Tag: Tom Brady retirement

Tom Brady makes his retirement officially, officially official with the NFL. We think.

Sorry to all those hoping for another Brady comeback.

Seven-time Super Bowl-winning quarterback Tom Brady is retiring. For good, this time. Allegedly.

When the former New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback announced that he was calling it quits after 23 seasons on Feb. 1, he said in his retirement video that his leaving the NFL was final.

Of course, that wasn’t quite enough to silence all speculation of a second Brady comeback, but the legendary quarterback all but ended those questions on Friday. He filed a letter with the NFL and NFLPA reaffirming his decision to retire, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

He will now be eligible for the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2028 when he’ll be an essential shoo-in to enter on the first ballot.

Brady walks away from a legendary career, leaving a legacy that almost certainly won’t be matched any time soon. In addition to his seven rings, he won five Super Bowl MVPs and three NFL MVPs. He was a six-time All-Pro and made 15 Pro Bowls.

Though you can never say never, it seems we’ve now officially, officially seen the last of Brady’s playing career.

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A look at Tom Brady’s final career stats and where they rank in NFL history

Tom Brady, man. What a career.

Love him or hate him, Tom Brady is undoubtedly the most accomplished NFL player of all time. The NFL is going to miss him.

Nobody has had as much sustained success as Brady in a league where parity rules more often than not. Somehow, Brady managed to cling to the top of the mountain without ever letting go. No matter who the competition was, Brady somehow always seemed to persevere.

As a result, he just retired — allegedly— with some pretty impressive stats and records that will be hard to eclipse. Here’s a look at his final numbers and where they rank all-time in NFL history.

Tom Brady: ‘I’m retiring… for good’

Tom Brady has announced his retirement again. He says it’s for good this time, but we can only wait and see what happens.

This time around, Tom Brady sounds a bit more serious about retiring. In a Twitter video message on Wednesday morning, an emotional Brady had this to say.

“Good morning, guys. I’ll get to the point right away: I’m retiring. For good. I know the process was a pretty big deal last time, so when I woke up this morning, I figured I’d just press ‘record’ and let you guys know first. So, I won’t be long-winded. You only get one super-emotional retirement essay, and I used mine up last year. So, I really thank you guys so much — every single one of you — for supporting me. My family, my friends, my teammates, my competitors… I could go on forever. There’s too many. Thank you for allowing me to live my absolute dream. I wouldn’t change a thing.

“I love you all.”

Brady has nothing left to prove after a 23-year career in which he established himself as the best quarterback in pro football history. His 2022 season, which only came about after he reversed a previous decision to retire, was a relative disappointment. He led the league in passing attempts (733) and completions (490), but had just 25 touchdown passes. Brady’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers finished 8-9 in the regular season, and were unceremoniously booted out of the wild-card round of the playoffs, 31-14, by the Dallas Cowboys.

Many believed that Brady wouldn’t go out that way, but as for now, it appears that the GOAT has decided to hang them up… for good.

Rob Gronkowski to Tom Brady in touching tribute: ‘You’re a legend and always will be’

Gronk outdid Tom Brady with this appreciation post.

Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski will go down as maybe the greatest combination in NFL history.

The two have broken record after record and have literally gotten each other paid over and over again while doing it. Sounds like a pretty great friendship if you ask me.

So it’s no wonder Rob Gronkowski had so many touching things to say about Tom Brady after he learned his buddy was retiring. Brady officially announced he was done with the NFL on Tuesday.

Gronk dropped a pretty awesome tribute post to his former quarterback on Wednesday along with a video sharing some of their most fun moments together.

It was great. And, also, much better than Tom Brady’s announcement post.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CZeqs_wr7jA/

“Thank you for your dedication to the game, putting the team in the best possible position to win every year, all the records that were broken, the Super Bowls, the memories, and your friendship through the last 12 years.” 

Get you a friend like Gronk, y’all.

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Good riddance, Tom Brady

The Jets can breathe a bit easier after Tom Brady’s retirement. His reign of terror over Gang Green is officially over.

Mo Lewis altered NFL history the second he made contact with Patriots quarterback Drew Bledsoe during the fourth quarter of the Jets’ second game of the 2001 season.

Lewis leveled New England’s $100 million quarterback and sent him to the sideline with an injury that landed him in the hospital. The Patriots were left with no choice but to turn to their second-year backup quarterback, a former sixth-round pick who had appeared in just one game as a rookie.

Thomas Edward Patrick Brady Jr. wasn’t highly thought of coming out of the University of Michigan. He spent just two seasons as the program’s starting quarterback and was far from an overly impressive athlete. The Patriots selected Brady with the 199th pick in the 2000 draft, but with Bledsoe entrenched as the starter and signed to a long-term extension before the 2001 season, Brady was viewed as nothing more than an insurance policy.

That wound up being the furthest thing from the case.

Brady didn’t lead the Patriots to a win over the Jets in relief of Bledsoe. But he did spend the next two decades torturing New York — and the rest of the league — while cementing himself as the greatest quarterback of all time.

Brady called it a career on Tuesday, bringing an end to the 21-year nightmare Lewis brought upon the Jets. New York received a bit of a reprieve when Brady left the Patriots to finish his career with the Buccaneers, but even a change in location wasn’t enough to stop Brady from inflicting one last painful moment on the franchise he owned from the second he stepped into Bledsoe’s shoes.

Wins were hard for the Jets to come by whenever they squared off with Brady. He went an eye-popping 31-8 against New York between the regular season and the postseason, routinely thrashing Gang Green’s best defenses during that span. Brady’s final triumph over the Jets came in dramatic fashion this past season, as he led a two-minute drill and fired a game-winning score with 15 seconds remaining to give the Buccaneers a 28-24 win.

Want a better idea of how long Brady’s torturous reign over the Jets lasted? Vinny Testaverde was New York’s starting quarterback when Brady replaced Bledsoe in 2001. He is now 58 years old. Zach Wilson, who happens to share a birthday with Brady, was born during the summer of Brady’s senior year at Michigan.

The Jets cycled through 18 different quarterbacks during Brady’s time in the NFL. Mark Sanchez was the only one to beat him during the postseason, and that 2010 Divisonal Round win is now considered one of the franchise’s greatest moments ever. Brady, meanwhile, won six Super Bowls with the Patriots and one with the Bucs.

Gang Green can sleep a bit easier from here on out. The recurring nightmares are over. Brady’s dominance left a permanent scar on the organization, but his days of running roughshod over New York are mercifully over.

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VIDEO: Why is Tom Brady the greatest quarterback in NFL history?

In this video, Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar and Mark Schofield reflect on what made Tom Brady the greatest QB ever throughout his career.

In this video, Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar and Mark Schofield reflect on Tom Brady’s NFL career now that Brady has made his retirement official.

What are the quarterback non-negotiables Brady mastered at a higher level than anybody else?

How was he able to play so well in a modern NFL where second-reaction ability seems to be a requirement for quarterbacks?

Why was he able to excel in so many different offensive concepts, and why was this so uncommon?

Why was he able to play so well into his forties — by far better than any other quarterback in his forties — and is it a surprise at all that Brady’s hanging it up now when he’s still playing at an MVP level?

You can watch the video right here:

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Rams CB Jalen Ramsey remembers giving up Tom Brady’s last touchdown pass

After Tom Brady announced his retirement, Rams cornerback Jalen Ramsey remembered how he allowed Brady’s last touchdown pass.

Los Angeles Rams cornerback Jalen Ramsey will play in his first Super Bowl on February 13, and while that’s well-deserved for one of the best at his position in the NFL today, Ramsey took a second to reflect on Tom Brady’s retirement Tuesday morning.

That touchdown came in the Rams’ 30-27 win over the Buccaneers in the divisional round of the playoffs. Brady brought his team back from a 27-3 third-quarter deficit to tie the game at 27 with less than a minute left before Matthew Stafford out-Brady’d Brady with his own last-second drive, which led to Matt Gay’s 30-yard game-winning field goal as time expired.

Ramsey, and everyone else on the Rams’ side knew that they had just escaped one more of those Brady comebacks.

As to the play Ramsey’s talking about, it came with 3:20 left in the fourth quarter. The Buccaneers had second-and-7 from their own 45-yard line after a 19-yard pass to Scotty Miller and a three-yard pass to Leonard Fournette. Brady went quick no-huddle, and caught Ramsey in a one-on-one matchup with receiver Mike Evans. At that point, it was about Evans beating Ramsey downfield, and Brady throwing it where only Evans was going to get it.

Which, of course, Brady did.

“After I hit Mike on the deep one, that was a pretty good feeling,” Brady said after the game. “You know, we are right in it at that point. And then we got a great turnover. It gave us great field position and then had the play there before Leonard’s touchdown, we were kind of figuring down what down it was. First, they said it was a first down then all of a sudden it wasn’t a first down, mid-snap, so made the play then they [Rams] made a couple plays after that.”

(Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports)

We didn’t know it at that point, but it was Brady’s last touchdown pass, and Ramsey had no issue admitting that it was on him.

Tom Brady retires from NFL while his former OC admits ‘It was a fumble’ in tuck rule game

Hours after his former OC admits ‘It was a fumble’ Tom Brady officially retires from NFL

The end of Tom Brady’s long career arrived Tuesday as the seven-time Super Bowl champion announced his retirement from the NFL after 22 years.

Brady’s Buccaneers went 13-4 this season but were knocked out of the playoffs in the Divisional round by the now Super Bowl-bound Rams.

It was just a year ago that Brady was hoisting the Lombardi for the seventh time in his first season with the Bucs at the age of 43. He came back for one more year to see if he could do it again and fell short and called it a career.

The day prior to Brady’s announcement, the Raiders were announcing the hiring of his former longtime offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels as their new head coach.

McDaniels got his start in coaching with the Patriots in 2001 as a personnel assistant. That was also the year that Brady’s legacy began with a fateful play in the snow, most commonly known as the Tuck Rule game.

Charles Woodson came on the blitz and forced the fumble on Brady and LB Greg Biekert recovered it on a play that should have ended the game with a Raiders win. But the officials upstairs overruled it, citing the tuck rule.

The Patriots kept the ball and went on to win. Then they went on to win Brady’s first Super Bowl.

In McDaniels introductory press conference, he said, with Tom Brady’s blessing, that he would be admitting it was a fumble.

“When I met Josh on Saturday, we met in the hallway as we were passing,” Raiders owner Mark Davis said. “It was before the interview process was going to start. I said, hey, I introduced myself and everything, and he looked me in the eye and he said, there’s one thing: It was a fumble. So Raider Nation, if you’re worried, he’s already come over to the dark side.”

McDaniels responded by saying “True story”. Then he expanded on it.

“That was my icebreaker,” McDaniels said. “I figured, I was there, I lived through that experience, it was positive for me back then, and I think I did the right thing the other day. . . Tom and I are good friends and I told him I would have to say it.”

McDaniels enjoyed donning six rings during Tom Brady’s time in New England, three of which with McDaniels as offensive coordinator. Though Brady has seven rings and actually won more Super Bowls (4) *without* McDaniels as his OC than with (3).

Now each of them embarks on new chapters in their lives. Congrats Tom Brady on your retirement.

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The NFL world reacts quickly to Tom Brady’s retirement

The NFL world reacted quickly and with great respect to the (official) news that Tom Brady has announced his retirement.

As we’re all looking to Senior Bowl Week, the ramp-up to Super Bowl LVI, and draft season for the fans of most teams, there was other news from the NFL on Tuesday. A sixth-round quarterback from the year 2000 announced his retirement (officially), and it was kind of a big deal.

Tom Brady, unquestionably the greatest quarterback in NFL history, hung ’em up after 22 of the most remarkable seasons we’ll see in any sport.

As expected, the NFL world reacted quickly and with great respect.

Tom Brady provides updates on retirement rumors: “It’s literally day to day with me”

On Monday, Tom Brady provided some clarity regarding recent rumors about his retirement.

Just when everybody in the NFL world thought they were going to have a relaxing Saturday in the lead-up to the Conference Championship games, there was the report from ESPN’s Adam Schefter and Jeff Darlington that Tom Brady had decided to retire after 22 seasons.

The report, claiming that sources close to Brady had spilled the beans, was immediately and forcefully refuted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Brady’s agent Don Yee, and even Brady’s father, Tom Brady Sr.

That doesn’t mean that Schefter and Darlington were wrong, per se — just that they may have gotten ahead of themselves with the news.

Denials come fast and furious after Tom Brady retirement report

On Monday, during an appearance on Mad Dog Radio, Brady tried to provide some clarity on the situation.

“I’m just still going through the process that I said I was going through,” Brady told co-host Jim Gray, per the Boston Globe. “Sometimes it takes some time to really evaluate how you feel and what you want to do. I think when the time’s right, I’ll be ready to make a decision one way or the other.”

Brady wasn’t surprised by the reports, he said.

“There’s a good line — I’m responsible for what I say and do and not responsible for what others say or do,” he said. “We’re in such an era of information and people want to be in front of the news often. I totally understand that. I understand that’s the environment we’re in.

“I’m just trying to do the best I can every day and evaluate things as they come and make a great decision for me and my family. I’ll know when the time is right. I’m very blessed to have played as long as I have.

“As things have gone on in the later parts of my career, whether that was five years ago or even this year, there’s a lot of interest in when I’m going to stop playing. I understand that. It’s not that I don’t recognize that. It’s just — when I know, I’ll know. When I don’t know, I don’t know.”

So, at this point, it appears that he doesn’t know.

“I think my motivation for playing football is to win and be successful,” Brady concluded. “Maybe there’s little parts of motivation that come from different places or what people may say or think, but I’m mostly motivated from inside and wanting to be the best for my teammates, my coaches, and my organization. That’s kind of been where motivation’s been for a long time.

“At different times, you use different techniques and tools to put yourself in the right frame of mind, but for me, it’s always about being the best I can be.”

Brady had quite a remarkable season at age 44 — including the postseason, he completed 544 of 810 passes for 5,916 yards, 46 touchdowns, 13 interceptions, and a passer rating of 100.7. It’s clear that he could play at a high level for at least one more season, but as Brady said, the decision is yet to be made.