Julian Edelman and Tom Brady had one of the NFL’s most notable partnerships on and off the field. The two were an iconic duo that was the backbone of the New England Patriots’ Super Bowl wins in 2016 and 2018. But there once was a time when Brady yelled at a rookie Edelman for dilly-dallying as a punt returner.
Advertisement
Now that the two work for FOX, Brady apologized to Edelman after all these years. During a pregame show earlier this year, he opened up about yelling at his teammate for the first time ever at Lincoln Field.
The setting was a preseason game against the Eagles in 2009, Edelman’s rookie season. Brady said he saw his teammate returning a punt, and he kept running side to side rather than pushing upfield. This perturbed Tom.
“I said, ‘Julian, get upfield!’” Brady yelled.
As a rookie, Edelman might have felt it pretty intimidating to be yelled at by the captain of the team. But funny enough, the punt return was called back due to a penalty, and they re-kicked. That time, Edelman proved Brady wrong by scoring a 70-yard TD.
“He catches the ball right after that, goes 70 yards for a touchdown. What a way to break him in,” Brady pointed out. “And, I never even got to thank you for that.”
It was a nice gesture by Tom to offer his thanks for Julian’s performance. However, Edelman admitted that the memory brought up what he was thinking during the time, and they weren’t kind thoughts.
“I was sitting watching this punt come in and I was yelling at Tom Brady in my head, ‘This guy’s never done a punt return in his life!’” Edelman shared. “And I ended up housing it and making the team. We had some great memories here.”
It’s cool that all these years later, the two former Patriot legends can reminisce about the good times and poke fun at each other. There surely must be other great stories that they have in their memory banks.
Off to the side during the interaction, though, was another former Pats legend in Rob Gronkowski. He was standing while his former teammates were reminiscing about their Lincoln Field adventures. Gronk then shared his epic moment at the stadium that he remembered with Brady.
“I’ve only played one game here before, and right here, right on this field at the 30-yard line, I had a middle read right up the middle with two safeties high. And Tom, you hit me with a bullet right down the middle. I caught it at the 4-yard line and dragged two guys into the endzone. So, one game here, one touchdown, and one massive Gronk spike,” he added.
It’s hard to believe, but it’s true that Gronk only ever played one regular-season game against the Eagles in his career. He had four catches for 59 yards and the aforementioned score. The Pats also went on to win the game 38-20 in Week 12 of the 2011 season.
All in all, this was a fun trip down memory lane that the three former New England legends took. It also highlighted how little the three matched up against Philadelphia in their careers. Aside from the Super Bowl matchup in 2018, the teams have only met each other 5 times since 2005. During his career, Brady went 7-2 against the Birds.
