Tom Brady Changing Goals (And History)
October 16th, 2021
When will the end come?
So yesterday the interwebs was abuzz that Bucs quarterback Tom Brady now wants to play until he is “50 or 55.”
Tap the brakes just a little.
Brady, the-salad bar-hating, park-violating, home-invading, NFLPA-ignoring, down-forgetting, handshake-stiffing, jet-ski-losing, biscuit-baking, tequila-shooting, smartphone-phobic, waffle-grilling, trophy-throwing, roller-coaster-scared, numbers-rules-peeved, helmet-tossing, football-punting, Bucs-Super-Bowl-winning quarterback, has said for years he wanted to play until he is 45.
Barring an ugly injury, he is scheduled to do that next year. He is 44 and his Bucs contract ends after the 2022 season.
There has been chatter recently that the Bucs and Brady will begin negotiations on an extension after this season.
The way Brady is slinging the ball at 44, why wouldn’t you want to keep him? And it seems Brady is changing his initial goal of playing until 45.
Joe isn’t sure how many fans choose not to watch the NFL Network production of “Thursday Night Football,” which is also simulcast on FOX, and instead watched Amazon’s production? Joe never has. But the Amazon streaming broadcast is totally different than NFL Network’s with different announcers, analysts, etc.
On Amazon’s pregame show, Brady told Andrea Kramer and Hannah Storm that he might play until he is “50 or 55” but added in the very next sentence that is unlikely.
“I could literally play until I’m 50 or 55 if I wanted to,” Brady said. “I don’t think I will, obviously.”
Brady said the notion that he won’t play until that age won’t have anything to do with his body. Rather, it would be family obligations that will chase him from the game.
We all remember that after the Bucs won the Super Bowl in February, NFL Film caught Brady’s wife, supermodel Gisele Bündchen, saying to Brady, “What more do you have to prove?”
So it seems that wifey doesn’t want Brady playing when he fills out the paperwork for AARP membership.
All Joe wants is for Brady to sign a three-year extension with the Bucs and the two parties can cross that bridge on two more seasons when they get there in 2025.
Kevin Wildes of the FS1 hollering show “First Things First,” has a few thoughts on Brady playing until he’s 55. If Brady decides to.
Can Tom Brady play until he’s 50 or 55?
“Father Time, you’ve lost a step buddy! Between Jennifer Lopez, Brad Pitt, LeBron, Brady — Father Time, step your game up. It’s a fool’s errand to doubt Brady. Maybe at that point Mac Jones retires & Brady comes back.” — @kevinwildes 🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/cNNFCjY2Nz
— First Things First (@FTFonFS1) October 15, 2021
October 16th, 2021 at 12:33 am
I can see him playing two more seasons.
October 16th, 2021 at 12:35 am
It is too late at night for Pete to be first to comment.
October 16th, 2021 at 12:55 am
Not 55. Kids grow up then go spend some Gisele money.
October 16th, 2021 at 12:56 am
Who remembers the BIG DOG’s monday morning WDAE broadcast of…”The Bucs are 5 and 1″ from 2005? Ahhhh…that was EPIC!
October 16th, 2021 at 1:25 am
Let’s be honest, nothing should surprise us about Tom Brady. He’s already in uncharted, unprecented territory. Consider that each time he takes the field, he breaks an all-time record. Same for every completion, every touchdown pass. Let’s just enjoy watching this story unfold, we’re not likely to see anything like it again in our lifetimes
October 16th, 2021 at 1:27 am
Am I the only one that doesn’t want to see TB12 go back to retire as a Patriot? Its like watching your ex go back to the guy she dated before you. Makes you think she never really loved you in the first place. 🙂
October 16th, 2021 at 2:11 am
“…NFL Films cameras caught Brady’s wife, supermodel Gisele Bündchen, saying to Brady, “What more do you have to prove?”
The cameras (audio) didn’t catch her. Brady was the one who said she said it.
October 16th, 2021 at 2:50 am
it’ll be really cool if tom plays for the bucs for a full 5 years…
bill really miscalculated on this one…
anything after that is gravy…
just call him:
#TomGravy
“his name isn’t robert paulson, it’s tom gravy”
October 16th, 2021 at 5:29 am
How long Tom Brady will play makes great media banter, but it’s all pure speculation. No one knows, not even Tom Brady.
Money’s the issue with many QBs, but not with Brady; he’s already shown that. I tend to think that 4 things will determine how long Tom Brady is a Buc.
First: family pressures. As you noted, at some point spending more time with family may well take precedence over spending time playing football. Tom’s not the only one with a say when it comes to family.
Second: Brady’s own desire to continue. Regardless of all the other influences, it still comes down to personal motivation in the end. And that can change very quickly.
Third: physical condition. Injuries are just a fact of life in the NFL. Bucs have done a magnificent job of protecting Brady, but all that could be undone in just 1 unfortunate play. That’s just life in the NFL, for everyone.
Fourth: the quality of the TEAM the Bucs surround Brady with. I still think the Bucs were Brady’s 2nd choice when he decided to move on from the Patriots (49ers were the front-runner IMO).
But apparently Brady saw promise in the nucleus we’d put together; Bucs had much of what he needed to continue at his age (a strong OLine that could protect him AND some excellent weapons to work with). Once he signed, Bucs went all-in by adding Gronk, AB & Fournette especially, drafting Wirfs & re-signing several FAs (like Godwin?). Can’t imagine any QB not being excited to lead a Who’s-Who offense like what we have.
But next year will almost surely be a whole different animal, and I don’t envy Jason Licht one bit. We kicked the can down the street to put together the roster we’re now fielding; comes a point where you can’t do that any longer. Regardless of how well the Bucs do this season, we’ll be facing some daunting personnel decisions next year & beyond. No sense in worrying about them now (heck, we don’t even know what next year’s salary CAP will be), but we’re realistically at the point where we’ll have to ‘pay the piper’ as they say (like the Falcons & Saints & Patriots were this year?). In any event, if the talent we’re surrounding Brady with drops appreciably, that may well provide the spark for him to hang it up. Time will tell.
October 16th, 2021 at 6:46 am
Blah blah Brady’s playing till 50!
October 16th, 2021 at 7:04 am
@ Defense Rules Well said!
October 16th, 2021 at 7:12 am
So the pregame show on amazon is hannah storm and andrea kramer
😂. (Well of course it it )
I think i will rather take a staple gun to my nut sack
October 16th, 2021 at 7:28 am
He just loves toying with the media. And we love it down here.
October 16th, 2021 at 7:31 am
DR an astute commentator, and reasonable in his list of factors that may prompt Tom Brady to retire. He raises the specter of future cap hell issues. Undeniably true, but let’s drop the details on Mel Greenburg’s desk, he will capably navigate those issues.
Mr. 7 Rings signed at 25 mil per, his pal Gronk at 10, and other notably long-in-the-tooth vets for similar compensation. Looking at you Suh, David, Jensen. What I’m getting at here is that cap hell will be mitigated by fielding a younger roster. IMHO we already have in place a cadre of young replacements being mentored by the vets they are destined to supplant. It’s called roster building, and GM Jason Licht has demonstrated his excellent ability in this skill very admirably. We’re talking Gil Brandt status here people. This fan is not the least bit concerned about any pending cap issues.
LFG Bucs!
October 16th, 2021 at 7:38 am
D.R.
As usual agree with everything you’ve just said. So we’re old enough to flash back to the Grass Root’s first big hit. “Let’s Live for Today”.
Everybody, including Brady, knows we only have today. We know it but it’s hard to not keep time shifting. Sometimes out of necessisity, the team sucks and tomorrow is all we have. But not now.
Let’s see what “living for the day” means for Buc fans. The pleasure of watching the GOAT bring an unbelievalble ending to an unbelievable career.
The pleasure of watching so many other stars, some of them ours…ME and CG and some of them newcomers like AB and Playoff Lennie.
And we sit alone at the top of our Division 5-1. We now reach a break in the schedule that will hopefully give guys some chance to keep healing.
That’s a LOT to enjoy today!!!
October 16th, 2021 at 7:55 am
Agree. For those who have been there from the beginning. The really bad years. Some really bad football. I mean forking over thousands of dollars for season tickets to get smoked by 30-40 points at half (was it ravens game?) to watch crap football. Driving over from orlando for that crap.
We deserve this. Brady has given this franchise new life. In years past , you expected to lose the close gAmes. Now we win those. The offense is so much fun to watch. Just wait until we get healthy gronk back.
If bucs are smart , they will have brady in some capacity in tampa for years to come. Even when he is done playing . Lets be honest , he will live the rest of life most likely in florida and maybe some california though i doubt it. Think his house house is in jupiter / miami south fl west coast. Give him the statute. Ring of honor. And maybe tampa can become a place where championships are won. Rays and lightning. Champa bay. If we want to make a deal with stud player , brady can meet with him in tampa for lunch. 😂
October 16th, 2021 at 8:17 am
Brady is one major, season ending injury away from retiring. At his age, it is hard on the body to recover and makes you really think about moving away from an injury-prone sport.
A lot of former football players deal with life long symptoms stemming from long NFL careers. Let’s hope Brady can keep being healthy over the next few years.
October 16th, 2021 at 9:26 am
Beautifully said StPete. And ya, I remember The Grass Roots.
October 16th, 2021 at 9:55 am
I hope we “squeeze the sponge “ and get everything out of Brady possible. It is so hard to draft or acquire a Franchise QB…. Just look at our history…
October 16th, 2021 at 9:58 am
DR
Excellent post, as usual.
At the risk of being nitpicky, I think you may have left out an important factor.
Tom LOVES playing the game.
I think the last few years with the Patriots it became more of a job for him. Belichick saw it and tried to force him into retirement. Instead, Tom looked for greener pastures.
It’s easy to see that Tom is having more fun playing right now than he has in a long time.
Ignoring all other possible ends to his career, he will play until it just isn’t any fun anymore.
October 16th, 2021 at 10:06 am
‘79
Nope… she said it.
October 16th, 2021 at 10:10 am
The team is gonna suck hind tit for YEARS after Brady retires–but it’s not like we aren’t USED to that anyhow
October 16th, 2021 at 10:29 am
You wonder if the Bucs win the SB this year the newness wears off and players go back to the show me the money Jerry attitude. I wouldn’t count on any longer than next season then he hangs up the cleats. If he doesn’t have a winning team he isn’t going down with the ship(no pun intended). DR is correct, in this league injuries are inevitable and they hurt a whole lot more as you get closer to 50, not to mention the extra time to heal. He is done at 45, that was his original goal and he’ll talk those around him to hang in with him one more season. The sad truth.
October 16th, 2021 at 10:37 am
I was in the best shape of my life at 50. I lifted weights (not a body builder) for many years. However, I think a safety could’ve knocked me out with ease. I do see Tom playing for a couple more years at a high level.
October 16th, 2021 at 3:33 pm
I hope Brady retires before Father Time finally catches up. He should go out on top of his game. I’d hate to see him start losing arm strength or otherwise losing his edge. You know as well as I, a few interceptions, some injuries, or he repeatedly forgets what down it is, whatever, and the fans will start piling on the dump Brady bandwagon. We don’t need that. What he’s done for the Bucs deserves reverence. Please Tom, one, maybe two, more years and then hang it up.
October 17th, 2021 at 12:10 am
79 defense,,I heard her say it along with my girl,,you’d have to watch it again,,true
October 17th, 2021 at 12:22 am
Dr, always a great read,but I also think a factor would be in possibly 2-3 years is him winning a Superbowl and going out on top,,I think he’ll consider it regarding his age, family,ect
October 17th, 2021 at 7:16 am
I don’t blame the wifey. Apart from family obligations, she’s probably scared to death of a major injury that could change Tom’s quality of life.
Whenever he does retire, it will be at that point where he’ll come to terms with having no regrets leaving behind the ability to still play. Because at his rate, I don’t think he can realistically say, “I can’t play at a high level.” The guy has found the fountain of youth with the way he takes care of his body.
If for some reason we can’t maintain the team around him, he will walk away easier than him walking away from a SB team. The guy just loves to compete.
October 17th, 2021 at 9:01 pm
I remember when Mike Schmidt retired during the season. Tears streaming down his face, he said “I just can’t do it anymore.” I don’t want that for Tom.
October 18th, 2021 at 11:22 am
Brady’s a Buc now. New England was great and I can’t see any circumstance that he’ll retire as a Patriot. They had their time, this is ours. GO BUCS!
October 18th, 2021 at 2:01 pm
Y’all don’t be worrying about how long my boy Tom is gonna play and focus on him playing cause in a very few years he will be a memory!
October 18th, 2021 at 2:08 pm
My boy Tom said once that he didn’t care about rings on his thumbs but he did want one for every finger.(8). If bucs do win SB again he will be around for only next year so he can hit his 45mark. Or Mrs Brady may say 44 is enough we’re moving to Tahiti till time for Canton!;)
October 18th, 2021 at 2:40 pm
Tom should play until he is 50. Why not? What team likes losing? Why are people so worried about his age? If he can keep up and remain healthy then go tom. Make 50 your cut of age. Make it so nobody ever will catch you or best you in any way shape or form
October 18th, 2021 at 2:59 pm
I personally would like to see him go out healthy and on a winning streak no matter when it is. Even more importantly, I would love to see him coaching. As great a QB as he has been, I think he would destroy the rest of the league as a coach. He has a phenomenal mind for the game and for building a team.