Tom Brady ceremony further proves Patriots are living in the past originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
What happens when the franchise infamous for only looking forward suddenly has nothing to look forward to? You get Tom Brady Night in June versus the NBA Finals.
Didn’t we just roast this guy? Didn’t he just ring the lighthouse bell?
We did and so did he, but prepare for a total embrace of the past because it surpasses anything to come for the six-time Super Bowl champion New England Patriots.
The franchise that could quietly mock the various Rings of Honor and reunion nights common to other, lesser organizations during its twenty-year reign is suddenly leaning on nostalgia as well. Like the deposed dictator who must find a home for her 6,000 shoes overnight, the Patriots get a taste of how ordinary people live.
It’s not pretty. You sell the past because the future may never come.
The Pats are already 0-1 on Brady’s succession plans, with Alabama Mac Jones melting like a forgotten, fried Alaska rigged by conniving chefs. Now they’re in the second round, and we’ll no doubt hear great things about No. 3 overall pick Drake Maye during training camp, even if the odds suggest he’ll end up being Blake Bortles rather than Josh Allen. If Maye drops out, another three or four years will have been wasted.
So Brady has to save the day again and give everyone a chance to show off their Super Bowl rings, which are getting a little less shiny by the day. The Patriots chose the date of June 12 because TB12 won six rings here, conveniently omitting the fact that if the organization hadn’t let the greatest of all time leave due to former head coach Bill Belichick’s persistent pettiness, we might have . in July or August. As it is, I guess we’ll just pretend the seventh ring in Tampa Bay never happened.
Be prepared for more of this, because we’re still a long way from “Off to Cincinnati” and “No Days Off.” The Patriots mastered the art of acknowledging the future only during the Belichick era, at least when it suited them. It allowed them to survive the various gates of those years, and it was also a flex: “We control the story, not you.”
Then Brady ran, Jones bombed, Belichick got the boot, and now they’re starting over as just another franchise hoping to one day be worthy of primetime status.
They push the past because it’s more compelling than the present, but it’s also officially the stuff of John Facenda’s narrations and sepia tones, and it no longer generates much goodwill. The owners must prove they can win without Brady and Belichick, newcomer head coach Jerod Mayo will soon be under scrutiny and the immediate fate of the franchise rests on the shoulders of the third quarterback taken in this year’s draft. Welcome to life as a schnook, as Henry Hill might say.
Making the descent into have-not status even clearer, the Patriots did not anticipate the Celtics playing for a championship, so their ceremony will be set against Game 3 of the NBA Finals on Wednesday night in Dallas.
Some may say that’s bad luck, but in reality it’s quite the opposite.
The Celtics were considered title favorites when the Patriots announced Brady’s early induction into the Hall of Fame in September, so this overlap was always on the table. While Jayson Tatum and Co. in trying to win in the here and now, the Patriots are celebrating an era that ended five years ago.
I suppose it’s clever marketing. Sell what is sellable. For the Patriots, that used to mean the promise of the next Super Bowl. Now it glorifies the old. Me? I’m going to watch basketball.
