Tom Brady’s roast involved a lot of jokes aimed at low-hanging fruit. For Brady, one of the easiest items is #Deflategate.
Toward the end of the event that was literally as long as a football game (and, like a football game, had maybe four or five key moments), Brady made a joke about his punishment for his involvement in the blow-out hit. of soccer balls.
“The NFL spent $20 million and found that it was ‘more likely than not’ that I was ‘generally aware’ that someone may have deflated my footballs,” Brady said. “You could have just given me the U.S. $20 million and I would just tell you, I fucking did it.
It got a lot of laughs, partly because it felt like a confession.
While Brady could plausibly say he was joking and it wasn’t an admission, it sure felt like one. Really, at this point, who cares? He won three Super Bowls with properly inflated footballs. It’s a footnote to an illustrious career.
And ultimately, who cares if the balls were in the magic 12.5 to 13.5 psi range. No one knows where this rule came from or why it exists. Over-inflate, under-inflate, who cares how much air is in the football bladder?
Perhaps that was the mentality at the heart of the joke. At the end of the day, who really cares?
The NFL did this, reportedly because some thought the Patriots weren’t beaten enough by Spygate. It seemed ridiculous at the time. It seems even more ridiculous now.
