Tom Brady and Patriots’ shrewd move in 2016 helped legendary QB save $2,000,000

The beginning of 2016 was not a good one for Tom Brady and the New England Patriots. The star quarterback was set to serve a four-game suspension in relation to Deflategate, an ultimately-debunked conspiracy to deliberately alter the footballs during the 2014 AFC Championship Game against the Indianapolis Colts.

Under normal circumstances, this would have meant plenty of money wasted. However, the Patriots, anticipating this, reached an agreement.

Before the season began, Brady had recommitted to the Patriots for an additional two years, keeping him in the team until 2019. While no specifics were disclosed at the time of signing, he would have made at least $9 million under his old contract. He instead had it lowered to $1 million, just above the 10-year veteran minimum of $985,000.00, while guaranteeing himself a $28 million signing bonus in return.

That move saved him close to $2 million while he sat out, meaning he lost only under $250,000.00. Brady then returned in Week 5, and the rest is history.

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How the Tom Brady-Patriots partnership ended

Unfortunately, just as with most partnerships, Tom Brady was not destined to be a Patriot forever. And it may be attributed to head coach Bill Belichick.

Behind the scenes, quarterback and coach were far from the perfect couple. But tensions did not really boil over until 2017, a season after that magical 2016, when Belichick banned Brady's very popular personal trainer Alex Guerrero from all team events.

Brady had been good friends and partners with Guerrero ever since his season-ending ACL injury in 2008. Thanks to the TB12 wellness philosophy he jointly developed with Guerrero, Brady believed that he could play into his 40's, and that thinking eventually influenced his contract demands.

But Belichick bluntly refused to believe that he could play well into such an age, denying him long-term extensions in favor of short-term restructurings. He had also drafted a potential successor in Jimmy Garoppolo in 2014; but the same year as Guerrero's exclusion from Foxborough, Garoppolo was traded to San Francisco for a draft pick.

While the Patriots would win a Super Bowl in two more appearances after 2016, the end came in 2019. Brady had signed a two-year extension that allowed him to become a free agent after one year. After the team shockingly lost to the Tennessee Titans in the Wild Card Round, he invoked said option and joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.