The Demands Tom Brady Had Once Joining The Tampa Bay Buccaneers Are Unbelievable
Tampa Bay Times -- Brady never asked for control of the offense. He knew that Arians, offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich, quarterbacks coach Clyde Christensen and special assistant Tom Moore would collaborate with him on game plans. He didn’t ask for any specific players to join him. He didn’t even ask to wear No. 12, which for the moment belongs to Godwin.
In fact, there was only one request Brady had after he had signed: He wanted the phone numbers of all his new Bucs teammates.
Just the phone numbers of his teammates. That's all Tom Brady wanted once he became a Buccaneer. The GOAT, winningest QB of all time, 20 year vet, wanted nothing else but the phone numbers of his teammates. Didn't want them to go after players or to have a say in play calling. Didn't even ask for his number (which he's obviously gonna get but still). I swear to Tom Brady, there is no one like Tom Brady in the world.
I recommend reading the whole article, though you'll do it through tears, because it's amazing. It's perfectly Brady. He talked to Arians and Licht and they were surprised by how prepared he was. He didn't call to get pitched, he called to interview them. He wanted to know about his new #weaponz and what they were like as people, were they good guys? He was even well-versed in their defense and the final takeaway from the Bucs was "the competitive fire still burns in him white hot" and "holy shit we might actually get this guy."
If I have to find a silver lining in all of this, I think it's that maybe the rest of the country will finally love Tom Brady. Everyone has always respected him as a player, he took away their choice in that matter before I even got to high school, but many still hated Tom Brady the person. If this article was written in Boston it would be met with eye rolls and they'd say it was ball fondling by a 20-year friendly media. But for two decades countless players and personnel and reporters have met Brady, none walked out the door saying anything less than he's the greatest person to ever live. No one has left, not even people who probably had a fair axe to grind with the organization as a whole, and uttered a bad word about him. This is who Tom Brady is, a perfect person. Take care of him.
Tom Brady Forever. Buy it.