Julian Edelman got in on the jokes after Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars ... by using the viral moment to reference Tom Brady's fight with retirement -- and it's pretty good.
Edelman posted the hilarious meme on his Twitter page ... poking fun at the fact his good friend, Brady, was retired for just 40 days before deciding to rejoin the Buccaneers.
You can probably guess by now, but in the meme, Tom Brady's name is edited onto Smith ... and the word "retirement" is on Rock -- in other words, TB12 is slapping retirement in the face.