McCourty and Thuney were signed for roughly $25M, the same cost as Brady. Brady signing before the March deadline would have also reduced his cap hit by something like $7.5M in 2020. There were also many other ways to restructure deals and backload them into 2021 where they had so much cap space, which we just saw them fill with all these free agents.
None of this is complicated...it's just you foolishly rationalizing that the Patriots couldn't have made the contract/cap financials work out, despite overwhelming, obvious, glaring evidence directly in your face. It's laughable that you'd even try this argument. The team had enough money to sign Brady for 2021 and could have also maneuvered to sign other players, but all the rumblings were that they thought they'd be okay without Brady, it was time to move on, and Stidham was looking ready. My guess is you also bought those arguments at the time and are now desperately trying to save face. Stop trying to revise history with this stuff...smoke and mirrors doesn't work.
You don't understand the basics of the salary cap if you believe that the 2020 cap situation precluded the Patriots from making Brady a highly competitive offer. It always comes down to this: the Patriots severely underappreciated, undervalued and underestimated Brady, and that's why he's gone.
Thuney was franchise tagged, he costs the Patriots zero dollars in 2021... his signing is irrelevant considering they needed a starting guard in 2020 and they hoped to keep him. DMC is an important player on the defense and one they wanted to retain going forward to QB the defense. Brady cost 50 million guaranteed, not 25.
And signing Brady before the deadline would not "reduce" his cap hit, it would have allowed them to spread it out over the remainder of a new contract. It doesn't mean new money added to his existing cap hit wouldn't accumulate further.
Consider last year's 15th round pick Jerry Jeudy signed a 4 year, $15,192,974 contract with the Broncos, including a $8,609,436 signing bonus = $15,192,974 guaranteed.
Now pretend for a moment BB drafts Mac Jones or Trey Lance at fifteen...
Year one: $9.2 million - 2.76 million cap hit
Year two: $1.3 million - 3.45 million cap hit
Year three:$2.0 million - 4.14 million cap hit
Year four: $2.7 million - 4.83 million cap hit
Vs Tom Brady's Tampa contract, plus the cap we already owed for him... a 63.5 million dollar cap hit spread out over two years:
Year one: $25 million - 31.75 million cap hit
Year two: $25 million - 31.75 million cap hit
Even if you spread it out and add a phantom third year:
Year one: $25 million - 21.2 million cap hit
Year two: $25 million - 21.2 million cap hit
Year three:$0.0 million - 21.2 million dead cap hit
Now tell me where all the veteran weapons that Tom wanted are coming from, especially in 2020 when they were flat broke? Once they let DMC and Thuney walk imagine that team with all the free agent vets they did sign also gone. Tom would retire in another year or so with zero rings to show for it and the Patriots would be saddled with more cap debt than they had in 2020. The point is to win rings... not make it so Tom can retire a Patriot.