We finally know how the Patriots ACTUALLY got Tom Brady. And Jets fans, you might want to close your eyes. Pablo Torre did some digging on his “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast, and uncovered one of the NFL's biggest mysteries.
We all know the Pats took Brady with the 199th pick in the 2000 NFL Draft. But it was actually a compensatory pick.
Compensatory picks have always been one of the more puzzling and mysterious elements of the NFL. As the league explains them on its football operations website, “under the rules for compensatory draft selections, a team losing more or better compensatory free agents (‘CFA') than it acquires in the previous year is eligible to receive compensatory draft picks.”
Basically, if you lose a lot of good free agents in the offseason, and don't sign back what the league deems an equivalent crop of new signees, you get compensated with a few extra draft picks. The NFL has a formula for compensatory picks that's never been revealed, but is determined “based on salary, playing time and postseason honors.”
Somehow, the NFL awarded New England the #199 selection for a player they lost. And who was that player the Pats lost? Tom Tupa, a dual QB/punter.
Don’t worry if you don't recognize the name. But his story is pretty wild. Tupa was a 6-4, 225-pound QB from Ohio State. Those are awfully similar attributes to Tom Brady at the time, who was a 6-4, 225 lb. QB from rival Michigan.
Back when Bill Belichick was with the Browns, he signed Tupa — not to be QB, but rather to be a holder on kicks.
And Tupa became the first man in NFL history to score a 2-point conversion — doing it as the holder on a fake field goal. The Browns did it again and again.
And the legend that became known as “2-point Tupa” was born.
When Belichick went to New England, Tupa followed him. But in 1999, Tupa left the Pats and signed with the Jets, where Belichick was now an assistant coach.
The Jets made Tupa the highest-paid punter in the NFL. And Tupa rewarded them by having an All-Pro season.
But here’s where it gets particularly crazy: the Jets played him at QB for one game due to an injury, and Tupa was on fire for three quarters. But Bill Parcells decided to relegate him back to punting for the fourth quarter. A backup QB then threw two interceptions, and the Jets lost by two points.
That year, the Jets finished 8-8 and missed the playoffs by one game — or really by one quarter, since keeping Tupa in that game most likely would have led to a victory.
That’s important because it caused Bill Parcells to retire, and Bill Belichick became the Jets’ head coach for a whole day… before stepping down and becoming head coach of the Pats.
And because they lost All-Pro punter Tom Tupa the year before, and because the Jets paid him a massive salary, those same Patriots were rewarded a 6th round compensatory pick: #199 to be exact.
Belichick then used that pick to draft the greatest QB of all time — Tom Brady. Sometimes sports have a funny way of working out. And we can now officially thank the Jets for the Patriots getting both Bill Belichick and Tom Brady.
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