Reportedly Tom Brady Ripped Off FTX, Not the Other Way Around. He Got $55 Million for a Few Days of Work.

There are moments in every person's life where they lose faith in the institutions that have guided them. And sometimes those moments are deeply regrettable. For instance, I must confess I bailed on the Red Sox during the 2004 ALCS for about the first five innings of Game 4. It was the first time in my life, and I've regretted it ever since. 

Another time was when I allowed myself to believe that Tom Brady could ever have been naive enough to be taken in by Sam Bankman-Fried and his weirdo polygamy cult friends. Or to suggest that he lacks the business savvy of a Taylor Swift:

Or to even consider for one hot second that this perfectly sculpted handsome devil could ever lose out on a business arrangement with this rumpled, unkempt, unmade bed of a man:

I should never gone against my instincts. Because one of the most successful non-fiction authors of our times tells us it was exactly the opposite of what we've been told all along:

Source - Sam Bankman-Fried paid Tom Brady $55million for the equivalent of a week's work promoting his failed cryptocurrency platform FTX, the author of Moneyball has claimed.

Bankman-Fried recruited the ex-NFL star to be an ambassador for FTX and he did about '20 hours [of work] a year for three years', according to author Michael Lewis.

Lewis, who shadowed Bankman-Fried, said Brady was paid $55million in the deal and the pair struck up an unlikely friendship in the process. 

Brady was left 'crushed' when FTX collapsed - owing customers billions of dollars - and Bankman-Fried was charged with fraud offenses. …

Lewis told CBS' 60 Minutes: '[Brady] really liked him and he really liked the hope that he brought. 

'As time has gone by and he's ceased to get a really good explanation about what's happened, I think [Brady] is just like, 'He tricked me. I'm angry. I don't want to have anything to do with it anymore'.'

And here I was, thinking that for once, Brady made a terrible mistake. When the only mistake was made by me, thinking he'd made a mistake. I should've known better. Because it would've been his first. 

Over the eons, there have been very few human beings who were able to do everything right. Well this clearly is one. Because while I was mocking all the investors with their supposed business acumen who got taken in by Bankman-Fried, and praising Taylor Swift for having the horse sense to give him a good leaving alone, here was Brady. Not only getting into bed with SBF financially, but being a selfish lover and stealing all his covers afterwards. He was grifting the grifter. Robbing the master thief. Getting in with at guy so crooked he needs a corkscrew to put his pants on, and then taking him for more than he's currently worth.

Sure, Brady feels bad for the people who got scammed by FTX. He's an empathetic man who's read The Four Agreements and cares about his fellow citizens. But that's nobody's fault but Bankman-Fried and his horny band of unattractive, orgy enthusiast gamer nerds. Instead of putting their retirement funds into FTX, those people should've should've won a few championship rings and did a Super Bowl ad with a CGI flamethrower. That's how winning is done. 

It's a shame that with Lewis' The Blind Side the dark, grim reality didn't turn out to match the sunny, positive narrative he told. But at least this story has a happy ending. For Tom Brady, anyway.