1. Ever since ESPN cameras caught Tom Brady in the Raiders’ coaches booth wearing a headset a couple of weeks ago, the discussion surrounding his “conflict of interest” as a Fox broadcaster and Las Vegas minority owner has intensified.

Apparently, Brady has seen and heard the blowback because he responded on Wednesday via his newsletter—and he was not happy.

Brady went full Dr. Freud and used a lot of psychological analysis in defending his role as broadcaster and owner.

“I love football,” wrote Brady. “At its core it is a game of principles. And with all the success it has given me, I feel I have a moral and ethical duty to the sport; which is why the point where my roles in it intersect is not actually a point of conflict, despite what the paranoid and distrustful might believe. Rather, it’s the place from which my ethical duty emerges: to grow, evolve, and improve the game that has given me everything.”

It’s funny to hear Brady call out the paranoid and distrustful after he played for Bill Belichick for a million years. Brady was far from done in psychoanalyzing his critics.

“When you live through uncertain and untrusting times like we are today, it is very easy to watch a person’s passions and profession intersect, and to believe you’re looking at some sort of dilemma. Because when you’re blinded by distrust, it’s hard to see anything other than self-interest.

“People who are like that, particularly to a chronic, pathological degree, are telling on themselves. They’re showing you their worldview and how they operate. They’re admitting that they can only conceive of interests that are selfish; that they cannot imagine a person doing their job for reasons that are greater than themselves. (These kinds of people make horrible teammates, by the way.)”

All this over broadcasting some football games? I get that Brady isn’t used to being criticized for his work since he’s the greatest quarterback of all time, but this entire “conflict of interest” thing is not that important or serious.

The real reason people are screaming, “CONFLICT OF INTEREST” is because you’re Tom Brady and people can get clicks and engagement off your name. I’m literally doing it right now. It has nothing to do with paranoia and distrust.

2. Puck’s John Ourand reports that USC and Netflix tried to concoct a scheme that would allow Netflix to air a USC-Notre Dame football game. Given that NBC owns the rights to Notre Dame home games and the Big Ten has contracts with Fox, CBS and NBC, the Netflix plan was swiftly shot down.

From Ourand: “Both Netflix and USC considered ways to circumvent these arrangements, and homed in on the idea of scheduling the game at a neutral site, like Mexico City or Las Vegas. The traditional partners went berserk when they learned about the subterfuge—a flurry of phone calls, as one source described it. Big Ten officials almost immediately shut down the idea, and the conference made clear that USC was not allowed to sell media rights to individual, non-conference games on their own, regardless of where they are played.”

Of course, the main takeaway here is that we are headed to a time where you’re going to have to pay for games on a one-off basis. I know most of you are thinking, “Oh, stop being so dramatic, Jimmy. EVERYONE has Netflix.” One, that’s not true. Two, once it happens with Netflix, it will happen with other streaming services. And sports fans will have to do what they always have to do: pay, pay, pay.

3. MLB announced Tuesday that the sport will now use a balls-and-strikes challenge system beginning next season.

Teams will get two challenges per game (which is way too low considering how bad the umps are). Hitters, pitchers and catchers will be the only ones allowed to call for a challenge. If the challenge is successful, teams will keep their challenge.

The timing of the announcement was quite ironic since it came just hours after this video was posted revealing that home plate umpire Roberto Ortiz was wrong on 25 ball-strike calls in the Brewers-Padres game on Monday,

4. Dan Patrick Show producer Paul Pabst hit on what might be the most underdiscussed (I don’t know if that’s a word, but just go with it) topics when it comes to watching sports: The ineptness of bars when it comes to putting games on televisions.

I have literally asked establishments to just give me the remote so I could handle things. (A couple have let me do it and a couple looked at me as if I were deranged, which is fair.)

His idea for an app to fix this problem is a great one.

5. I’m so in.

6. The latest SI Media With Jimmy Traina features two interviews plus the weekly “Traina Thoughts” segment.

First up is ESPN’s Mina Kimes, who talks about how she got her start at ESPN, transitioning into an NFL analyst, the stigma of being an NFL analyst who didn’t play the game, what her typical Sunday is like and whether she’d like to be in the booth calling games one day.

Kimes also discusses auditioning for the ManningCast, the worst thing about social media becoming a cesspool, working with Dan Orlovsky and much more.

Following Kimes, WWE Superstar Seth Rollins joins the show. Rollins talks about the WWE–ESPN partnership, fooling the entire wrestling world with his fake knee injury, the one person he felt bad about lying to, becoming a cast member on Good Morning Football, getting duped by Kyle Brandt, why he despises the tush push and more.

The podcast closes with the weekly “Traina Thoughts” segment featuring Sal Licata from WFAN radio and SNY TV. This week, we talk about my friends and I getting booted from a restaurant, Sal’s second week in a row suffering a horrific NFL betting loss, a crazy college football bad beat, Sal losing the Emmy Award on his birthday and more.

You can listen to the SI Media With Jimmy Traina podcast below or on Apple and Spotify.

You can also watch SI Media With Jimmy Traina on Sports Illustrated‘s YouTube channel.

7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: As of this writing, Jimmy Kimmel’s monologue from last night has 10 million views on YouTube.

Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out the Sports Illustrated Media Podcast hosted by Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on X and Instagram.


This article was originally published on www.si.com as Tom Brady Has Had Enough of the ‘Paranoid and Distrustful’ Who Claim He Has a Conflict of Interest.

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