With the Pro Bowl, NFL Honors and Super Bowl in the rearview, the NFL offseason is in full swing. Two teams have already been in the spotlight thus far in the Las Vegas Raiders and the New England Patriots.
Rumors have indicated that Mark Davis and the Raiders might have a significant interest in signing long-time Patriots quarterback Tom Brady to take the place of Derek Carr under center.
Carr, of course, has been the Raiders’ starting quarterback since 2014, while Brady has spent 20 seasons with the Patriots, winning six Super Bowls and three MVPs.
While Brady’s contract has expired, it seemed that the Patriots were out of luck trying to extend him and the quarterback was bound for free agency. According to Ian Rapoport of NFL Network, the Patriots and Brady are actually in mutual agreement about letting him test free agency:
“Well there is a pretty good reason that owner Robert Kraft and Tom Brady have worked closely on several deals in the past. There is a reason why, the option was to allow Brady to test free agency, to not get franchised, to not get transitioned, just to have a clear path towards free agency and from what I understand, Kraft’s thinking on this was basically, if the sides came together, if Brady decided that the Patriots were his best option after testing free agency and if Bill Belichick, who of course is making the decisions for New England, if he decides that Brady is his best option at this price, then in the end, after all this, after going through everything, that it will mean that it’s basically meant to be and that it’s the best thing for all sides. Kraft wanted them to get apart to see what’s out there and try to come together in the middle, and the hope is that if that works out for 2020, everyone will be happy they went through the process.”
Of course, if Patriots head coach Bill Belichick cannot find a suitable replacement it could be very likely that Brady will return to New England. Until then, Brady will be free to hear offers from many other teams, including the Raiders.
The Raiders certainly seem to have the biggest upside of the teams interested. While other franchises like the Cincinnati Bengals or Cleveland Browns might be interested in replacing their quarterbacks, the Raiders have a roster full of young talent and nearly made the playoffs in 2019.
On the other hand, bringing in Brady means letting go of Carr, who had his best statistical year in 2019. On top of that, Carr just signed a five-year extension in 2017. As Josh Jacobs has already stated, there is really no going wrong when picking between these two quarterbacks and it should be interesting to see how it plays out this offseason.
