You could have heard that an eBay consumer is promoting(Opens in a brand new window) a jar full of what they name sand from “Tom Brady’s actual retirement spot,” and it’s been bid as much as an astonishing $99,900.00 as of this writing. However is that this truly a jar of sand kissed by the butt cheeks of the best NFL quarterback of all time on one of the vital auspicious days of his profession? 

It’s extremely uncertain, our investigation has discovered.

To recap, on Feb. 1, the ageless Tom Brady (precise age: 45) introduced his apparently real-this-time retirement after a lackluster closing season with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The announcement got here within the type of a video posted to Twitter and Instagram across the similar time, displaying Brady on a sandy seaside. It appears for a second like he’s going to announce that he’s engaged to himself, however then he will get to the purpose instantly and makes his announcement.

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Briefly order, the video was watched by tens of millions of individuals, and Miami space Brady followers had been shortly capable of establish the stretch of seaside the place Brady made the video: Surfside Seaside in Surfside, Florida, on a patch of sand close to the 94th road entrance(Opens in a brand new window). 

One fan who discovered the spot was TikTok consumer @betrcaroline, who posted a video explaining that she was bitter after apparently playing on the Buccs all season, and was going to make all her a refund by promoting Brady’s butt sand. She then holds up a bag of sand. There’s no phrase on how she plans to promote it. 

It’s not abundantly clear when @betrcaroline scooped up that sand, however no matter when the video was posted, it does appear to have been filmed the afternoon of Feb. 1, because it’s daylight, and @betrcaroline says “good afternoon” initially of the video. 

On Feb. 2, an eBay public sale appeared, titled “Tom Brady’s actual retirement spot –  Bottled Sand.” The public sale is for “an 8oz mason jar bottled with the precise sand the GOAT Tom Brady made his retirement video on,” in response to the textual content of the public sale, which sounds way more pro-Brady than the embittered @betrcaroline. The fingers within the eBay public sale photographs are clearly not @betrcaroline’s.

One photograph on the eBay public sale consists of the Feb 1 New York Occasions. It is a well-known technique for courting photographs throughout kidnappings and different conditions the place proof is required that somebody continues to be alive. Since newspapers don’t magically vanish after sooner or later, the newspaper proves solely that the photograph was taken on Feb 1 or any time after that.   

@betrcaroline’s TikTok put up and the eBay public sale each blew up on-line and began getting plenty of publicity. An article in The Every day Mail (Opens in a brand new window)on February 4 attributes that eBay public sale to @betrcaroline, who generally shortens her identify to Carol, saying “Carol helps show the authenticity of her jar of sand by photographing it in entrance of Brady’s retirement video backdrop,” and that “She additionally features a copy of the February 1 version of The New York Occasions to show that the photographs are current.”

However a second @betrcaroline TikTok video concerning the sand appears to refute this. @betrcaroline says within the video that she plans to place her bagged sand on eBay for the comparatively low beginning value of $100. Her Feb. 1 video confirmed her holding what she calls, “the true sand from the day of, and never this faux shit that they are placing up as a result of the wind blew.” 

“It is in all probability not even the true sand,” she says.

Mashable has requested @betrcaroline for a hyperlink to the right eBay public sale, and for the precise time she scooped up her sand, however as of this writing, she had not replied.

However assuming she actually did get there on Feb. 1 hours after Brady had posted the video, is @betrcaroline’s sand the precise sand from the video, with attainable fibers from Tom Brady’s khakis blended in? 

That’s fairly uncertain.

On the night time of January 31 — mere hours earlier than the retirement video was posted — Tom Brady was in Los Angeles to attend the premiere of 80 for Brady, the film he simply produced starring Jane Fonda, Sally Area, Lily Tomlin, and Rita Moreno. Right here’s a video of him taking photographs on the purple carpet:

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Assuming Brady didn’t sit via the movie screening, is it attainable he hopped on a personal jet instantly, caught forty winks on the airplane, rushed to Surfside Seaside at what could be 5:12 a.m. Los Angeles time, after which made and posted the video? 

Sure, it’s actually attainable. However is it extra seemingly than Brady being asleep in his Los Angeles mansion(Opens in a brand new window) at 5:12 a.m., and having his handlers put up a prerecorded video of his retirement announcement taken days earlier when he was in Florida, and posting it in time to coincide with the discharge of his film, which means the precise sand he sat on was scattered and blown out to sea ages in the past? You be the choose.

There at the moment are a whole lot of eBay auctions purporting to supply Tom Brady’s butt sand(Opens in a brand new window) from his retirement video. There are additionally parody auctions, just like the one promoting an image of an exasperated man reacting(Opens in a brand new window) to the Tom Brady butt sand eBay itemizing, and one promoting an empty jar(Opens in a brand new window) with no Brady Sand, with the bidding beginning at $25,000. 

If in case you have all the cash on the planet, be at liberty to bid on all or any of those. They’ll get you principally the identical factor: nothing. If, nevertheless, you want your cash for issues like meals, housing, and even private enjoyment, we are able to’t advocate spending it on any eBay public sale involving Tom Brady and sand.