Maybe you've heard. A couple of days ago, on vacation in Costa Rica—and you should probably sit down for this—Tom Brady took his shirt off.


The Internet, upon seeing the pasty Patriot, reacted with unbridled glee. This was the NFL's Greatest of All Time? In an era when legions of thirsty Instagram influencers are distorting the very idea of what a dude should look like, the unquestioned standard of excellence in our most hyper-masculine sport has the body of... your mailman? This revelation was seen as a stunning victory for dudes the world 'round: dudes who aren't married to a supermodel; dudes who can't throw a perfect spiral; dudes who think Equinox is a thing that happens with (or to?) the sun.

Look, body-shaming is not an activity we endorse. But Brady has made his body his brand. He wrote a book about it. He has a food delivery service. He's got it down to a perfect formula: Avocado ice cream and water—lots of water—go in; nightshades do not; flawless game-winning touchdown passes come out. When you've sold your body as sacrosanct, and it turns out that the hidden temple under your shirt actually looks like the hidden temple (government name: Olmec) from Legends of the Hidden Temple, you're going to take a little heat. That's to be expected. (Especially if you remember #KissGate from earlier in the year. Tom Brady and his myriad idiosyncracies are Internet catnip.)

But everyone's got the wrong idea here. Brady is so good at playing football that people forget that he's 40. Sure, he looks a little, shall we say... deflated? (You know, like someone took the air out of him.) But dude looks great for 40! He's built to be pliable, not to be Zac Efron in the Baywatch remake. People keep saying he has a dadbod, as if he wasn't, you know, a dad. Plus, when you consider where he started—here—he's making incredible strides. If this pace keeps up, we might actually start to see some abs in another two decades, when he turns 60 and wins his 21st Super Bowl championship.

This is not meant as discouragement to those who would use it as motivation. By all means, use Tom Brady's less-than-taut figure to get you to the gym. ("I, too, can have an elite athlete's body!") And feel free, if you please, to do the exact opposite. ("If he's eating gluten, and only looks like that, I'm definitely not giving up bagels.") But whatever you do, the next time you watch Tom Brady play, try not to think too hard about the fact that the guy carving up your favorite team's secondary also has a torso that sort of resembles a sad emoji whenever he pops top.


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