I spent 45 minutes with Brady one day in training camp, sitting on a golf cart in the Gillette Stadium tunnel. He was expansive, almost philosophical. He talked about how much he loved practice, how much he loved playing with Moss. "If you could pick the traits for the perfect wide receiver, Randy would have every single one of them," he said. "Long, lean muscles. Speed. Quick hands. Tremendous second gear when the ball's in the air. So smart. He wants to practice. He wants to work.''
I remember sitting there thinking, how lucky is Moss to have Brady, and vice versa. Now I wonder if Moss is going to turn into the leader he needs to be to help the Patriots save this season, and whether he'll mesh with Matt Cassel the way he'll need to if Brady is gone for the year.
I asked Brady that day about the Super Bowl loss.
"You control what you can control,'' he said, applying a moist wrap, painstakingly, around his right elbow. "Just because you lose the Super Bowl, it's not the end of your career, or the end of the world. You practice, you prepare, you do everything in your power to come out on top. And then you don't. You move on. Life gets simpler when you get older.''
It won't be as simple if the 45 minutes in the MRI tube today shows what we all fear it will show.
