Retirement is a huge life choice for people, especially pro athletes. For those who are lucky enough to play a sport for a living and make tremendous money, retirement marks the end of one chapter of life, and afterward, one is in search of something else that will define them as a human being.
Tom Brady had as great and successful a career as any athlete ever has. The legendary quarterback led the New England Patriots to six Super Bowl championships, and after leaving them, he immediately won a seventh Vince Lombardi Trophy with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He retired after the 2022 season, which was his 23rd in the NFL.
Brady could’ve retired quite a bit sooner than he did, especially after a rift that grew between him and former Patriots coach Bill Belichick in the late 2010s. But he admitted in his “199” newsletter that he continued playing in order to be of service to his teammates.
“I spent some time with Jerry Rice recently, which is always a little surreal having grown up in the Bay Area idolizing his Niners teams,” Brady wrote. “We got to talking about our careers, as guys who played longer than anyone else at our respective positions, and Jerry said something that really resonated with me. The thing that kept him going all those years, at such a high level, was the desire to never let his teammates down. I felt the exact same way. It’s what motivated me for 23 seasons and what drove me to prep, practice, and play the way I did every day. More than money, more than accolades, more even than winning when I really step back to think about it.”
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As Brady mentioned, he grew up in the Bay Area as a big San Francisco 49ers fan back when Rice, widely considered the greatest wide receiver of all time, was racking up championship after championship. It may have given him an early lesson in what it took to be a winner, as Rice was renowned for his insane work ethic and leadership.
He won his first Super Bowl title at age 24, and then earned two more within the following three seasons. At the time, he was considered a great signal-caller, but some wondered if he was a “system quarterback” and more a product of Belichick than a historically great player.
After winning it all in the 2004 season, Brady would have to wait a full decade to do so again. In the interim, he had to endure to painful Super Bowl losses to Eli Manning’s New York Giants, not to mention a torn ACL and MCL in Week 1 of the 2008 season, not to mention an infection in the resulting wound that would require multiple more procedures.
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Today, Brady has embarked on what should become a very successful second career as a commentator for Fox Sports’ coverage of NFL games. He’s also a minority owner of the Las Vegas Raiders, as well as the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces.