On a weekend where Baker Mayfield should have been universally celebrated by fans for turning in a fantastic effort against the Philadelphia Eagles, where he got rid of the ball quickly and led his team to a 33-16 victory, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers starting quarterback earned headlines for a very different reason for his comments regarding Tom Brady’s run leading the pewter and red.
“The building was a little bit different with Tom in there,” Mayfield said. “Obviously, playing-wise, Tom is different. He had everybody dialed in in a high-strung environment. So, I think everybody was pretty stressed out. They wanted me to come in, be myself, bring the joy back to football for guys who weren’t having as much fun.”
Now, to some, this was a shot at Brady; others noted that the comments were taken out of context, and others still wanted to focus on the task at hand and the Buccaneers win that went along with it, but the comments went so mainstream that they earned a response from Bill Belichick, who just so happens to have coached the “GOAT” to much of his biggest successes in the NFL.
Discussing Mayfield’s comments on The Pat McAfee Show, Belichick noted that winning six Super Bowls is actually very fun, thank you very much.
“People say we didn’t have fun; let me tell you something: winning six Super Bowl Championships was fun. Going to nine Super Bowls was fun,” Belichick admitted. “Winning those AFC Championship games that was fun. Fun was really the winning, and I certainly understand where Tom is coming from. Honestly, I think there’s a lot more stress when you’re not winning. Winning is hard, it’s very hard in the National Football League, and I think you got to put a lot into it, and it’s a very fine line between winning and not winning. Especially when you get to the final week or two of the season.”
Interesting stuff, right? Well wait, it gets even better as Belichick had even more to say about Brady and the man who replaced him in Tampa Bay.
Bill Belichick will always have Tom Brady’s back, Baker Mayfield
Continuing his comments regarding Mayfield and Brady in conversation with McAfee and company, Belichick noted that he hopes both men can get along moving forward, even if he clearly still has a bias towards his long-time starting quarterback.
“In the end I think that both of those guys have a lot of respect for each other. I don’t think either one of them is malicious,” Belichick noted. “Look, Baker is his own person; Tom is his own person. They’re both very successful; nobody is more successful than Brady. I don’t know how you could question anything Tom has done. He’s probably the greatest player of all time and certainly has had the most success of any NFL player.”
While things may not have ended perfectly between Belichick and Brady in New England, it’s nice to know the duo are back on good terms and rooting for each other’s shared success, even if it took some (potential) smack talk from Mayfield to bring that to the forefront once more.
