How Tom Brady's Raiders Ownership Will Affect His Broadcasting
Tom Brady had already accomplished a lot by the time he arrived to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but that didn't stop his internal fire from igniting the entire franchise's goal of winning the franchise's second Super Bowl.
After retiring from the Buccaneers and the NFL, Brady agreed to a deal that put him on Fox Sports' top broadcast team, and it appeared the next mountain the quarterback wanted to climb would be that of an analyst.
However, with the news that Brady has been approved to be a minority owner of the Las Vegas Raiders, the future Hall of Famer will now add another challenge to his plate while making his current venture a little more difficult at the same time. And it is not sitting well with some.
"I'm incredibly humbled and excited to have been unanimously approved as an owner of the Las Vegas Raiders," Brady said in a statement with the Raiders logo at the top and the hashtags 'JustWinBaby' and 'LFG' at the bottom just above his name and signature. "Throughout my NFL career, I've leared that at its core, football is a game of teamwork, resilience, and a relentless puruit of excellence."
Here's the thing though — television broadcasts are also built upon teamwork. Contrary to what some may think, your average broadcast isn't two super smart people in a booth talking about every nuance of football in real time.
There's a lot of planning, preparation, research, conversation, and real-time resourcing that is all happening to provide viewers the illusion that Tony Romo can predict the future, or Al Michaels can remember every word he's ever heard in passing conversation.
Because of this latest development, a lot of that responsibility is going to fall on other shoulders, all in an effort to make Brady appear just as prepared as his counterparts across the league.
On top of other restrictions, as a minority owner of the Raiders, Brady can no longer be in another team's facility, cannot watch practice, cannot be part of broadcast prodcution meetings in any way and cannot criticize officials or other teams.
The extent of those last two parts is interesting, especially because Brady has spoken out in the past about the way current NFL rules help cover up offensive mistakes by penalizing defensive players who simply play to what is happening in front of them. Things like quarterbacks throwing receivers into contact where a defender might get flagged for then hitting that receiver too hard or in the wrong body part.
Brady has always been known as an avid preparer, so there are things he'll surely take from tape studies that most would never be able to identify. But not getting some of the nuggets of information that make broadcasters appear so intuitive could certainly damage his on-screen performance. Add to it that there are already plenty who haven't been impressed with his start in the media field and there's some reason for concern there.
It isn't in Brady's nature to make a challenge even harder than it already is, but there's a first time for everything. And this is a first worth watching, that much is for sure. Which is going to make Fox happy, at least for a little while.
READ MORE: Tom Brady Approved as Raiders Minority Owner
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