Patriots: New book reveals Tom Brady’s 2018 hand injury was worse than you thought

New England Patriots QB Tom Brady’s hand injury was so, so gross before the 2018 AFC Championship.

Back in early 2018, with the most ferocious defense in the NFL standing between him another Super Bowl berth, Patriots QB Tom Brady hit an additional snag.

And that snag ripped his hand and thumb apart mid-practice, as if he’d reached into Rex Burkhead’s helmet and encountered a serrated knife.

If you remember the circumstances of Brady’s “hand injury” prior to the January 2018 title game against the ferocious and precocious young cats, the whole thing was shrouded in mystery. Would he be able to play? Of course he would be. He’s Tom Brady. But how would he possibly have an elite level-grip with a sliced-up hand? Turns out, we didn’t even know the half of it.

Author Jeff Benedict’s new book The Dynasty gives us an inside look at the 20-year run of the Brady-Belichick Pats, and a snippet released to the public on Sunday tells us all we ever needed to know about Brady’s toughness, insanity, and incredibly graphic injury.

Brady’s hyperextended thumb, suffered on a routine handoff to Rex Burkhead, reportedly looked like it had been “sliced by a blade,” and the opinion was overwhelming that he’d be headed to the operating table.

As Benedict writes:

"In 99 percent of the cases where a hyperextended thumb results in a gaping laceration, there is also a fracture or dislocation involved. And the underlying ligaments and tendons are inevitably damaged as well.Confident that Brady needed surgery, he called Van Allen back. ‘Does Tom just want to meet me at the hospital?’ [Hand Surgeon Dr. Matthew] Leibman said. ‘Because we may go straight to the OR.’"

Somehow, Brady avoided this fate — likely due, in part, to his own dogged attitude.

And, of course, leave it to Bill Belichick to help mitigate the spin operation — anyone else remember how casual he was as Brady’s big day approached, hand held together by twine and pliability prayer?

25 stitches later, Brady made the comeback of a lifetime from an injury “deep enough that [Dr. Liebman] could see down to the bone and tendon.” After assuming his season was over and consoling a distraught Burkhead, Brady not only played, but showed no ill effects, leading a comeback from 20-10 down in the fourth quarter, hammering the gas after the Jags let up.

Wouldn’t have expected anything less, now would we? Brady was the ultimate warrior, and escaped devastating injury here by the skin of his teeth, shaking off the gruesome overtones.

How could he have lost after all that winning?

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