Ronald “Mac” McDonald earnestly believed that he could beat Tom Brady in a street fight. Rob McElhenney, on the other hand, understands that he’s not “pliable” enough to take a punch from the GOAT.
During his historic NFL career, Brady was known as one of professional sports’ greatest leaders, but after his playing days ended, he found himself following in the footsteps of an even more formidable physical specimen. You see, when It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia star and creator McElhenney purchased the Welsh professional soccer team Wrexham A.F.C. along with his business and life partner Ryan Reynolds in 2020, he apparently instilled a deep-seated jealousy in the heart of the seven-time Super Bowl champion that drove Brady to become a minority owner (lower than McElhenney’s rank at Wrexham) of the soccer team Birmingham City F.C. in England (a lesser country than Wales) three years after McElhenney’s acquisition.
However, though McElhenney continues to lead Brady in the field of sports ownership, the Philadelphia Eagles’ old rival has kept receipts on some of McElhenney’s claims from the early It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia days. And when McElhenney and Brady met before Wrexham’s match at Birmingham City last week, the (minority) owner of the latter had a score to settle with the former.
As Brady’s producer so threateningly reminded McElhenney before the match, in which Brady’s side beat Wrexham by a final score of 3-1, in the Season One It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia episode “The Gang Finds a Dead Guy,” the cold-open features Mac pitching his idea for how he can help the Eagles succeed in Super Bowl XXXIX against Brady’s New England Patriots. Mac’s plan is to get a bunch of guys together, find where Brady is staying and “intimidate him, maybe break his arm.” Dee disagreed with the scheme, warning Mac that Brady would deliver the legendarily cowardly bouncer a worse ass-kicking than the one he would soon give the Eagles.
McElhenney didn’t seem too keen on testing his 2005 hypothesis on the pitch last week, backing out of a possible fight with Brady in proper Mac form with the claim that he's “not pliable enough” to tussle with five-time Super Bowl MVP. However, with his sports-owning seniority and generally superior knowledge of athletic success, McElhenney offered some words of wisdom to the new (minority) owner who owns a 1-1 record against the Eagles in the Super Bowl, telling Brady, “Listen more than you talk. … Ryan and I, who talk for a living, we recognize that this is all about the community, it’s all about the people who come to these stadiums, who have filled these stadiums for a hundred years.”
And, if those fans offer Brady a towel to wipe his face, he probably shouldn’t take it — you never know which gangly, uncoordinated bird will give you pink eye.
