Future Hall-of-Famer Ben Roethlisberger believes that Tom Brady’s body language during the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Week 6 loss told a story of a man who has lost his joy for playing in the NFL.
The last few months have been tumultuous for Tom Brady. After originally deciding to call it a career earlier this year, the 45-year-old legend stunned the NFL over a month later when he changed course and instead decided to return for season 23 in the league. However, since then the headlines surrounding the Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback have been mostly negative.
It started with him taking a longer-than-expected hiatus away from the team during training camp where the organization seemed to know as much about his whereabouts as the media. It was then revealed that he was a part of an instance of tampering by Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross that got the team boss suspended. After that came the ongoing rumors of a rift between him and his wife Gisele Bündchen that reportedly stems from his desire to play another season in the league.
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Last week, the intensely devoted Brady shockingly missed the Buccaneers’ Saturday practice after partying the night away on Friday at the wedding of his former boss Robert Kraft. And then, of course, he was caught chewing out his offensive line on Sunday for their poor play in the team’s shocking upset loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Brady just doesn’t seem in a good place right now and Steelers great Ben Roethlisberger believes it is starting to show.
Ben Roethlisberger on Tom Brady: ‘It didn’t look like he wanted to be out there’
During a new episode of his “Footbahlin with Ben Roethlisberger” podcast, “Big Ben” spoke about being in the house to take in the game between his Steelers and the Bucs. While he says he was excited to be there, one person who didn’t seem to have the same passion was the Tampa Bay QB. To Roethlisberger, Brady looked like he didn’t even want to be there. A shocking visual for a player who wears his passion for football on his sleeve.
- Tom Brady stats (2022): 1,652 yards, 8 TD, 1 INT, 95.1 rating
“I was up there just happy as can be watching the game. This is just my opinion, Tom is the greatest. The Super Bowl rings show it. It didn’t look like he wanted to be out there. Maybe it was the pressure, and he was getting hit and whatever was going on. At one point I looked down there and said, there’s no way he’s enjoying this. No way. I was enjoying being up there watching the game. It just didn’t look fun for him.”
“When a defense gets after you, sometimes your anger and your disgust for things happen because the other team is affecting you. Not because it’s you. But yeah, it just looked like a different Tom.”
– Ben Roethlisberger on Tom Brady’s Week 6 body language (h/t Yahoo Sports)
If Brady’s long marriage is falling apart due to his insistence on playing another season, it would make a bunch of sense if the multi-time Super Bowl has finally fallen out of love with the game he has played for his entire adult life.
The Buccaneers return on Sunday afternoon at 1 PM ET to face the Carolina Panthers.