Was Tom Brady planning to run the Miami Dolphins front office?

The pseudo-retirement of Tom Brady is the gift that keeps on giving. From the day he “retired”, conspiracy theories have abounded. In fact, even before February 1st, the rumor mill was rife with the “will he/won’t he” narrative.

Once the “retirement” happened, the stories really started to come out. The fact that he never used the word “retire”, instead referring to “not [making] a competitive commitment”, was not lost on everyone in this strange tale. Words matter, and Brady used his best legalese to leave all the doors wide open.

Then after forty days in the wilderness, like a resplendent Jesus coming in from the fast, Tom Brady reappeared. He spoke in parables and mysteries of unfinished business, leading the pundits to wonder if perhaps he was angling for a trade to his beloved boyhood heroes, the San Francisco 49ers. But swirling in the background, always lurking but never seen as a serious threat, the shark-like shadow of the Miami Dolphins.

Now, there is a flicker of a tale from the Boston Globe, referring to a month-old radio show in which another possible storyline plays out. For those who like the conspiracy-theory laden world of big sports business, and let’s be honest, who doesn’t, this one is a doozy. The thing is, though, that all of the strings to this story ring true.

The details of the story go like this:

Ben Volin of the Boston Globe reports that Tom Brady, unhappy with Bruce Arians, had found a way to get out of his Tampa contract by moving to a front-office position with the Dolphins. The cherry on top would be that he would be able to bring in Sean Payton to coach and possibly, just possibly, convince the Bucs to trade him to Miami where he would ride in to tumultuous applause and save the day. Like all best-laid plans, though, there was a snag. Bill Belichick.

Volin’s theory doesn’t expand on this part, perhaps in deference to his Boston audience, where Brian Flores’ lawsuit “threw a wrench” into this seemingly airtight plan. He leaves it to the imagination of the readers, or perhaps to chance, that this lawsuit came somewhat out of the blue. And in this uncertain scenario, Tom Brady would have balked at the idea of handing over his phone, perhaps his computers, to a legal investigation. So he cut loose of the deal.

But what is clear about this lawsuit is that it did not simply pop up from nothing, but was instigated by a series of text messages sent to Brian Flores by none other than the yang to Brady’s ying, Bill Belichick.

As per screengrabs presented as part of the lawsuit, the content of those texts went as follows:

Belichick: “Sounds like you have landed -- congrats!!”

Flores: “Did you hear something I didn’t hear?”

Belichick: “Giants?!?!?!”

Flores: “I interview on Thursday. I think I have a shot at it.”

Belichick: “Got it -- I hear from Buffalo & NYG that you are their guy.”

Flores: “Coach, are you talking to Brian Flores or Brian Daboll? Just making sure.”

Belichick: “Sorry - I f**ked this up. I doubled checked & I misread the text. I think they are naming Daboll. I’m sorry about that. BB”

You can almost feel the wry smile from Belichick. That “oh, sorry, I think I left my cowboy boots under your bed, ma’am” look that he excels at. Now, in fairness, this could have been, as Belichick claims, a simple mistake on his part. Or it could have been a calculated step to twist the knife on his former protégé. Like Volin, I think that I will leave that choice to the readers’ imaginations.

The substance of the lawsuit is not of issue when talking about Tom Brady. He wasn’t involved in any of the dealings and while the press jumped on the racial allegations in the lawsuit, the practice of big organizations holding sham interviews to comply with legislation is not unusual, as anyone who has ever worked for an Apple, IBM, Ford, Disney, Comcast, or any other mega-conglomerate will tell you. They have generally already decided who to hire, shamefully it is quite often a family member of the owner, but must still walk through the process for appearances.

But where the story does apply to Tom Brady is in the effect that the lawsuit had on his plan to get out of Tampa. He was forced, by this turn of events, to recant his earlier “retirement”. Another element of this story is exactly how Brady unstitched the quilt that he had woven.

In mid-March, Tom Brady attended a Manchester United match as a guest of Tampa Bay and Manchester owner Joel Glazer. After the match, he refused to answer Cristiano Ronaldo’s question “You’re finished right?” raising eyebrows all over the Twitterverse.

The next leg of Volin’s argument is that Brady and Glazer hatched a plan for the legendary quarterback to return to the Buccaneers. Two days later, Brady announced his “unfinished business” and within two weeks, Bruce Arians handed over the head coaching reins to Todd Bowles. Hopefully Bowles didn’t inherit that ridiculous Rube Goldberg machine with the job.

In all, this story contains the most coherent version of this Florida soap-opera that we have heard to date. All of the steps in the tale, in fact, seem to hold up. It is unlikely that Tampa would have traded Brady within the year, preferring instead to keep him optioned until time had done its work on him, and he may have never played again. But the Dolphins would have ended up with a legend on their staff and one of the best coaches in the NFL, at the very least.

But as it turned out, Miami came off sacrificing the most in this deal gone sour.

And the big winner? He’s wearing a hoodie up in Foxborough, Massachusetts.