Tom Brady had specific motivation for agreeing to participate in last year’s bawdy Netflix live roast, according to one of the roast’s hosts.
Comedian Jeff Ross, who cohosted May 2024’s Roast of Tom Brady alongside Kevin Hart, opened up during a Wednesday, June 26, appearance on The Howard Stern Show about how the whole thing came to be.
“I had seen him looking at my Instagram on Super Bowl Sunday a few years ago,” Ross, 59, explained. “I was like, ‘Why the f*** is Tom Brady on my Instagram?’ I go, ‘Oh, I had some jokes up. Maybe that’s how he unwinds before a big game.’ And he f***ing wins!”
Based on the timeline, Brady, 47, was looking at Ross’ social media hours before winning Super Bowl LV in 2021 as quarterback of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
“I hit him the next day on Instagram going, ‘Dude, it’s time for a roast. You obviously love this s***,’” Ross continued. “He writes me back and we start talking and it turns out my agent and his agent, they work together. And we put a deal together to do a roast. Netflix is like, ‘Sure!’”
Things were all set, according to Ross, but then Brady had a change of heart professionally.
“He agreed and he retired and we were like, ‘Let’s go! Now’s our chance.’ Then he unretired,” Ross said. “I was like, ‘No, we got to wait until he’s done playing. It’s a little more fun.’”
Brady announced his retirement from the NFL in February 2022 but walked back his decision and returned for one more season with the Buccaneers. He officially announced he was retiring for good in February 2023.
Jeff Ross attends the Netflix live comedy event “The Greatest Roast of All Time: Tom Brady” at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California, on May 5, 2024. Michael Tran / AFP
According to Ross, Brady’s personal life also got in the way of the roast getting off the ground.
“Then he was going through a divorce and I’m like, ‘Let’s wait for that,’” Ross said.
Brady and his ex-wife, Gisele Bündchen, confirmed their split in October 2022 after 13 years of marriage.
When the day of the roast finally came in May 2024, Ross recalled asking Brady, “Why are you doing this?”
“He goes, ‘I love this kind of humor. People are too snowflaky right now,’” Brady responded, according to Ross.
Ross also recalled getting a text from Brady on the day of the roast reading: “No fear. This is what we do.”
Netflix’s first live roast featured Brady getting raked over the coals by comedians like Nikki Glaser and Andrew Schulz, celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Ben Affleck and former New England Patriots teammates Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman.
“He should get a Nobel Peace Prize for saying yes to that,” Ross said of Brady. “He took the hit so we could all forget our problems for three hours.”
