Report: Tom Brady Wasn't Referring to Bears' Trubisky with 'That Motherf--ker' Remark

Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady reportedly wasn't referring to the Chicago Bears with his incredulous comment on HBO's The Shop about an NFL team "sticking with that motherf--ker" while he was deciding where to sign as a free agent last year.

Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk reported Saturday a "source with direct knowledge of the situation" said the Bears, who had Mitchell Trubisky as their projected starter at the time, weren't the franchise Brady was talking about—but it remains unclear which team was the target of the future Hall of Famer's disbelief.

Speculation has run rampant about Brady's remark, with people trying to extrapolate the answer by combining which teams were in the market for a quarterback during the 2020 NFL offseason with those who featured signal-callers the longtime New England Patriots superstar could have formed such a strong opinion about.

The Bears with Trubisky and the San Francisco 49ers with Jimmy Garoppolo, Brady's former teammate with the Pats, were the two most popular predictions. Fox Sports' Colin Cowherd believes it was Chicago:

Trubisky had endured an up-and-down first three years in the NFL after the Bears selected him with the second overall pick in the 2017 draft, and they were definitely in the market for a veteran because they ultimately finalized a trade for Nick Foles from the Philadelphia Eagles after Brady found his new home in Tampa.

Yet, part of Brady's comment on The Shop was about how the team showed interest and then dropped out of the race in the latter stages—something that wouldn't have made sense for Chicago.

While it's easy to focus on the obvious candidates like the Bears and Niners, it's always possible another team with a seemingly established quarterback was involved in the Brady sweepstakes as part of a plan to go all-in on chasing a title.

That makes it impossible to know what team Brady was talking about, and he'll probably never provide a definitive answer.

In the end, Brady went on to win his seventh Super Bowl championship during his first season with the Bucs, showing he made the right decision despite the other interest.

Trubisky signed with the Buffalo Bills as a free agent this offseason to serve as a backup to Josh Allen, while the Niners selected quarterback Trey Lance with the No. 3 pick in the 2021 draft to eventually replace Garoppolo.