Alleged Tom Brady jersey thief reportedly had Kurt Warner autograph his own Super Bowl jersey

One day, the various adventures of Mauricio Ortega will become the greatest sports documentary ever.

We already knew, from video surveillance footage, that credentialed reporter Ortega walked into the New England Patriots locker room after Super Bowl LI like he belonged (he didn’t, the media wasn’t allowed in yet), allegedly took Tom Brady’s jersey despite the presence of Patriots players and team and league officials, then walked out. When Brady’s jersey was recovered, so too was a helmet that apparently was worn by Denver Von Miller in Super Bowl 50 and Brady’s Super Bowl XLIX jersey.

On Tuesday evening the Associated Press published a long story on Ortega, and unveiled perhaps the most jaw-dropping snippet of this insane ordeal: Ortega, at this year’s Super Bowl, asked a surprised Kurt Warner to sign his own game-worn Super Bowl jersey. And then – you didn’t believe it could get better than that last part, did you? – he planned to sell Warner’s autographed Super Bowl jersey back to him.

And you thought allegedly stealing Brady’s jersey out of the Patriots locker room took some chutzpah.

“He showed me Warner’s jersey with his signature and told me a story about how Warner was surprised that he was in possession of the item,” Arturo Palafox, sports editor for the newspaper 24 Horas, told the AP. “He said he planned to gather interest from Warner to sell him the jersey for $8,000.”

The detail that Ortega had Warner sign a jersey during Super Bowl week was reported before, but that didn’t include that it was one of Warner’s Super Bowl jerseys. Two reporters who Ortega spoke with both told the AP that Ortega had one of Warner’s Super Bowl jerseys in his bag. The AP story said Ortega has been credentialed for the Super Bowl going back to at least 2005. The AP didn’t say which of Warner’s Super Bowl jerseys Ortega had signed, or how Ortega obtained it. Warner played in three Super Bowls, at the end of the 1999 and 2001 seasons with the St. Louis Rams and at the end of the 2008 season with the Arizona Cardinals.

The AP story is rich on details, including that Ortega brought multiple NFL memorabilia items to get signed (a no-no for the media) and that he had no intention of actually working Super Bowl week from Houston (also frowned upon, generally). Ortega was the director of the Mexican newspaper La Prensa, which posted at least six bylines from Ortega during Super Bowl week. However, the AP story said he “ordered staffers back in Mexico City to write the articles and use his byline.”

So to recap: There was a credentialed person who went to Super Bowl for years, took selfies in the locker room with key players (including Brady in 2005), felt emboldened enough to stroll into the Patriots locker room when he wasn’t allowed, allegedly stole items from Brady and perhaps Miller and Brady a second time, and reportedly asked Warner to sign a Super Bowl jersey that Warner once wore in hopes of selling it later to the Hall-of-Fame quarterback for $8,000. And who knows what else might have gone on that we haven’t heard about yet.

Some wise director is going to have fun telling this story when it’s all done.

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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
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