Patriots fans conflicted ahead of Tom Brady's return to New England
BOSTON — Childhood hero or hometown team? G.O.A.T. or local pride? Tom Brady or the Patriots?
These are the choices many New Englanders will have to make Sunday night when Brady – along with his Tampa Bay Buccaneers – returns to Foxborough.
And they were already feeling conflicted three days before kickoff.
“Because that was, like, your icon and your hero growing up,” Anthony Lasillo, a 27-year-old lifelong Patriots fan from from Whitman, Mass., said while out for a walk on a crisp autumn Thursday in Boston. "So You always want to root for him, but the die-hard Boston sports fans that we are can’t root against our own team.
He's expecting a rush of emotions when the game begins at 8:20 p.m. ET Sunday on NBC.
"You want him to do good, but you also want him to lose," Lasillo said.
Losing isn't Brady's natural state. He quarterbacked the Patriots to six Super Bowl championships over two decades. Then, he won a Super Bowl title his first year with the Buccaneers in 2020, while the Patriots finished 8-8 and missed the playoffs for the first time since 2008.
Charles Atkeison, 40 of Braintree, Mass., said he’s been scouting tickets for Sunday’s game and is prepared to put aside his Brady fandom for the Patriots if he finds himself at Gillette Stadium.
“This will be the one time I don’t root for Brady,” Atkeison told Paste BN Sports+. “I have to stay with the Patriots. I’m sorry. It’s that meaningful. I rooted for Brady in the Super Bowl last season, but I can’t root for him and (ex-Patriots and current Buccaneers tight end) Rob Gronkowski on Sunday.
“But it’s Tom for everything else. This game, I’m sorry. We want the Patriots to try to make the playoffs and we don’t want to lose to the Bucs.”
Many Patriots fans might feel as though they’re being pulled in two directions, but not Stephen Larosa, 62 of Jackson, Wyo., who was raised in South Hadley, Mass.
Larosa was in town to catch a Boston Bruins preseason game Thursday and said he won’t have any issues with his rooting interests Sunday.
“I’m a true Patriots fan,” Larosa said. “I believed when we were Boston’s lovable losers. Of course, the championships started and I appreciate Brady and everything he did. But it was time for us to move on, and we weren’t going to win much anymore.”
Larosa said he’s excited about the Patriots’ current core of players – specifically rookie quarterback Mac Jones, who he thinks is “ahead of the learning curve.” Larosa added he hasn’t rooted for Brady once since the quarterback joined the Buccaneers.
“Tampa Bay has the Rays,” Larosa said. “They have the Lightning. I’m sorry. I think it’s going to be a rivalry that will eventually be compared to (New York and) the Yankees. It’s gonna get there.”
Still, not all Patriots fans have been able to sever emotional ties with Brady so easily. Kimberly Fox, 57 of Hudson, Mass., said she is expecting a crazy atmosphere at Gillette Stadium.
“How can you not love Tom Brady?” Fox said on her way home from work Thursday near Fenway Park. “I think they’re going to have to pause the game because there’s going to be such an ovation. And how can you not respect what he did here? Incredible.
"I think it’s going to be a tough one because once they see him marching down the field, they’ll just be cheering for him because he’s so flipping good.”
Fox said she watches every Patriots game and expects the Brady-led offense to “surgically take apart the Patriots."
“Unfortunately, I don’t think the Patriots have much of a chance at winning,” Fox said.
However, she is interested to see whether Brady or Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has the more successful career post-separation. It’s only been one season, but the advantage lies with Brady.
“What’s going on now is, 'Who is better off without the other?'” Fox said. “It seems to be like Tom is better off without Bill.
"He’s incredible. He’s got to be the G.O.A.T – he’s got to be, right?”
Patriots fans will watch with mixed emotions as another chapter in that debate is written Sunday night.