NFL bending over backwards to make room for Tom Brady’s dull punditry

During last week’s Monday Night Football, ESPN cameras cut away to the Las Vegas Raiders coaches’ booth, where a gaggle of earnest men in hoodies were trying to figure out a way to stop the Los Angeles Chargers. There among them, sporting a sharp suit and tie and a headset, sat Tom Brady, Steve Silvermint-like owner of 5 per cent of the Raiders.

A sideline reporter on the broadcast mentioned to the national audience how the most successful quarterback in the history of the NFL has been lending his expertise to the team on a weekly basis. Apparently realising that he was on screen, Brady began lowering his chair as if trying rather comically to disappear from public view.

The reason for his cartoonish and futile attempt at subterfuge was obvious. He knew his presence assisting the beleaguered Raiders’ brains trust would cause controversy. As part of his day job analysing games for Fox, a gig where he has struggled to justify a contract worth $375 million (€319 million) across 10 years, Brady is supposed to be a strictly neutral observer. He has to be.

The television role comes with a degree of accessibility and certain privileges that include hearing head coaches, quarterbacks and key players from every team outline their preferred strategies. If he’s working on the sideline for the Raiders too, accusations about conflicts of interest and the appearance of unfair advantage are bound to fly. And did.

More than four decades have passed since Terry O’Neill, a visionary producer at CBS, revolutionised how gridiron was covered on American television. Bringing new standards of preparation, he insisted his crew arrive at the venue 48 hours before kick-off, sit in on the home team’s last training session and spend hours watching videotape of both sides.

He also introduced the concept of a production meeting before each game, insisting on a serious off-the-record sit-down between John Madden and Pat Summerall, his commentary team, and the main characters in the match they were about to cover.

Between Madden’s pedigree as a Super Bowl-winning coach with the then Oakland Raiders and Summerall’s as a former New York Giant, the pair had instant credibility when they walked in for this conflab. They spoke the language of the locker room and coaches gladly shared details of plays they wanted to deploy, while quarterbacks and linebackers opened up about what they’d been working on.

Information gleaned during these encounters was never to be shared with the opposing side, but it better informed Madden and Summerall’s live analysis, greatly improved the televised product and set a new benchmark for others to aspire to. The production meeting soon came to be seen as standard across the sport.

Brady had already made his debut on Fox last season when he took a stake in the Raiders. The NFL were so conscious of the blurring of lines between media responsibility and minority ownership that they insisted he could not attend production meetings or visit any team’s practice facility, another important part of pregame prep for any serious analyst. To assuage obvious concerns about a clash of interests, these stipulations were outlined to nervous club owners during a slide show entitled “Brady – Broadcast Restrictions”. They even inserted a clause banning him from criticising match officials, the first refuge of every scoundrel pundit.

By the time the Super Bowl came around last February, at the end of a campaign in which Brady utterly underwhelmed behind the microphone, the rules were relaxed so he could interview star players in advance of that fixture. Before the start of this new season, he’s retained that right and further amendments have been made to his position. He is now allowed to remotely attend production meetings but remains prohibited from visiting training facilities. Despite lingering concerns about the true nature of his role with the Raiders, the NFL was unequivocal in its defence of him last week.

“There are no policies that prohibit an owner from sitting in the coaches’ booth or wearing a headset during a game,” said the official statement. “Brady was sitting in the booth in his capacity as a limited partner.”

Some journalists have wondered if Brady should be considered the Raiders’ de-facto president of football operations. After all, Alex Guerrero, his business partner and personal coach during his playing days, a man with a tawdry history of passing himself off as a doctor while peddling fake supplements, is now the club’s “wellness co-ordinator”. An appointment that suggests the former quarterback retains some serious influence around the club.

Rival coaches have so far played down allegations about Brady gaining a competitive edge via his television work. More than one shot-caller testified that they have always withheld crucial information at production meetings due to trust issues with, or personal animosity towards, certain commentators. Others point out that in a sport where every player and play is subject to constant and forensic video scrutiny, there is no real room for industrial espionage in these chats. Teams already have a good idea exactly what the other side is going to do in any given situation a lot of the time.

The most interesting aspect of the entire brouhaha may be that it showcases just how much the NFL remains in thrall to Brady. For 22 seasons he was the face of the sport. Now they want him to be the voice of it on television. Come what may.

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