Tom Brady makes 9/11 joke 19 months after apology for comparing NFL season to military deployment

Joking about Robert Kraft’s massage controversy may have been off limits during Tom Brady’s roast on Netflix, but 9/11 wasn’t.

During the roast that was nearly two years in the making, Brady received jabs about Spygate, Deflategate, his divorce from Gisele Bündchen, sexuality, and even the suicide of former teammate and convicted murderer Aaron Hernandez. But one of the most surprising jokes came from Brady himself, when the seven-time Super Bowl champion and soon-to-be Fox NFL broadcaster used 9/11 to reference Drew Bledsoe’s 2001 injury that jumpstarted his own career.

TOM BRADY WITH A WILD 9-11 JOKE pic.twitter.com/YvxSvk4ctj

— MLFootball (@_MLFootball) May 6, 2024

“Like the rest of America, I’ll always remember where I was that fateful day in September of 2001, when tragically, those two Jets slammed into Drew Bledsoe,” Brady said during the roast.

In the fourth quarter of their Sept. 23, 2001 game against the New York Jets, Bledsoe was hit by Mo Lewis and Shaun Ellis while attempting scramble for a first down. Bledsoe suffered a torn blood vessel in his chest on the play. That opened the door for Brady to step in as New England’s starting quarterback, a job he would hold on to for 18 seasons.

That was also the Patriots’ first game back following the September 11 terrorist attacks. Those attacks saw nearly 3,000 people killed after two planes were hijacked and crashed into New York’s Twin Towers. The NFL postponed its Week 2 schedule of games in the wake of those attacks.

This is a roast. It’s supposed to be edgy, controversial, and borderline offensive, during a time where comedians gripe about comedy being ruined by political correctness. But it was still surprising to hear Brady joke about 9/11, especially after he issued an apology to the military nearly two years ago for a “poor choice of words.”

During an Oct. 2022 episode of his Let’s Go podcast, Brady sparked controversy by comparing the NFL season to military deployment.

“I almost look at like a football season like you’re going away on deployment in the military,” Brady said. “And it’s like, ‘Man, here I go again.’”

It appeared very clear that Brady meant no harm by the analogy. He did not compare playing in the NFL to being in the military, he connected the mindset of needing to depart everything for a period of time. Still, Brady drew a lot of backlash for the analogy, enough to convince the seven-time Super Bowl champion that an apology was warranted.

“Earlier this week I made a statement about playing football and the military and it was a very poor choice of words,” Brady said while meeting with the media shortly after the podcast controversy. “And I just want to express that to any sentiments out there that people may have taken it in a certain way. So, I apologize.”

Less than two years after that apology, Brady’s 9/11 joke can certainly be deemed more controversial than his military deployment comment. But Brady probably won’t have to apologize for anything that was said during Sunday’s Netflix special.

Political correctness will grant Brady more leeway during a roast than it does during his podcast, That’s just like it allows for more leeway on a podcast than a radio show, and more leeway on a radio show than a game broadcast. Further, apologizing for a roast joke isn’t a precedent Netflix wants to set.

[Netflix]