I also fall under the group of "they should have ridden that horse into the ground" and kept him, but the only way it would have worked would have been continuing to kick the can down the road with a long-term extension, which would have caught up with them eventually. So rather than get 1-2 more good years out of him (which ended up being the reality) and then end up with a solid year but then 1-2 years of cap issues, the year-to-year approach they went to made it where it only really hurt them cap-wise for one season.
That was clearly Belichick's call and it obviously sucks for how Brady was treated, no doubt, but these things historically don't typically end the way people always want them to with that caliber of player and the $$ involved. And no, the $$ wasn't that bad, but it's lower when it's pushed out longer, which was ultimately the issue. They way they did it allowed them to get him off the books faster.
At the end of the day, you're not talking about a 35-38-year-old player. You're talking about a guy who was at the very end in his 40s or whatever, and honestly, good for him for going to Tampa and getting a ring. People are mad about it due to the fact he didn't finish out his career here, but let's be honest, that one season ended up cementing his legacy as the best ever, and it also slammed the door on the nonsense with Rodgers, Manning, and even Mahomes (for now).
Meanwhile, the Patriots spent one season in cap jail instead of more than one, and they're essentially into a process that was coming eventually. Like
@Steve102 said earlier, be happy the last 20 years happened, but also be happy Brady had the chance to really shut everybody up.
Once Brady was gone, someone like a Mac Jones was going to be here eventually, and anyone hoping for an elite QB to just fall into their laps and keep things rolling is just being unrealistic. It just almost never happens and he could have easily landed elsewhere and we might have missed out on it. But they can potentially contend with a decent QB and the type of defense they have now. They're just not going to dominate people the way they did. It's going to be ugly and difficult at times. So people just need to flip the page and try and enjoy the ride instead of pining for the past.
It's over. So rather than drive yourself nuts and get mad, try and watch the highlight video when they show it on opening night and be thankful this happened in a time where we were all front and center, rather than reading or having to watch archive footage. We were lucky, and I certainly enjoyed all of it.