Alan Truex: Belichick and Brady put their egos aside, embrace for another ring

Just in case millions of Americans were wondering if Bill Belichick and Tom Brady still liked each other, they were seen hugging minutes after they secured their eighth Super Bowl appearance.

You’d have to be very cynical to think these New England Patriots were insincere.  It’s difficult to imagine the ever-stoic Belichick being able to fake emotion.  And yet, there’s no question their relationship – almost father/son, a perfect gap of 25 years in their ages – had been strained during the past month.

Owner Robert Kraft acknowledged as much by telling NFL Network before Sunday’s AFC Championship Game: “Everybody’s got to get their egos checked in and try to hold it together.”

Brady, model citizen and model model, is long beloved by his coaches and teammates for not being greedy.  But in recent years he’s ventured off Patriot Way with the marketing of his own TB12 brand that was attached to his training methods and assorted health-related products.

Brady’s fitness guru, Alex Guerrero, twice has been investigated by the federal government for what the non-medical community might call “quackery.”  This is a problem for Belichick, who is hypersensitive to scandal after Spygate and Deflategate.

The Patriots’ medical and training staffs told the boss they had reservations about Guerrero’s methods, even though they were endorsed by Brady as being critical to his longevity.

Belichick banished Guerrero from the team’s locker room, sideline and charter flights.   He thereby cut into the business interests of Brady, and even more so the business of one of the quarterback’s closest friends, Guerrero.

Speculation was rampant that Belichick would leave the Patriots when this season concludes.  Perhaps he would take over the New York Giants, where he had been an assistant coach.  

But the Patriots’ comeback victory in the AFC title game re-established the Belichick-Brady bond and what it means to the business interests of both men.

Without Brady, Belichick still would be very successful.  He won 11 games with Matt Cassel quarterbacking the one Patriot season in the past 17 that Brady did not.

But without the Greatest of All Time, it’s doubtful Belichick would have a Lombardi Trophy.  Brady’s postseason record is 27-9, with 68 touchdown passes to 31 interceptions.

Except for his rookie season, when he barely played at all, and 2008, which because of a knee injury he missed almost entirely, Brady has played in the Super Bowl 50% of his Patriot years.  Only once have the Patriots won the game by more than 4 points, and that was the overtime defeat of Atlanta a year ago.

You could argue, however, that without Belichick, Brady might have won just one Super Bowl, like his fellow Future Hall of Famers, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Peyton Manning and Ben Roethlisberger.

Perhaps he would have won two, as Eli Manning has done.  But there’s no way Brady would have five Super Bowl rings without the connection to Belichick.  So often the margin of Super Bowl victory seems to be a new formation, a surprise play, a brilliant defensive scheme that Belichick and his staff implement.

Belichick continually evolves, correcting flaws in his team as soon as they emerge.  Last year’s near loss in the Super Bowl exposed a lack of speed.  So this season saw the meaningful additions of Brandin Cooks, Stephon Gilmore and Kyle Van Noy.

Meanwhile, Brady evolves faster than he ages.  At 40, he may be better than he was five years ago. 

Phil Simms, former Super Bowl-winning quarterback, compared Brady to a golfer whose swing is in a groove.  “He is physically throwing the ball better the last two years than he has in previous years,” Simms said on NFL Monday QB.

“He’s made his throwing motion so efficient, so smooth that he can duplicate it time and time again when he’s under pressure.  That’s why he’s the greatest.”

Brady has vowed to play until he’s 45.  The goal may not be far-fetched, considering his health record — notwithstanding a cut on his right hand that caused only the slightest flutter in Sunday’s game in Foxborough.  When George Blanda was 44, he completed 32 of 58 passes, 4 TDs, for the Oakland Raiders.

In Brady and Belichick we see the consummate symbiotic relationship between coach and athlete that will never be duplicated.

Brady accepts about half the salary he could command on the open market, because he wants to give Belichick room to maneuver under the salary cap.  Brady realizes that the better the team Belichick assembles, the more valuable is his TB12 brand.

As fine a game-day tactician as he is, Belichick is even better as a talent evaluator.  He uses players other teams no longer want, such as Van Noy and the 39-year-old James Harrison, key contributors to the current Patriot defense.  With his many sub-packages Belichick counters any athlete the opponent may have.

Kevin Faulk, former Patriots running back, writes in The Player’s Tribune: “If you play for New England, it means Coach Belichick thinks you can fit as a piece to his puzzle.”

Sunday’s victory over the Jaguars was typical, showing how team defense overcomes an individual star.   Belichick shut down their main threat, running back Leonard Fournette, a first-round draft pick.  The Patriots swarmed Fournette, who gained just 76 yards, averaging 3.2 per carry.

Brady may have assumed that because he so willingly sacrifices at least $8 million a year to make his team stronger, Belichick would give him plenty of latitude to make a fortune with other enterprises, as long as they do not detract from his performance on the field.

Brady authored the best-selling TB12 Method in which he stated his not very scientific theories on diet, exercise and longevity.  He’s big on hydration – drinking upwards of 100 ounces of water a day, which he thinks has many benefits, including the prevention of sunburn.

He recommends various supplements that carry his TB12 brand.  If you want to know more about this, you can buy the TB12 Nutritional Manual, which Brady sells for $200 a copy.

It was inevitable that two businessmen as dedicated, diligent, thorough and quietly ambitious as Belichick and Brady eventually would collide.  But it may be just as inevitable that they would recalibrate and reunite, to continue making football history for a few more years.