Tom Brady Clarifies That Football Is Not Actually War

Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback and wellness entrepreneur Tom Brady is taking back one of his more outrageous claims. No, not the one about water being equivalent to sunscreen, that one is science. He is walking back a statement he made on his podcast in which he compared being a professional football player to “going away on deployment for the military.”

He is very sorry, he did not mean it like that. When he said that the start of an NFL season was like going off to war because — much like soldiers preparing for a battle from which they may never return — he’s struck by the thought, “Man, here I go again,” he meant… something else.

“Earlier this week I made a statement about playing football and the military and it was a very poor choice of words,” Brady said at a press conference on Thursday. “And I just want to express that to any sentiments out there that people may have taken it in a certain way. I apologize.”

What “I just want to express that to any sentiments out there” means is between Brady and his god (Alex Guerro), but I think I understand the rest of what he’s saying. Football is not war. Namely because when football players sign up for physical injury and being away from their families for long stretches of time, they’re getting paid a lot of money for it, which is arguably better than killing people and getting severe PTSD all in the hopes of snagging a measly college education. Tom knows that now, and he is sorry.