The Sports Xchange

Ready to speak doesn’t mean ready to open up, but Tom Brady discussed how difficult life was while facing allegations that he and the New England Patriots conspired to break rules by intentionally deflating game balls in the AFC Championship game.

“Whatever has happened has taken the focus away from my team and what happened last year,” Brady said Tuesday appearing on WEEI in Boston. “So it should have been a very joyous offseason and I’m sure it was for a lot of people, and certainly was for me at different times, but some of those things are pretty personal.”

Brady said he read the book “The Four Agreements” to get through the trying period. He would not directly address whether he was amenable to a one-game suspension in negotiations to reduce his four-game ban, vacated last week by a federal judge in New York.

“There were a lot of negotiations back and forth. We had five different settlement conferences with the league to try and avoid what has happened at this point,” Brady said. “I think at different points there were a lot of different things that came up. I think I was advised not to talk about those things.”

Brady denied in January any knowledge of rules violations before the AFC Championship game. During the investigation, Patriots employees Jim McNally and John Jastremski were suspended for their alleged role. Brady said last week he feels bad for the employees and on Tuesday endorsed them getting their jobs back.

“None of those things are my decision but I feel terrible for what they’ve been through, what their families have been put through. I know what my family has been put through, and what has happened but I just feel terrible they’re not with our team,” Brady said.

Ultimately the guarded quarterback said Tuesday he looks forward to getting back on the field.

“I have a lot of personal feelings about this and to get into every conversation everyone wants to have, you know, in a way I’ve had a lot of these conversations with people over the last seven months,” Brady said. “You get kind of brought back into those emotions and those haven’t been the best emotions, they don’t serve me as the quarterback of the New England Patriots this week, so I have to put whatever I have aside and try to go out and do my job.”