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Tom Brady's Long Hair Taking Boring Offseason By Storm

By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston

BOSTON (CBS) -- The month of June is really a tough time for sports entertainment.

Locally, the Patriots had OTAs and minicamp, but really, how exciting are non-padded practices and generic quotes from players and coaches? The Red Sox are good, certainly good enough to watch every night, but there's not too much drama or tension during the daytime hours to consume too much of our time. In Celtics land, now that the 24/7 "Will Kevin Durant Come To Boston?!?!" discussions are seemingly over, it's now simply, "What To Do With The No. 3 Pick?" The scenarios can be laid out in a matter of about 10 minutes. And the Bruins? Well, the Bruins have missed the playoffs for two straight years and provide little reason to believe there's anything great in their immediate future.

Add it all up, and there's just not too much happening to rock the boat here in mid-June, a time that's ripe for a story to come and knock us all off our feet.

Enter: Tom Brady's hair.

Yup. That's where the sports world is at right now. Tom. Brady's. Hair.

In fairness, Brady's hair has dominated news cycles in years past. If you type "Tom Brady's Hair" into Google, then you probably end up on a few government watch lists. But you also get more than 300,000 results, from the old Justin Bieber days to some thorough criticism of his media day 'do last year to the infamous Rio/pony incident to an entire dang gallery of his hair's "evolution" on GQ.

So when seeking a photo of Brady for a non-hair-related story on Wednesday, I noticed that a number of photos of Brady attending last weekend's F1 race showed the Patriots quarterback sporting some long locks. Seriously -- there's a lot of hair going on here.

Tom Brady
Tom Brady on June 12 (Photo by Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
Tom Brady
Tom Brady on June 11 (Photo by Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for TAG Heuer)
Tom Brady
Tom Brady on June 12 (Photo by Mark Thompson/Getty Images)

I immediately phoned the Globe Spotlight team to ask why it hadn't garnered more coverage, and when they had no answer, it was time to bring it to the people.

Just a dumb little joke, right?

Wrong!

Tom Brady's hair is a topic. And it got the people going.

And the people seem to like it.

The overwhelmingly positive response from men and women alike prove definitively in this time of political unrest in America, there may be no greater uniter of people than Tom Brady's hair.

But not everyone's enamored with the moss. Some folks recall Brady letting it flow back in 2010. And their memories of that season aren't fond.

 

It should be stated that Brady also threw a ridiculous 36 touchdowns to just four interceptions that year, becoming the first player to unanimously win the NFL MVP Award. So there's clearly some power in that mane. Maybe just not in January.

But it all begs the question: Why, Tommy? Why? Approaching your 39th birthday, still at the top of your game, in the spotlight both on the field and attending court proceedings -- why switch it up so drastically?

Turns out, Brady slipped the news of his impending hair growth out last October, and the typical lamestream media didn't consider the news to be fit to print.

Makes you think.

Anyway, here's what Tom said back in October when asked if he missed the days of feeling the breeze sway through that shoulder-length salad.

"I think I'm going back to some long hair," Brady said in a Yahoo interview that mostly focused on fashion. "Yeah, you know. Screw it."

Screw it. Sometimes, it's just that simple.

And we're now all a few minutes closer to the end of June. Thanks, Tom.

You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.

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