GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN – JANUARY 24: Tom Brady #12 of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers celebrates in the final seconds of their 31 to 26 win over the Green Bay Packers during the NFC Championship game at Lambeau Field on January 24, 2021 in Green Bay, Wisconsin. (Photo by Dylan Buell/Getty Images)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady has yet to announce his plans for 2023. It’s either retirement and to the FOX booth, a return to Tampa or a new chapter with another team.
Brady’s contract with the Buccaneers expires after this season. The 45-year-old hasn’t offered any timeline on when he’ll make a decision, so the free agency rumors are only going to continue piling up in the coming weeks.
The seven-time Super Bowl champion has been linked to the Las Vegas Raiders, given his familiarity with Josh McDaniels. On Tuesday’s edition of “PFT Live”, Chris Simms threw out the Detroit Lions as a possible destination. Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio went deeper into the possibility by writing the following:
“Wouldn’t that be something? Tom Brady, back in Michigan. Tom Brady, with a Lions team that finished 2022 strong. A Lions team with an impressive nucleus of talented players. A Lions team that quarterback Jared Goff may be able to lead on a deep run in the postseason, but may not be able to take over the top.
Brady has shown he can do it. Seven times. And while he’s 46, if the Lions want to finally make an appearance in the Super Bowl and possibly even win it, Brady could give them a better chance to do it than Goff…
Beyond football, there’s a very real business element to wanting Brady. He’d sell every ticket to every game at Ford Field. The Lions also would end up with multiple prime-time games, along with multiple 4:25 p.m. ET contests. In recent years, those games draw even more viewers than games played at night.”
Needless to say, plenty of football fans on Twitter weren’t at all on board with this idea.
Back in December, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported that the Lions view Jared Goff as their starting quarterback, and not a “bridge” to their next QB. Given that Goff is 17 years younger than Brady, it’d be quite surprising if the Lions seriously considered ditching Goff for a soon-to-be 46-year-old.
But crazier things have happened in football, so you can never say never.
