Tom Brady’s new deal — a four-year extension worth $72 million, $48.5 million of which is guaranteed — is one that will have long-term ramifications for the New England front office and his own teammates, as well as the rest of the league’s elite players and opposing front offices as well.

With a labor showdown looming, no one is sure what the future holds for the NFL’s salary structure, but at first glance, it appears that this is a deal that will allow each side to claim a certain measure of victory.

First and foremost, the contract is a win for the Patriots, who can claim they were able to get a deal done with their most important player within the boundaries of their traditional team-building framework. As strange as it sounds, the $48.5 million guaranteed contract the former MVP and three-time Super Bowl winner will get is something of a bargain, especially when the market dictates that rookie quarterbacks like Sam Bradford (who signed a six-year, $78 million deal with $50 million guaranteed) and Matthew Stafford (six years, $72 million, with $41.7 guaranteed) get to cash in even before they play a game in the NFL.

The contract could also been seen as a victory for Brady. The quarterback will become the highest-paid player annually in the NFL, and can go back to the union and say he was able to raise the financial bar for his generation of signal-callers. He took a below market-value deal when he signed his last contract in 2005, a six-year deal where he earned approximately $10 million a year. At that time, that was in the upper-echelon of quarterback contracts, but was soon eclipsed by a series of deals to a host of younger quarterbacks with fewer rings, a group that included Ben Roethlisberger (eight years, $102 million and just over $36 million in guarantees, which was signed in 2008), Eli Manning (who signed a seven-year deal worth $106.9 million with $35 million in guaranteed money in 2009) and Philip Rivers (six years, $92 million, with roughly $38 million guaranteed, which was also signed in 2009). He is now paid on a level commensurate with his resume in the current market structure.

In addition, the new deal will run out when Brady is 37 — if he plays in New England until the end of his new deal, it would mark 15 seasons with the Patriots. (Steve Grogan is the franchise leader for most seasons in a New England uniform, having played 16 seasons in Foxboro.) Brady could ultimately decide that he does want to play into his 40s (as he suggested) and follow the same path as his childhood idol Joe Montana, ending his career in a different spot. But for now, he’s here in New England. If he does stay with the Patriots for the duration of the contract, he will have the sort of stability over the course of his career that most quarterbacks only dream about — he and Bill Belichick already have the NFL’s longest-running active relationship between coach and a starting quarterback, which began in September 2001 and has spanned almost 10 full seasons. (Given the depth of their relationship, it’s also not a leap to suggest that Belichick will stick around as long as Brady does. If he does coach the Patriots through 2014, that would be 15 seasons as head coach in Foxboro, an eternity in the NFL.)

While it’s a record deal for a veteran, New England was able to make sure it wasn’t a contract that would drastically alter the financial landscape for veteran quarterbacks across the league. But at the same time, those veteran quarterbacks — elite ones like Peyton Manning, Drew Brees and Donovan McNabb who are all nearing the end of their current deals — were likely the happiest guys in the league on hearing the news on Thursday night, because Brady’s $48.5 million in guaranteed money sets a new record for a veteran quarterback, and established a framework for their own negotiations going forward. Armed with this as a baseline, expect Colts’ owner Jim Irsay (who is on record as saying he is “committed to making Manning the highest-paid player in the league”) to shell out at least $50 million in guaranteed money to his own quarterback. While deals won’t get done immediately, Brady’s deal sets a framework, which will help both sides get a clearer focus on what it will take to get their own contracts done.

The locker room reaction will be interesting to gauge. While no one is short-sighted enough to see the impact of Brady on the franchise and the importance of getting him signed to a long-term deal, some of his teammates who have expiring deals or are currently in contract holdups of their own would be well within their rights to question what this could mean for their futures in New England. While Logan Mankins continues to stay away over his contract situation, wide receiver Randy Moss, who is entering the final year of his own contract, has made it clear in no uncertain terms that he feels “not wanted” by the franchise. If the Patriots have a priority list of players with expiring contracts, these two are likely next in line to do business with the front office, as well as other players like Matt Light who also have deals that are up at the end of the 2010 season.