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Tom Brady's Courtroom Sketch Spawns Internet Gold

The courtroom sketch of Tom Brady.
Jane Rosenberg via Boston Herald
The courtroom sketch of Tom Brady.

The biggest news to come out of Wednesday's high-profile federal court hearing on the "deflategate" saga had nothing to do with the NFL or Tom Brady's pending four-game suspension.

Veteran courtroom sketch artist Jane Rosenberg is grabbing most of the attention for her depiction of the New England Patriots quarterback. And of course the interwebs responded in kind, unleashing countless memes of the now-infamous sketch.

Outside the Manhattan courtroom on Wednesday, Rosenberg defended her work.

"When I'm under such pressure, I tend to just grab on to certain lines and I don't flatter people," she said in an interview with Comcast SportsNet that was posted to the website of the Boston Herald. "So I have to apologize to Tom Brady and all his fans that I didn't make him look pretty enough."

According to The New York Times, Rosenberg has a proven track record of getting her sketches right:

"In 2011, The New York Times noted that Ms. Rosenberg's likeness of Robert De Niro during a court appearance in Manhattan was 'remarkably accurate.' She has been a sketch artist for 35 years, depicting a litany of public figures including Woody Allen, Martha Stewart, Bill Cosby and John Gotti.

" 'I'm getting bad criticism that I made him look like Lurch,' she said, referring to the Addams Family character. 'And obviously I apologize to Tom Brady for not making him as good-looking as he is.' "

As we reported Wednesday, both Brady and NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell were in federal court to update a judge on whether progress had been made resolving the dispute over the four-time Super Bowl champion's suspension.

The New England patriots open their preseason tonight against the Green Bay Packers. Brady is not expected to play.

Here are some of the best memes from around the Twitterverse:

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Brakkton Booker is a National Desk reporter based in Washington, DC.