The Seahawks beat the Patriots 29-13 in Super Bowl LX, and normally that's the kind of blowout that gets analyzed to death and then forgotten by the time free agency hits. Instead, Mike Macdonald keeps it alive every time he opens his mouth. On The Dan Patrick Show, Macdonald was asked to name someone who helped him prep for the game who might surprise people, and instead of just naming a name, he got cute: he couldn't mention one guy who really helped out because that guy had 'some conflict of interest.' When Dan Patrick guessed Bill Belichick, Macdonald shot it down. He never said Brady. He never said anyone. And that's exactly the problem for Boston.
If this doesnt piss you off as a Patriots fan you are dead on this inside. Im not going to say who they are saying gave a ton of advice to the Seahawks before the Superbowl but the guy has a statue in front of our stadium. What a joke
Portnoy didn't need much to connect the dots. "The guy has a statue in front of our stadium" only points to one person, and Dave made it clear he's taking this as a personal insult to Patriots fandom everywhere. It's the kind of accusation that only lands because it's plausible. Brady is a Raiders owner now, reportedly eyeing Seattle's offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak for a Las Vegas head-coaching job, so there's an actual working relationship between the Brady camp and this Seahawks staff. That doesn't prove anything about Super Bowl prep, but it's enough smoke for Barstool to start asking the question out loud.
Is it possible that Tom Brady gave Mike Macdonald advice on how to beat the Patriots in the Super Bowl?
The thing is, Macdonald has actually addressed this since and denied it was Brady. That hasn't slowed anything down, because a flat denial from a coach who loves being cryptic just reads as more cover-up to a fan base that's already primed to be furious. And Pardon My Take has been more than happy to keep stirring the pot instead of letting it die.
Mike McDonald got some great advice from an anonymous person about the Patriots before the big game @TwistedTea
None of this changes the final score. Macdonald ran the NFL's best defense as his own play-caller and became the third-youngest head coach ever to win a Super Bowl, right behind Sean McVay and Mike Tomlin, in a season that saw Seattle go 14-3 and knock off the 49ers and Rams before finishing off New England. That's the real story: a 39-year-old defensive mind who built this from scratch. But football fans, and Patriots fans especially, don't want the boring explanation. They want the conspiracy, and Macdonald's own cageyness is doing nothing to talk them out of it.
Whether or not Brady actually whispered anything useful into Macdonald's ear, the accusation has legs because it's unverifiable and because Brady's fingerprints are already all over the Seahawks organization through the Kubiak connection. Until Macdonald just says the name, plainly, on the record, this is going to keep getting relitigated on every podcast and every Portnoy rant. And given how much he clearly enjoys the mystery, don't expect that to happen anytime soon.