We may never know who ordered the Code Red (a.k.a. the trading of Jimmy Garoppolo), but fallout from two days of blockbuster stories is sure to shake the holy trinity of Patriot Nation.
On Friday, ESPN released an exhaustive report of trouble in Patriot Land, reporting that Bob Kraft mandated the Garoppolo trade and detailing hard feelings between Bill Belichick, Kraft, and Tom Brady, much of it owed to the Jimmy G. trade and treatment of Brady’s personal training guru, Alex Guerrero. The story largely made Belichick look good, made Brady look bad, and made Kraft look like a meddling owner.
On Saturday, Kraft told Sports Illustrated’s Peter King that any report of Kraft mandating the Garoppolo trade was “a total fabrication and fiction.’’
Wow. The Patriots are 13-3, Brady is likely to be named league MVP, and the Patriots have a great chance to win the Super Bowl next month, but fallout from these stories is going to make life more difficult for the Patriot troika. Fingerprints of Belichick’s operatives are all over the ESPN story. Now we have Kraft taking himself off the hook, making Belichick the sole author of the bad trade. This is Finger Pointing 101. The Hot Potato Blame Pie. Moving forward, how does all this make Brady feel about his coach? How does it make the coach feel about the owner?
This is what happens when ESPN shines a light on the egos and strained relationships inside the walls of Fort Foxborough.
If you’ve been paying attention, it’s no surprise really. We’ve been telling you all along that Kraft ordered the trading of Jimmy G. against the wishes of Belichick. We’ve exposed the fraudulence of Guerrero. Thumbing through Brady’s fitness book, or listening to the quarterback talk about Guerrero, suggests that Tom has been kidnapped by aliens. It’s more cult than sports culture. Belichick restricting Guerrero’s access and availability to other Patriot players at team facilities this season has agitated Brady and divided the organization. Tossing a little more tension on the pile, we have the beloved/needy owner who thinks of Brady as a fifth son.
Friday’s breaking story and Kraft’s Saturday denial have triggered yet another rallying call for Patriot Nation, providing fans with a familiar common enemy — the Worldwide Leader.
Nothing new here. Patriots fans were similarly galvanized against the league office after Spygate and against Roger Goodell in the wake of the interminable and wildly litigious Deflategate matter. “They Hate Us Because They Ain’t Us’’ has been a fine New England mantra through the controversies, and now the Patriots and their fans have another boogeyman to flip off as they go for a third Super Bowl win in four seasons.
While Patriots fans ranted on social media and called talk shows Friday, Kraft, Belichick, and Brady issued a one-paragraph statement of solidarity, citing the ESPN report’s “flat-out inaccurate . . . fallacies’’ without specifying anything that was actually incorrect. On Saturday, Kraft took it to another level, telling King that reports of him mandating the trade are false and denying there was an extended meeting involving himself and Belichick regarding Garoppolo two weeks before the trade was made. Perhaps this is an issue of semantics, but Bob Kraft’s denial here sounds much like Jonathan Kraft’s mid-December radio interview in which he insisted he “hadn’t heard anything from the coaching staff or Alex [Guerrero] about either one being upset with each other.’’
That was a whopper. And proof that sometimes it’s better to not comment. When insisting there is “nothing to see here,’’ the paranoid Patriots are traditionally better served by mobilizing their well-oiled Media Cartel.
It speaks highly of the Patriots that they have been so successful this season while navigating choppy waters around Gillette. Regardless of who made the call, one could argue that the trading of Garoppolo was an understandable decision given the play of the 40-year-old Brady and the fiscal responsibilities of ownership.
It might be as simple as this: Belichick had a quarterback succession plan, but Brady’s level of performance outlived Bill’s plan.
Still, the vaunted Patriot Way for 18 years has been to get rid of a guy too early rather than too late. For some reason, that time-tested logic went out the window when it came to Brady. Now Kraft is asking us to believe it was all Bill. So, here we are.
Take a hard look at the takeaway theme of the ESPN piece. Under a headline of, “For Kraft, Brady and Belichick, is this the beginning of the end?’’ ESPN featured this nut sentence: “Those interviewed describe a palpable sense in the building that this might be the last year together for this group.’’
1. Kraft isn’t going anywhere and his sons someday will inherit the team.
2. Brady isn’t going anywhere. He’s the franchise and just won some kind of power struggle in which his successor was irrationally traded for a bag of footballs.
3. Which brings us back to Belichick. It is simply too perfect that the New York football Giants would have a coaching opening at the same moment we find out Belichick is upset with Kraft and Brady. We know Bill loves the Giants almost as much as he hates the Jets. We know he loves a challenge, even at 65 years old. We know he thought he had the future of the Patriots solved with Jimmy G. Now, there’s the possibility he’s been told he can’t shop for all the groceries AND he’s got to take the blame for making a bad deal.
In this spirit, the New York tabloids did not disappoint Saturday morning. The coveted back cover of the Daily News featured a full-page photo of Bill accompanied by the headline, “BRING BILL HOME.’’ Not to be outdone, the Post went with a front-page tease of, “Patriot Shames — The Pats are as dysfunctional as the Jets,’’ plus a back cover screaming, “BACK TO THE HOODIE’’ splashed on a full-page photo of a young Belichick being carried off the field by his Giants players after an NFC title game win in January 1987.
I don’t think Belichick is going anywhere, but the hard feelings in Foxborough are real. Try for a moment to imagine what it’s going to look like around here if Josh McDaniels and Matt Patricia leave for head coaching jobs and then Belichick shocks the world and goes to the Giants. Try to imagine Kraft left with a 41-year-old quarterback and no head coach.
Now that would be a story.
Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at dshaughnessy@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @Dan_Shaughnessy
