New England Patriots
Brady discussed a range of topics, from his welcome to the NFL moment to his favorite Super Bowl win.
Tom Brady Photo by Andreas Rentz/Getty Images
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Tom Brady made an appearance on the “New Heights” podcast with Travis and Jason Kelce.
He touched on a range of topics, from his favorite Super Bowl victory to the debate about his and Bill Belichick‘s contributions to the Patriots’ success.
Brady sat down with the Kelces for a little more than an hour. Here are four moments that stood out from the interview.
Brady recalls his “welcome to the NFL moment”
Tom Brady’s big break in the NFL came when Jets linebacker Mo Lewis delivered a vicious hit that injured Drew Bledsoe in 2001.
But, later that season, Brady took a big hit from a player on another AFC East rival team. Brady was OK after the collision with Buffalo’s Nate Clements, but the play stood out when he was asked about his welcome to the NFL moment.
“There was a lot of those,” Brady said. “I had one probably in Buffalo, I was scrambling up the sideline and Nate Clements from Ohio State was a big, physical corner. I slid late and he knocked the [expletive] out of me.”
“I got up and I was looking around. I got taught in college, like, get your a** up, got up and I was like holy [expletive]. No helmet on, ran back to the huddle … that was the one.”
The Randy Moss catch that let Brady know 2007 would be “different”
Brady’s most prolific season came in 2007, when Brady threw for 4,807 yards and 50 touchdowns en route to a perfect 17-0 regular-season.
The Patriots eventually lost to the Giants in the Super Bowl, but the amount of firepower that New England had on offense made it a special one for Brady. He recalled a moment with Randy Moss at the beginning of the season that told him so.
“We go out there against the Jets in Week 1, there was a ball on the sideline and he kind of ran like — I don’t know what you’d call it — a deep out route,” Brady said. “Kind of like a 18-20 yard throw. They had a good rush on, I could feel the rush coming and I knew then that Randy was running an out-breaker.”
“Just as I was getting hit, I threw it and as I was going to the ground, of course you can’t see anything,” he added. “I’m thinking alright, I was kind of throwing it out of bounds. All of a sudden I heard the crowd go ‘oh’. I looked up and I was like ‘he caught that?’ At that point I was like this [expletive] is going to be different this year.”
Brady’s take on why Belichick vs. Brady debate is “dumb”
The debate about whether Belichick or Brady was more responsible for the Patriots’ success has gone on for years.
Brady isn’t fond of such talk. He said it was an honor and privilege to play for Belichick and that the Patriots needed both of them to win.
“It’s just a dumb analogy,” Brady said. “It’s like what’s more important, the left tackle or the center? I don’t know. You need both.”
“There’s nobody more important to winning Monday through Saturday than the head coach, especially in football and there’s nobody more important on Sunday than the quarterback. Everybody is important. The person who washes the clothes is important. The just has an outsized ability to help the team win because he touches the ball so much, but I need everybody to do their job.”
Super Bowl XLIX was Brady’s favorite victory
Brady has seven Super Bowl victories, which is more than any NFL franchise. Each win tells a different story and has a different meaning, he said.
When asked which one is his favorite, he went with Super Bowl XLIX. New England had won three championships in Brady’s first four seasons as a starter.
After losing to the Giants twice in Super Bowl XLII and Super Bowl XLVI, Brady and the Patriots had a decade-long title drought. Winning such a close game after those losses made XLIX a standout, he said.
“We were playing the Legion of Boom and I think we were down 10 in the fourth quarter,” Brady said. “Then we end up having the most incredible last 20 minutes of the game.”
Khari A. Thompson
Khari Thompson covers professional sports for Boston.com. Before joining the team in 2022, Khari covered college football for The Clarion Ledger in Jackson, Miss.
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