Not every NFL team is affiliated with the most successful player of all-time. In fact, the Raiders are the only franchise that has that luxury after NFL owners voted last year in favor of Tom Brady becoming a limited partner with the team.
While his work as an NFL commentator is out there in plain daylight, Brady’s actual role with the Raiders is anything but. What exactly does Brady do for the organization? Without getting into specifics, the seven-time Super Bowl champion recently shared one specific aspect of his job as is relates to decision-making and where he sits in the team’s pecking order that also concludes owner Mark Davis, new coach Pete Carroll and new general manager John Spytek.
“Well, I’m just a limited partner, so Mark’s the boss,” Brady said in an interview with Raiders.com’s Paul Gutierrez. “And then Pete does his job and Spy does his job and, I think, we trust them to make the right decisions. I’m there as a great sounding board for anything they want to do.”
Specifically, Brady was used as a “sounding board” when the Raiders decided to trade for quarterback Geno Smith as well as when the team chose to select running back Ashton Jeanty with the sixth overall pick in this year’s draft.
Based on his explanation, it appears that the Raiders are using Brady as a sounding board. While they are not necessarily making decisions off of whatever he says, it’s clear that Brady’s voice certainly carries some significant weight with the team’s top decision-makers.
Carroll, who suffered a heartbreaking Super Bowl loss to Brady’s Patriots 11 years ago, recently said that he and Brady are “phone buddies” while adding that Brady’s inclusion with the Raiders changed his outlook in terms of wanting to come to Las Vegas.
“I thought that would be one of the great opportunities of all time, to have his presence,” Carroll said of Brady last month. “His presence is strong. John Spytek and him go back a ton of years and Johnny holds him in the highest regard. So we’re trying to infuse Tom’s mentality, we’re trying to bring it into the organization, because it’s so good and so unique and so one-of-a-kind, I think it helps us to be a one-of-a-kind franchise.”
Brady’s quotes clarifying his role with the team comes after a recent report stating that he was “not in favor” of the team signing then-free agent quarterback Sam Darnold, who ultimately wound up in Seattle after the Seahawks traded Smith to Las Vegas. That report, in addition to Gutierrez including the acquisition of Smith as an example of Brady’s influence on decision-making, all but confirms that Brady played some sort of role in the Raiders’ decision to go with Smith as their QB1 for the 2025 season.
Brady — who was a five-time Super Bowl and three-time league MVP during his legendary playing career — expressed pleasure with what he’s seen so far from Caroll and Spytek, who together will try to help the Raiders get back to their formal place of prominence. While they haven’t been considered an elite team for over 20 years, the Raiders do have a rich history of success that includes three Super Bowl wins, five Super Bowl appearances and a litany of Hall of Fame players, coaches and executives that includes the team’s founder, Al Davis.
“They’ve worked together very well, and there’s a lot of decisions that are made,” Brady said of the Raiders’ new coach/GM combo. “Winning games in September starts with what happens in February, March and April, when no one’s really watching. They’ve been hard at work.
“And our goal is to, you know, win a lot of football games. You’ve got to work hard at it, and it’s all earned and we’ve got a tough division. There’s a lot of good opponents we face. But it’s going to be up to the guys and their daily commitment to doing the right things.”
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Author: Bryan DeArdo
June 28, 2025 | 3:10 pm
