The greatest American football player, his wife is supermodel Gisele Bundchen… Tom Brady is so perfect that someone wants to steal his “likeness” in a movie.
In March 2020, 42-year-old Tom Brady left the New England Patriots after 20 years of association. In football, this is an event on par with Lionel Messi leaving Barca. Brady has worn the Patriots’ jersey since his first professional game in the American National Football League – NFL. He is also considered the GOAT – the best player of all time – of football.
The achievements say it all. With the Patriots, Brady played in nine Super Bowls (NFL finals) and won six – more than any other player in history. He won the Super Bowl Most Valuable Player award four times and three more NFL Most Valuable Player awards. This includes the classic 2017 Super Bowl, now known as the “28-3 game”. At that time, the Atlanta Falcons thought they had a sure victory in hand when leading the Patriots with a score of 28-3, but were reversed and lost 28-34.
Not only successful on the field, Brady also has a fulfilling life. He is 1m93 tall, has a handsome face and his wife is the famous supermodel Gisele Bundchen. It is no coincidence that in the comedy “Ted 2”, the two main characters tried to break into Brady’s house to… get “seed”, when the teddy bear Ted wanted to have a child by artificial insemination. In the eyes of many Americans, Brady is the perfect man, a real-life superhero.
But to get to his current position, Brady has gone through months of extraordinary training and has not stopped yet.
For those who are unfamiliar with rugby and Tom Brady, they can think of him as a version of Cristiano Ronaldo in the football world. The Portuguese player is famous not only for his football talent but also for his professionalism, discipline, scientific lifestyle and ultimate desire to win. Brady is the same.
Brady had already shown exceptional discipline as an intern at the University of Michigan at Merrill Lynch. “Tom was always polite to everyone, worked hard, completed all assigned tasks and liked to feel busy,” former boss Oliver Owens told CNBC.
This was in the late 1990s, when Owens was a vice president at Merrill Lynch and the financial markets were hitting new records, causing many employees in the group to not put in their best efforts. This annoyed the intern Brady, as Owen witnessed: “One time I saw him throw his hands up in the air and ask, ‘Isn’t there anyone else working here?’
When Brady complained that he had no work to do, Owens asked him to update his Rolodex with all of his partners’ business cards. Now, after moving to UBS, Mr. Owens still keeps the Roledex with hundreds of business cards that Brady arranged on his desk and said it is “a great story to tell to clients who are football fans.”
Brady worked collecting research data before client meetings. He did so well that after his second summer internship, he was invited to a private conversation by Owens, who assured him he “had a great future in finance,” but Brady was adamant he wanted to try professional football.
A few months later, Brady was drafted by the New England Patriots with the 199th pick in the sixth round. When he first turned pro, Brady was just a backup quarterback, but even then he told Patriots owner Robert Kraft: “Picking me was the best decision this team has ever made in its history.” This story is part of the reason why English striker Harry Kane is a fan of Tom Brady. Kane was also rejected by Arsenal’s youth team and loaned out to lower-league clubs before finding his place in the Tottenham squad.
Since his college football days, Brady had told his coach that if he were promoted to the NFL, the Patriots would never use Drew Bledsoe again. At that time, Bledsoe was the Patriots’ starting quarterback and was even considered the top star of the NFL. But a serious injury in the 2001 season sidelined Bledsoe, giving rookie Brady an opportunity.
Patriots cornerback Ty Law told ESPN: “When Tom was in the starting lineup, we just hoped he wouldn’t make any mistakes. To this day, I still remember what Tom said to us in a conversation. Back then, Drew Bledsoe was an excellent quarterback, but Tom still firmly said: ‘Drew has no chance of getting his position back.'”
“On one hand, I was like, ‘That’s what I’m supposed to say!’ On the other hand, I was like, ‘This is the professional league and Drew was a first-round pick with a big contract. Good luck getting past him.’ But Tom didn’t think that way. He wasn’t disrespecting Drew at all, he was just trying his best to make it impossible for coach Bill Belichick and owner Kraft to bring Drew back into the starting lineup.”
The result was exactly as Brady had said: Bledsoe could not return to the starting lineup after recovering from injury. Despite having just signed a 10-year contract in March 2001, Bledsoe was forced to move to the Buffalo Bills for the 2002 season and then retired with the Dallas Cowboys in 2006. His replacement at the Patriots became a legend not only of the league but of the entire football game, nicknamed “TB12”.
In 2017, Bill Belichick, the Patriots’ coach since 2000, gave an interview to CNBC reporter Suzy Welch. According to him, Brady was not a natural athlete, but he had other qualities that made him great.
First was his training awareness. Belichick said: “He wasn’t as good as he is today when he first came to the Patriots, and I would say he was miles away from where he is now. But Tom works really hard. He trains harder than anyone else and deserves all the success he has now.” Tactical thinking is also important. The coach added: “On the field, he sees a lot of things and has the ability to absorb a huge amount of information quickly. Tom has a great football mind and understands how both his team and his opponents operate.”
Brady’s final strength, according to Belichick, is focus. “He’s always really focused on short-term goals. Tom can just focus on the challenges of this week and when the week is over, he’ll put it out of his mind and set a completely new challenge,” he said.
A statistic shows that only 5% of players maintain their football careers until age 42. Brady does that with a strict diet, sleep and training regimen. On radio station WEEI, the quarterback said he usually goes to bed before 9 p.m. He explained: “I go to bed very early because I’m used to waking up early. I think my personal choices always revolve around improving my football skills. So every decision about food, drink… revolves around football. I want to be the best version of myself every day, every week. I want to be the best for my teammates.”
“I love football and I want to play for a long time, but I know that to do that, I need to do things differently than other players. Strength training, fitness and lifestyle are very important. Because nothing makes me happier than playing football, and I want to keep it that way for as long as possible,” Brady added.
In his book “TB12 Method: How to Maintain Peak Performance for Life?”, Brady revealed his menu: “My diet is a blend of Eastern and Western philosophies. Some principles are even thousands of years old. My diet may be harsh to some people, but for me, eating differently is unnatural. Many young players today do not care about nutrition and eat whatever they want, but not me.”
Personal chef Allen Campbell revealed that up to 80% of the food Brady eats is vegetables. He drinks a lot of water every day and regularly eats fish and fruit. The list of foods and drinks that Brady does not use may shock many people. It is understandable that an athlete limits the use of alcoholic beverages, snacks, sweets… but Brady is even stricter. During the season, Brady does not eat bread and pasta containing a lot of gluten, grains, tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, sugar, foods with sweeteners, fruit juice, soft drinks, tomato sauce, coffee… Even the oil used to cook Brady’s food must be coconut oil, because for him olive oil is still not… healthy enough.
In Men’s Health, Brady said that sometimes he still relaxes and treats himself, but only when it is the best food. “If I’m craving bacon or pizza, I’ll have a slice. At the end of the day, we’re all human and we only have one life to live. But if I’m going to break the rules, it has to be the best pizza. I don’t want to eat a bad slice of pizza and wonder why I’m eating it,” he said. Cristiano Ronaldo is famous for waking up early to train at Man Utd and driving Carlos Tevez crazy because he couldn’t get to practice before his teammates. Brady has a similar story. The victim was Rodney Harrison, a player for the Patriots from 2003 to 2008. Harrison said: “When I first came to New England, we became friends. I’d go to the weight room at 6:30 in the morning and Brady would say, ‘Good afternoon!'”
“So the next day, I showed up 15 minutes early and the same thing happened. The next day, I showed up at 5:45 and he said ‘Good afternoon’ twice. Finally, I showed up at 5:30 and before Brady could open his mouth, I said, ‘I don’t care what you say, Tom. There’s no way I’m coming to practice before 5:30!’ We both laughed.”
A good relationship with his teammates also helped Brady reach the top. He was very demanding of his teammates on the field, but showed his concern off the field. When Sebastian Vollmer joined the Patriots in 2009, he was surprised to be greeted by Brady himself. Vollmer said: “In the locker room, of course everyone knew who Tom was. But he still came out and introduced himself to the rookies: ‘Hi, I’m Tom Brady. I play quarterback.’ Tom didn’t try to act like he was the boss or arrogant.”
Matthew Slater was even more surprised when he first turned pro. He said: “On the first day of the draft, I felt lost and didn’t know what role I would play on the team. But Tom came up to me and said he knew me and my career at the University of California. I didn’t expect a star like him to take the time to learn about a young player. That says a lot about Tom’s character.”
Obsessed with winning
At an age when many other players are retired, Brady still wants to continue fighting until he’s 45, even 50. He still has a burning desire to win, as he has shown throughout his career. On the field, Brady is known for his passion and his love of swearing to vent his anger. He has admitted that he hates losing and has had to practice his body language so as not to scare his teammates too much. Brady once had a pep talk with his teammates to keep them from losing in a charity match against local firefighters.
Darrelle Revis, a teammate at the Patriots, even likened Brady’s desire to win to a disease. He said: “I think Tom’s disease is always wanting to compete and destroy everyone. From the outside, the audience can see that he is a loser. But when you practice with Tom every day, you can see how much that desire is. I can understand why he is so successful when I see how he approaches the game every day.”
Brady’s high demands make his teammates better, because every practice match with them is no different from an official match when Brady is on the field. According to Business Insider, Brady even sacrificed more than $60 million in salary in his contract with the Patriots to help the team have money to strengthen its squad, thereby creating a stronger team.
Brady doesn’t just hate losing in football. He hates losing in… everything. Former teammate Danny Amendola said Brady once broke his racket after losing a ping pong match. Another story comes from Wes Welker, who played for the Patriots from 2007 to 2012. He said: “On the plane, I played a game for fun with Tom and beat him in the first few rounds. He lost $200. I started to make fun of Tom and he got really upset. He even threw the board on the floor before coming back to play with me.”
“He finally won $300 and had the biggest smile on his face. I took out the money to pay him, but Tom refused to take it. He just wanted to win.”
On March 20, Brady signed a two-year contract with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, worth $50 million. On social media, most Patriots fans sent their blessings rather than resentment toward Brady. For them, just seeing a living legend like Brady play was already a blessing, and many expressed hope that Brady would return to play for the Patriots for one more season before retiring.
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