There’s a 17-foot monument in Patriot Place Plaza. Six tons of granite and bronze, 20,000 hours in the making, built to outlast every argument about who the greatest quarterback in NFL history was. This week, Dave Portnoy decided Tom Brady’s statue shouldn’t stay up.

Portnoy, founder of Barstool Sports and a lifelong New England Patriots fan, fired off on Wake Up Barstool, calling for Brady’s statue to come down. For Portnoy, the frustration had been building for months, one slight at a time.

“It’s starting to sound like a broken record here where Tom Brady is slighting the New England Patriots,” Portnoy said.

But he didn’t stop there. After listing off all the ways Brady has seemingly gone against the Patriots, Dave Portnoy delivered the clear verdict.

“It’s not an accident. We just put a statue of the guy. I say tear it down,” Portnoy declared. “Thank you for your Super Bowls. You’re just a guy. Go play your flag football game. Go be in a million different ads. But I don’t need you in my life anymore, and you don’t need us.”

Now, the fallout started in February. Tom Brady appeared on the Let’s Go! podcast with Jim Gray ahead of Super Bowl LX. When faced with the question of whom to support, the New England Patriots or the Seattle Seahawks, Brady chose neutrality over two decades of loyalty.

“I just want to see good football,” Brady said. “I want to see good plays, good throws, good strategy, good decisions. And that’s the joy in the game for me. … So listen, I don’t have a dog in the fight in this one. May the best team win.”

While Brady did praise the Patriots’ rebuild under head coach Mike Vrabel, he made it clear he’s not rooting for his old team. Dave Portnoy had fired off an expletive-laced rant on X following these comments.

“I think it’s bull****. Tom Brady said he has no dog in the fight for the Super Bowl,” Portnoy said. “It’s pretty obvious he doesn’t give a s*** about us anymore, so maybe we shouldn’t care about him either. Maybe it was just professional, and that’s fine.”

But Portnoy wasn’t alone in airing his frustrations. Former Patriots guard Damien Woody also called it out directly on ESPN’s Unsportsmanlike, calling Brady’s stance “ludicrous.” Woody also reminded everyone that Patriots owner Robert Kraft had put Brady’s statue outside the stadium, and that should naturally be reason enough for Brady to support the team that got him six Super Bowl rings out of seven.

But Brady’s Super Bowl neutrality didn’t stand alone. When the 2025 NFL MVP debate consumed sports media, he chose Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford over Patriots quarterback Drake Maye. Despite Maye posting a 72% completion rate and 31 touchdown passes while steering New England to a 14-3 regular season record, Maye hadn’t done enough in Brady’s eyes.

“If you’re a Patriot fan, you can come to no other conclusion that he hates the New England Patriots,” Portnoy said on Wake Up Barstool.

Portnoy’s theory for this animosity: Tom Brady holds a 5% minority stake in the Las Vegas Raiders, approved unanimously by NFL owners in October 2024. Portnoy believes Brady sought similar terms for Patriots ownership and was refused.

For months, the frustration lived in words. But then came a move that may have cost New England one of the most dominant edge rushers in football.

Tom Brady’s blockade in the Maxx Crosby trade

On March 6, 2026, the Raiders traded their 5x Pro Bowl edge rusher Maxx Crosby to the Baltimore Ravens. In return, Las Vegas received two first-round picks: Baltimore’s 14th overall pick from the 2026 Draft and a 2027 first-rounder. It was a move that immediately reordered the AFC’s defensive balance of power.

But when breaking down the trade, ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler revealed something from an anonymous source that immediately caused a stir. Brady reportedly refused to include the Patriots in any trade discussions. As a minority owner with major influence over personnel decisions, he reportedly used that position to keep New England out of the conversation entirely.

“One person involved in the trade made an interesting point about the Patriots’ chances at Crosby: ‘No way Tom was sending Maxx to Vrabel,’” Fowler wrote.

Now, the Patriots’ defense ranked in the top 10 in nearly all metrics last season (8th in total defense, 9th in passing defense, 6th in rushing defense, and 4th in scoring defense, per Fox rankings). For a secondary rising steadily under Mike Vrabel, Crosby would have been a franchise-altering acquisition. He’s the kind of elite pass-rush presence New England has lacked since the dynasty era came to a close.

Instead, Crosby now suits up for Baltimore. The Ravens were already among the most complete rosters in football. Now armed with a premier pass rusher, they become a more dangerous threat to any New England postseason run.

Whether Tom Brady’s decisions stem from a personal grudge, a business dispute that never got resolved, or something else entirely, the damage to his relationship with New England is now tangible and on the record. The Pats are building toward another run. Their former quarterback, it seems, would rather watch from the other side. That 17-foot statue isn’t going anywhere. But for a growing number of Patriots faithful like Dave Portnoy, the man it represents is already gone.