To those who love Tom Brady — get ready to love him even more.
At their season opener Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles, the New England Patriots honored their legendary G.O.A.T quarterback Tom “Seven Ringz” Brady during a ceremony. It was absolutely beautiful, featuring a ton of memories about Brady and how he led the Pats to six Super Bowl championships.
His other Super Bowl was with the Buccaneers in Tampa Bay, where he was teammates with Kyle Rudolph. The tight end also happens to be the person who caught Brady‘s final regular-season touchdown.
Rudolph recently admitted to NBC Sports’ Pro Football Talk that he was personally disappointed in his last season in the NFL, however, he learned a lot from Brady while they were in the Sunshine State together.
“I went to the Bucs to try to win a championship with the best QB ever, who wanted me in Tampa. I came in with expectations, and then never even played. (Figuratively. Rudolph played 79 snaps in nine games as a Buc.) I was a healthy scratch most of the year, and, honestly, it was really disappointing,” Rudolph said.
“But my experience with Tom was incredible. First, the way he treated people. The way he treated the Glazer family [Bucs owners] is exactly the way he treated the janitor at 6:30 at night when he and maybe one or two other guys were the last players in the building.”
“Second, the way he treated his teammates. Tom had an empty locker next to him. I would look over there and every day, guys would put helmets, jerseys, pictures, footballs, all the stuff they wanted Tom to sign for them. There’d be notes on the stuff, a post-it note on a football—‘Sign this for Jimmy, it’s his birthday.’ At the end of the day, almost every day, he’d sit there and sign everything.”
Former NFL TE Kyle Rudolph shared a few insights about his team around Tom Brady on the #Bucs last season.
Rudolph says that Brady had an empty locker next to him, where other players would put helmets, jerseys, pictures, footballs, all the stuff they wanted Tom to sign for… pic.twitter.com/CtOJTVYayr
— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) September 11, 2023
Rudolph continued to praise Brady, explaining further how great of a teammate he is.
“If anyone had the right to sometimes be an a—hole, it was Tom. He never was. Think of how tough a year it was for him off the field. (Brady was in the throes of a divorce.),” Rudolph said.
“For me, he was such a great teammate. I went to Tampa to play with him and to win a Super Bowl. It just didn’t go the way I wanted it. But all season, he’d put his arm around me and keep me positive. He made me a better football player, not because of the games, but because of the practices Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. When you’re a 33-year-old former Pro Bowler playing scout team, you’ve got two ways to go.”
“You can be bitter and a distraction, or be a hard worker and try to get better every day. He said to me, ‘Keep working, keep working, I’m gonna give you a chance, I’m gonna get you the ball.’ I think he was appreciative of how I went to work. And when I look back on it now, I can’t tell you how much I loved Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.” (RELATED: Dolphins’ Tua Tagovailoa Makes Absolutely Perfect Throw Which Leads To Unbelievable Game-Winning Catch By Tyreek Hill)
Rudolph closed things out by saying that Brady was “always positive,” despite his off-the-field issues.
“The most amazing thing to me was, with all the negativity swirling around his life outside of football, he never carried it into the building. Always positive. I didn’t think it’d be possible when I walked into the team to be more impressed with Tom. But I was.”
What a guy. Truly the G.O.A.T.