Tom Brady and Randy Moss stood in the same huddle, two stars accustomed to all eyes being on them. It was hot and humid and sticky, like aways in August in New England. The crowd was particularly large and loud. The fans and media members couldn’t help but watch the exacting quarterback and his mercurial new receiver. The Patriots had traded a fourth-round pick for Moss at the 2007 draft, and then Brady had restructured his contract so that the team could fit Moss under the salary cap. Now everyone watched to see if they could play together.

Brady and Moss would say later they had an instant connection, but that’s probably some sepia-toned hindsight. It didn’t always come easily; there was some tension, and both players seemed so different. Brady appeared to lack his usual fire. Moss’ swagger was tempered.

It was impossible not to notice. Moss might jog out to his spot on the line of scrimmage and cast an eye toward Brady to read the quarterback’s minimalistic approach to pre-snap communication — a raised eyebrow or a tiny twist of the hand. It’s a sign language few have studied long enough to understand. Then Moss would rip into his route and stop, jarringly, and expect the ball to hit his hands. But Brady, expecting a go-route instead of a stop route, had already flung it down the field. This happens frequently, year-in and year-out at Patriots camp as Brady and his receivers get in synch.

Usually, such practice gaffes would cause Brady to unleash his signature high-pitched, hyena wail — “What are we doing?!”

But not this time. Brady just went back to work.

Moss, the walking embodiment of a diva receiver — so talented he didn’t need to behave — would simply trot back. No stalking off the field. No hands thrown in the air. No trash talk to the opposing cornerback.

It was odd — even disconcerting — for many onlookers. If only they had known that Brady and Moss would spend the rest of the day figuring it out from their quiet nook of the locker room — space the quarterback had carved out so that he could build a new kind of relationship with the most talented player he had ever thrown to.

Brady had broken Patriots tradition earlier that summer by requesting the locker next to Moss. Previously, head coach Bill Belichick had arranged his players by number. That generally put them near players of the same position. No need to overthink it. Brady dared to challenge the order of things. Belichick loathed giving special treatment to anyone, but Brady knew Moss would need it. And Belichick, a man who has always appreciated the fine details, surely appreciated Brady thinking carefully about something like this. It’s easier to disarm a bomb from up close. Brady had the reputation of a technician on the field, but off the field, he was proving equally dextrous.

Tom Brady was Tom Brady by then — but also not. He’d won three Super Bowls, twice being named MVP, and had been selected to three Pro Bowls in seven seasons. The scrawny, sixth-round pick out of Michigan had defied odds, but few considered him one of the defining players of his generation. He was still figuring out how to carry an offense — both on and off the field. So  Brady held back the critical words and the negative body language after each miscommunication with Moss.

Moss, having burned out after only two years in Minnesota, was more fragile than ever. He was also looking to change his approach on the field, and Brady’s plan turned out to be a perfect fit.

Matt Cassel had the other locker next to Brady that year, and watched carefully as Brady worked to build a relationship with the league’s most combustable personality. Brady was different. He had to be.

“With his body of work that [Moss had] already accomplished, Tom would talk to Randy or go over a certain route or go over a certain depth,” he said recently. “Those conversations took place in the locker room. Instead of doing it out in front of everybody — just to get more out of them — he would, on the other side of that, understand who he was talking to and understand the temperament of the player.”

Brady displayed his signature intensity elsewhere, Cassel recalls. The Patriots had also brought in a diminutive and little-known slot receiver that summer named Wes Welker, and Brady roared at him when a route turned sloppy or a pass fell incomplete.

“Some guys he would get after a little bit more, like in terms of the Welkers of the world,” said Cassel, who started 66 games after spending four seasons in New England and is now an NFL analyst for NBC Sports. “I always refer to Welker as a Labrador retriever. He always wanted more and more and more.”

With Moss, Brady’s proximity allowed for private and subtle conversations; he’d literally whisper to Moss about mistakes. This relationship became even more important because Moss injured his hamstring and missed practices — they were surely taking mental reps in the locker room. Brady could calmly instruct Moss on audibles, route options, timing, ball-placement and the other infinite preferences Brady has for his receivers on any given play. That’s what Moss wanted. And closeness created closeness.

“I wanted them to put my locker right beside his because whenever game time came about, I wanted to know everything,” Moss once shared. “If not everything, at least 98, 99 percent of everything he’s going to call. So if I see a defense shifting or I see the linebackers doing something, he might change the play, and I know why and what he’s changing it to. I know why he’s changing it.”

It worked: Moss caught 98 passes that year — including a career-high 23 touchdowns — while Brady won his first league MVP and the Patriots remained undefeated until losing to the Giants in the Super Bowl.

Brady, as is his habit, downplays the decision to sit next to Moss now.

“I remember asking for Randy to be put there,” Brady said recently. “I remember I wanted to get to know him. I think a part of it that when you’re two feet from one another, it’s easier than when you’re on the other side (of the locker room). It’s cool when you’re together with different guys. Talk about things they like and don’t like. Just build rapport and trust.”

That summer changed the dynamics of the Patriots locker room, and created fresh intrigue each training camp: Which player would get the seat next to Brady, the savant with a relentless love of football and desire to win? And what would Brady share with them?

Brady is a private person — the locker room is a private place. But as Brady embarks on his first off-season as a free agent, we sought to find the players who dressed next to — and were influenced by — the quarterback who kept improbably rising until he was widely considered one of the greatest of all time.

***

There’s no list of Players Who Sat Next To Brady. It’s not as official as that. But we did manage to piece together a partial tally: Drew Bledsoe, Matt Gutierez, Moss, Cassel, Deion Branch, Matthew Slater, Julian Edelman, Brian Hoyer, Aaron Dobson, Brandon LaFell, Malcolm Mitchell, Jacoby Brissett, Josh Gordon, Demaryius Thomas, Antonio Brown, Mohamed Sanu and Ben Watson.

Yes, Brady began his career as the young quarterback who needed to emulate the starter. Eventually, he became the mentor for those who might supplant him. (None have — yet.) He’s also been paired with pass-catchers hoping to become a favorite target, which is only possible through precise and consistent play. Talking to those who shared this space with Brady provides a more rounded picture of who he is, but you probably need to understand the dynamics of an NFL locker room first — and how drastically they’ve changed since Brady entered the league.

In 2019, the Patriots’ locker room is a cartoonish representation of how glamorous professional sports have gotten. The “lockers” are probably three feet wide, three feet deep and 10 feet tall. There’s shelving for shoulder pads and a helmet. Drawers hold cleats and other nicknacks. The structure is made of wood that looks like a rich mahogany Ron Burgandy might find suitable for his apartment. Because some players enjoy their privacy, the locker also features two doors that slide back into the sides of the locker (not unlike what an old TV cabinet used to have for doors). It’s basically a wardrobe, retrofitted for football. Brady’s locker includes a mass of TB12 gear, along with a small statue of Shiva, the Hindu deity, and often a notebook or two and packages from whatever company he’s promoting at that time (Gap, Glaceau Smartwater, Under Armour, UGG, Movado Watches, Stetson cologne, Tag Heuer watches and so many others). He has so much stuff that Brady is one of the few players to earn a second locker in 2018 and 2019. And yes, Brady’s locker once featured a MAGA hat, which entrenched the sports media in political discussion for months.

New England employs a half dozen equipment managers to keep the sprawling locker room tidy at all times.

It is a starkly different space than the one Brady first entered after the Patriots drafted him in 2000. At that time, the all-important locker belonged to Bledsoe, the man who had helped New England become a respectable franchise and distance the Patriots from their label as the laughingstock of the league, “the Patsies.”

Bledsoe and Brady sat beside each other in a cramped locker room at the old Foxborough Stadium. The lockers were metal and probably not far off from the ones at Foxborough High. There was nothing glitzy about the space: metal, concrete, mildewy football pads and dirty laundry. It felt, at times, like an underground bunker. There were temporary lockers in the middle of the room, and the space was overcrowded with 90 bodies during training camp. The media contingent, which was a fraction of the size at that time, only made things worse. In tight quarters and with stale, salty humidity in the air, Brady studied his mentor fiercely, much like so many quarterbacks have come to do with Brady.

Brady had no choice. He was a nobody who couldn’t beat out Drew Henson (who?) for the starting job in college.

“Tommy was a young kid out of Michigan, a skinny little twerp,” Bledsoe said. “The one thing that stuck out about Tommy when he was a young kid was that he was immediately an extremely hard worker and had a great personality about him. People naturally gravitated toward him. None of us — at that point — thought he would be something special.”

It’s likely that not even Belichick knew what he had until Brady took over for an injured Bledsoe on Sept. 23, 2001, when Jets linebacker Mo Lewis sent Bledsoe into the Patriots locker room with an injury and rearranged the power dynamics in that locker room — and set the history of the NFL in a new direction.

That November when Bledsoe got healthy, Belichick announced his controversial decision: Brady was the starter “barring unforeseen circumstances.” The most notable locker in the room was suddenly that of a doughy 24-year-old. He began to gain confidence on and off the field. The quarterback loved competing with his teammates in games of cards and backgammon — often getting heated while desperate for a win. Brady also started to take over the music in the locker room. He loved (and still loves) Jay-Z. If you were in the locker next to Brady, you’d hear him rap every lyric to some of his favorite Jay-Z songs.

“He was a big hiphop guy,” Branch said. He was next to Brady in his second stint with the Patriots from 2010 to 2012. “It didn’t surprise me that he was always over there DJing, which was cool. Who’s going to say anything to Tom? He could have put on rock and roll and nobody would have said anything, even though they hate it and probably dislike the music. But Tom never did that. … When it’s go time (on game day), he gets rowdy. He gets going (with hiphop).”

Brady’s locker was also known for its odor. All of the men who had a seat nearby talk about that. Not body odor. No. They caught wafts of either cocoa butter or a fancy men’s fragrance.

“He liked to smell good. Tom’s locker stayed full of Tom Ford cologne, cocoa butter lotion,” Branch said. “I’ve never seen too many Caucasian brothers with cocoa butter. You feel me? Back then, he wasn’t as heavy with the TB12 Method. … He wanted to be a wideout. All receivers, we always smell good, we always look good all the time.”

Edelman was quick to admit that Brady’s locker “smells just like a handsome man.” Cassel instantly recalled the smell of cocoa butter filling up the locker room thanks to Brady (which is an impressive feat considering the other smells that can overtake a locker room). In many ways, Brady is just like us. This is not one of those ways.

Brady’s rise to fame was quick. And, perhaps, his appearance grew more manicured with it. His once-chubby cheeks drew tight to his jawline and his haircut followed a number of the fashionable looks. He went from looking like a frat boy to a movie star. And of course, his jewelry collection was growing. By 2005, he owned three gaudy rings, bedazzled with diamonds in celebration of wins in Super Bowls XXXVI, XXXVIII and XXXIX. His appearances in the locker room started to feel like a stroll down the red carpet. Heads turned to watch him move through the room. Reporters swarmed. And as he aged, Brady became teammates with the young men who idolized him: the Tom Brady.

During breaks between meetings in the mid 2000s, Brady stood at his locker to call Bridget Moynahan, who he’d later have a child with. That’s also roughly around the same time that Brady met his body coach and personal trainer Alex Guerrero, who would spend more time around the quarterback’s locker in the coming years — until he was briefly prohibited from doing so when Belichick and Guerrero reportedly had a dispute about best practices for injury treatment. Brady eventually stopped calling Moynahan, and began FaceTiming with his wife Gisele Bündchen, one of the world’s most accomplished super models, and his kids Ben, Jack and Vivian. Because Brady is a busy man during the football season, he can often be found chatting with his wife and kids in his locker.

Despite all these changes, Brady’s teammates said, he stayed grounded.

“The biggest thing that I’ll tell you is that the guy that he is now is still the same guy that I met 20-something-years ago when I came in,” Bledsoe said. “He was just a really good person.”

He was particularly good to his teammates, and as he grew more famous, he seemed to grow more graceful and careful with that fame in the locker room. Although, there were some exceptions. When asked about his favorite moments with the players in the locker next to him, Brady responded: “The pranks.” One example? Cassel wouldn’t call Brady “Captain Longshanks.” Why did Brady want that nickname? Unclear. But Cassel wouldn’t go with the flow. So Brady responded: he removed the tires from Cassel’s car. Three of them landed in Cassel’s locker. Brady hid the fourth somewhere in the Patriots’ facility.

“I go outside and my car is on blocks,” Cassel said. “Everyone’s laughing. I had to get a ride home from my roommate, because he wouldn’t give me my tire back.”

Though that prank went a little far, these gestures set a playful tone in the Patriots’ locker room.

These days Brady is the elder statesman — by a lot — and seems to know it. As an icebreaker, Brady will stray from his locker to introduce himself, a laughable gesture. (“Hi, I’m Tom Brady.” “Yeah, I know.”) It’s an effort to show he’s not above anyone, which is important, because a few of his teammates were willing to admit they were jittery to meet Brady — and even more shocked that they’d be literally bumping shoulders in the locker room. Slater remembered managing his oh-my-god-I’m-in-the-locker-next-to-Brady feelings.

“At the beginning of my career — as much as you hate to admit this — you’re a little bit intimidated. You’re a little bit starstruck,” Slater said. “It’s like, ‘This is Tom Brady.’ You’re not quite sure what’s appropriate and what’s not.”

Once that feeling passes, they can begin to absorb, observe and eventually emulate. Once Cassel stopped calling him Mr. Brady — which lasted longer than Brady was comfortable — the backup began to truly see greatness at work. Cassel started his Patriots career in a temporary locker, like most rookies. The message: rookies haven’t earned their place on the team. A player’s place is as tenuous as his locker’s place. Eventually, Cassel made the 53-man roster and found himself in the coveted space next to Brady. That’s when he found himself in the balancing act for players in proximity to Brady — he is an invaluable resource with one limited resource: time.

“I didn’t try to ask too many questions or overwhelm him with questions, because I knew my questions were probably stupid at the time. Didn’t want to be too cumbersome and bother him with those,” Cassel said.

When Brady wasn’t pulling pass-catchers aside to discuss a scenario where the receiver should drift upfield against cover-2, he was getting through his busy and precise routine. Everything is calculated and efficient — he’s living in the 2-minute drill. During the 16 hours per day he spends on football, Brady moves through the locker room swiftly to get to his next offensive meeting, treatment session, workout and cold tub soak, with a special teams meeting mixed in here and there. (Yes, Brady has attended meetings for which he has no business being present.) His game day is routine, which includes the careful laying out of his jersey, his cleats, his shoulder pads, his scuba gear (on cold days), his helmet and so on. It’s all regimented. It’s all routine. He’s had the same job title for 20 years, even if he’ll tell you the responsibilities change every year.

“That’s the impressive thing. After so many weeks in the season, guys start to get tired and pack it in. He just keeps grinding,” Garoppolo said. “To do it for such a long time — I’m tell you. It’s one of those things you feel like a robot doing it for 17 weeks straight. (His preparation) is impressive.”

Garoppolo did his best to match Brady’s preparation. They would both be one day ahead on their homework. If they were talking about third-downs on Thursday in quarterback meetings, Brady and Garoppolo would have studied that situation on Tuesday — rather than the typical timeline on Wednesday. And perhaps Garoppolo, who is headed to Super Bowl LIV with the San Francisco 49ers, did what he saw Brady do for the final game of the postseason. The Patriots quarterback would study his opponent until 2 a.m. after winning the conference title game.

No matter what’s happening in a week, Brady puts aside moments to relax with his teammates. That’s when Brady leans into the locker next door to look at photos of his teammate’s wife and kids. He will congratulate a teammate on a newborn child, swap stories about the funniest thing their kids said or provide for emotional support for problems at home.

“When he’s here, he’s here. He’s engaged. We could sit here and not talk about football,” Benjamin Watson said. “The next minute, he’ll go do something that he has to do and prepare.”

Much has been made of earning Brady’s trust. But it goes both ways. He seems to work hard to earn the trust of those around him — those that become important to him.

“He is what you would hope someone of his stature in the game would be,” Cassel said. ”He’s a solid guy who treats people with respect. … They don’t understand how loyal he is with his friends.”

His friendships have given life to a quarterback tree, with Cassel, Hoyer, Garoppolo and Brissett graduating to starting jobs elsewhere. They studied him and emulated him at length, which helped propel them to a bigger gig, much like coaching assistants have done for years with Belichick. It seems Brady isn’t afraid to challenge his teammates.

“He’s been like a big brother to me,” Garoppolo said in 2017 during training camp. “It’s very competitive. Arguments break out and stuff like that, but it’s just very competitive. It’s just great being around (Brady and Brissett).”

Everyone wants a piece of Brady, everyone wants a piece of Belichick and everyone wants a piece of the Patriots’ dynasty. Even after the quarterbacks have left, Brady would keep them close, with regular phone calls and yearly meetings at The Kentucky Derby. If teammates do it right, they continue to reap the rewards of being in the locker next to Brady, even when they leave New England.

“I’d call him, even when I was in Kansas City, to talk to him about certain stuff,” Cassel said. “He truly helped me mature and grow as a quarterback and help me go to the next level in the NFL. Because without his help and without his my better understanding of how being an NFL quarterback works and his leadership, I don’t think I would have had the long career that I had.”

***

Greatness isn’t unconditionally contagious. Brady has a reputation for flunking receivers, who struggle to learn the Patriots offense. Maybe Brady and Moss made things work for a few years. But their chemistry expired while Moss’ relationship with Belichick imploded. The success that Brady and Moss had seemed to embolden the Patriots to try to revitalize the careers of other wideouts, who arrived to New England with a troubled reputation.

Over the last two seasons, the Patriots have placed Josh Gordon and Antonio Brown in the spot next to Brady. Gordon arrived in 2018 while battling mental health and addiction issues, which have landed him on an indefinite suspension for the better part of the last six seasons. “It’s good to be able to be in such close proximity to learn from him. I look up to the guy,” Gordon told ESPN’s Mike Reiss when he arrived last season. “He’s done everything right, so I just enjoy the time being around him.” It worked for a few games, but Gordon landed on suspension at the end of the 2018 season, and though he returned for 2019, the Patriots cut him midseason. He received a new suspension after joining the Seahawks this season.

Brown, meanwhile, was an entirely different problem. When he signed with the Patriots, Brown hadn’t yet faced allegations of sexual assault and rape, nor had he attempted to intimidate a woman who accused him of sexual harassment in an entirely separate incident. The word on Brown was that he was erratic after he had forced his way out of Pittsburgh and Oakland. Brady wanted Brown in the locker next to him. In fact, Brady was ready to invite Brown into the Brady household to help him acclimate to New England. Moss — the man who set precedent for Brown — thought the receiver needed Brady.

“Where will Antonio Brown be (in the locker room)? Because I know that Josh Gordon is next to him. Will Antonio Brown be close to him? Because I really believe he needs to be close to him,” Moss said. “You heard Tom in that soundbite talk about: you’ve got to get up to speed, you’ve got to get up to speed. My secret — the reason I wanted my locker beside Tom is that I wanted to be on the same page. When Tom audibled, I wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing, because a lot of people expected the magic to happen between me and Tom, just like people are going to expect the magic between Antonio Brown and Tom Brady to happen. It’s going to take time, but like Tom said, they’ve got some work to do.”

The Patriots’ attempt with Brown was a disaster, a Hail Mary attempt turned  into pick-six. He was beyond helping — at least within Brady’s capacity. For every Moss, there’s a Brown.

When Brown got cut, Watson, a veteran tight end brought in to try to fill some of the void left by Rob Gronkowski, settled in to Brady’s right. Sanu, a late-season add via trade, sat to Brady’s left (separated by Brady’s extra locker). There was no magic, this time. Brady couldn’t tap those two into New England’s collective unconscious. The Patriots offense floundered over the second half of the season, with Brady getting outplayed by Ryan Fitzpatrick and Ryan Tannehill Week 17 and the AFC wild-card round losses.

After all the years of influence and success, not even Brady knows where his locker will be next year. He is a free agent, reportedly with a clause in his contract preventing the Patriots from placing the franchise tag on him. He’s free to leave New England. If he does, the Patriots will have to find a way to fill his locker — and everything that comes with it.

Rookie quarterback Jarrett Stidham, a fourth-round pick, had a stall nearby Brady throughout the 2019 season. At one point, Brady invited Stidham over to his locker for a moment while reporters were in the locker room. The topic — which Stidham wouldn’t reveal — must have been fairly important, because Brady never lingers in the locker room when reporters can bother him and set him off-schedule with chattiness.

Brady set his foot up on his chair, and leaned over his knee. Inaudible to everyone but Stidham, Brady issued words of advice. Brady obscures everything that gives him a competitive edge as a quarterback — even if he has commoditized his dietary and fitness methods into the marketable “TB12 Method.” But these tidbits are precious, an alchemist’s secrets.

Stidham nodded, saying nothing. He’s well-aware of how lucky he is. He has spent the season following Brady around the facility, following Brady’s snaps on the practice field, following the movement of Brady’s arm on film study and following Brady out of the tunnel onto the field at Gillette Stadium. Stidham may find he tracked the G.O.A.T.’s footsteps in his final season as a Patriot. On this day, though, he simply listened and gave a slight nod every few seconds. Even though Stidham is only one inch shorter than Brady, the 42-year-old’s frame dwarfed the rookie. Stidham looked so small in that locker. Just as any other quarterback would.