearing. That's a lie which the public would have never known about, if not for Judge Richard Berman eventually deciding to release the appeal hearing transcripts to the public.
And in the eventual hearings in Judge Berman's courtroom, the NFL's charges against Brady grew from a "general awareness" of an event which was "more probable than not" to have happened into claims that Brady "participated in a scheme" to deflate footballs not just for the AFC Championship Game, but for years.
Clearly, with the entirety of the national news and sports media focused in on the case, the NFL had no problem lobbing bombs at Tom Brady's character. And when challenged, the NFL doubled down on its accusations.
So, given the not-too-cordial treatment from the league over the past year, the question has been raised as to whether Brady will actually attend this ceremony. The theory goes that by smiling and waving as part of the ceremony, Brady will be bolstering the image of the league and, as a result, Goodell. Yet by no-showing on the event, he'd be raising the proverbial middle finger to Goodell for all that he has done over the past year. In this case, a silent protest would be the loudest noise Brady could possibly make.
Bob Ryan, the unofficial voice of the Boston sports conscience, implored Brady to take the high road on TV this weekend, the Washington Post is debating the idea, and there's even an article titled "Should Patriots QB Tom Brady attend Super Bowl 50 ceremonies?" plastered right on Patriots.com. (As of this writing, fan voting on the Patriots' official website as to whether or not Brady should go was stuck right around 50-50.)
The Patriots may not be participating in this year's Super Bowl, but clearly, they'll still be at the center of some discussions.
So, with so much speculation as to whether or not Brady will be on the field Sunday in Santa Clara, let's try to put an end to it early.
Brady will be there.
Sure, there's some level of doubt. This is the same man who skipped the team's trip to the White House last season, leading some of us to wonder whether it was because of an insult made by White House press secretary Josh Earnest. And of course, there is the bad blood from the past year, as well as the foul taste left in Brady's mouth after having his season cut short in Denver a week ago.
But, more than all of that, there is this:
"It's about honor. It's about respect. We win this game, you're honored. Your kids are honored. Your families are honored."
Those were the words shouted by Brady to his teammates exactly one year ago today, as they all prepared for the biggest games of their lives. Brady was not thinking small when he delivered this speech; he was thinking about the big picture, about his and his teammates' places in history. He was thinking about honor.
Brady, who so often speaks almost robotically about execution, was not reminding players of their keys, and was not focused on specifics about the Seattle Seahawks or the game-plan. He was passionately speaking about the historical significance of the moment and the long-term implications it would have on him, his teammates, and their families. For someone who had already accomplished so much, the idea of gaining honor was clearly important to him.
And not coincidentally, when he shared his invite from Goodell on Facebook, Brady's first words were "What an honor."
Near his hometown, on the sport's grandest stage, in a milestone anniversary for the league in which he's always aspired to play, Brady has been invited to be part of something special. It's a ceremony that's bigger than him, bigger than any one individual on the field, bigger than the results of this past season, and certainly, bigger than Roger Goodell.
Brady won't be there to make Goodell look good, but Brady will be there.
It's about honor.
You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.
