Throughout this past offseason, there were multiple rumors about Tom Brady leaving the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to finish his NFL career elsewhere.
Instead, Brady ended up returning from his brief retirement for a third season with the Bucs. While many outside of One Buc Place had wild theories about the GOAT playing for another club, those closest to the Bucs (and common sense) knew that if Brady was going to play this season, it would be in Tampa Bay.
Brady was still under contract for the 2022 season, so any other interested party would have had to trade for his rights, something the Bucs were obviously never going to do.
Now, the intriguing question becomes, what will Brady do next season?
He’s no longer under contract with the Bucs beyond this year, so he can become a free agent in 2023 if he decides he still wants to keep playing.
Former Bucs head coach Bruce Arians spoke with longtime beat writer Ira Kaufman recently, and seemed to show optimism that Brady could return for another season in Tampa Bay.
“He loves it here,” Arians told Kaufman. “He loves his teammates, his coaches and the organization. If he decides to play next season, I think it will be with the Buccaneers.”
Dan Pompei at The Athletic recently wrote a feature on Arians, and the Bucs’ special assistant to the general manager spoke about Brady’s insatiable commitment to excellence.
“In practice, even in quarterback drills, he’s over there competing to win the damn drills every day,” Arians told Pompei. “I still spend a lot of time with him, but not as much probably as I used to. In a week, we maybe spend an hour talking about football and another hour talking about life.”
It still feels most likely that 2022 will be Brady’s last NFL season, but if he does decide to keep playing, it’s hard to imagine that he’d want to start over again with a new team. Most of Tampa Bay’s key players on offense are under contract for 2023, and though the team obviously has some salary cap issues they’ll have to sort out, they would obviously do whatever was necessary to keep a winning team around Brady for another season.
Despite the Bucs’ offensive struggles throughout the first half of the 2022 season, Brady is still playing at a high level, so it wouldn’t be a total shock if he decides to return for a 24th NFL season.
If he does, it’s hard to believe it’ll be anywhere but Tampa Bay.
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