Cincinnati Bengals center Ted Karras cut his teeth in the NFL snapping to Tom Brady in New England, so he knows a thing or two about uncomfortable feedback.
‘Tom was a big stickler of: Your center can’t be wet,’ the 32-year-old lineman told former teammate and current podcaster Julian Edelman on a recent episode of Games with Names.
Edelman, a former wide receiver with the Patriots and long-time friend of Brady’s, instantly recalled the quarterback’s ‘huge’ pet peeve about sweaty centers.
The issue, as you can imagine, involves the quarterback’s grip on the football. If his hands are being covered in sweat every time he puts his hands ‘under center,’ his passes are going to suffer. As a result, Brady was one of many quarterbacks to insist his center tuck a towel into the backside of his uniform.
And it wasn’t a friendly suggestion. Brady was rather specific about how he wanted his centers to prepare his towel along their rear ends.
‘Tom takes all the centers to the side,’ Karras began. ‘If you’re gonna play center at any point, even just an undrafted guy, he’ll teach you how to fold it and put it into you’re a**.’
Tom Brady and Robert Kraft walk down the sideline before the FIFA Club World Cup final
Ted Karras revealed that Brady once powdered his back side after calling him a sweaty pig
Karras is seen in front of Brady during a 2019 game against the Jets in East Rutherford
Brady made his point in other ways too.
‘I was on Tom’s team, and apparently too wet for him – this is an embarrassing moment – he literally pulls me off to the sidelines and screams in my face that I’m a sweaty pig and then pulls my pants down and powders my ass with baby powder in front of everyone,’ Karras recalled of one training camp interaction.
‘I was kind of embarrassed,’ Karras continued. ‘All the fans were looking. There were like 15,000 people at Gillette Stadium. But I would also just do whatever he said.’
Edelman quickly agreed: ‘We all did.’
These days, Karras is snapping to Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow. And regardless of the Cincinnati signal caller’s preferences, Karras said he still follows Brady’s instructions when it comes to towel usage.
‘I still do the towel to this day, you can see me,’ he said.
Karras is a third-generation NFL player and the grand nephew of Alex Karras, the legendary Detroit Lions defensive tackle who went on to star in Blazing Saddles as ‘Mongo’ and in the hit series ‘Webster’ as George Papadopolis.
