Nelly .....
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FOXBORO - Tom Brady looked well-rested and relaxed during the first day of Patriots training camp. Yesterday, he told the media his mind, body, arm and ankle were all in great shape.
If you want the quarterback’s secret, he seems to have discovered a new formula to help get himself better prepared for the year ahead.
In fact, he claimed this was his best offseason yet, much of it spent away from the training room inside Gillette Stadium, where he pretty much has been a fixture during the past eight seasons.
The only trade-off?
For the first time anyone can remember, he lost his prime parking space as an offseason workout award winner.
“I gave it up. I didn’t compete for it this year,” Brady said. “I’m sure if I competed for it, I would have won. But I didn’t compete for it.”
The reason he didn’t vie for the yearly crown and coveted space can be explained by how he and his life have changed over time.
The Patriots quarterback did not openly bring up issues in his personal life - such as spending quality time with model girlfriend Gisele Bundchen, or bonding with his infant son John, who lives in California with Brady’s former girlfriend Bridget Moynahan.
Instead, he just left it for everyone to fill in the blanks.
“There’s other things that have come up in my life that I’ve had to make choices on,” Brady said. “One of the choices was to spend time away with things I don’t get the opportunity to do when I’m in the football season. It was not all vacation, though.”
Some fans might start worrying about Brady and his focus, but how can you really argue with a guy who just set the NFL record for touchdown passes in one season with 50 and led a record-setting offense?
Brady has merely evolved - from that kid who was drafted in the sixth round out of Michigan who eats, sleeps and drinks football 365 days a year, into a three-time Super Bowl champion who figured out he needs a break when the time calls for it.
He also has figured out he doesn’t need to throw the football in double sessions. One session will suffice, if that. It’s called pacing yourself for the regular season.
“Each year, I’ve learned something different. I think the goal this year isn’t to go out and see how sore my arm can get,” Brady said following the morning session, in which he threw sparingly. “I think for our team, it’s the same thing. The goal is to be ready in September, do whatever we need to do to get to that point, and that’s what our coach is going to put us through.”
Beyond his downtime, Brady was quizzed on a number of topics - including the threat of his team facing a Super Bowl hangover, his record-setting receiving corps a year later and how he felt about no longer having to face division foe and personal terror Jason Taylor on a regular basis.
The latter query drew the best out of Brady, who claimed he and left tackle Matt Light threw a celebration upon learning the news his pal Taylor had been traded from Miami to Washington.
“I think Light and I popped a cold beer when I saw the transaction,” Brady said. “We were the two most excited players in the NFL. We were hugging each other. That was awesome.”
As for the 17-14 Super Bowl loss to the Giants, and the long history of Super Bowl losers going on to have bad seasons the following year, Brady sounded like a true disciple of his coach when answering.
“We start by taking leadership from our head coach (Bill Belichick) and the example that he sets. I don’t think he is too concerned with what anybody did last year, including us,” Brady said. “He is concerned with what we did today and what we do tomorrow. That is where is all starts.”
Talk of Brady’s receiving corps focused on the element of familiarity the group now shares after a season of playing together.
“We now know what everybody can do. We know what everybody is capable of,” Brady said. “Last year when we broke the huddle, guys were running to the right or the left because that is where they had to go. They were trying to figure out how to run the routes and find out what I am looking for.
“Now when we get in the huddle, I tell Randy (Moss) what to do and he knows exactly what you are going to do,” Brady continued. “It is the same with Wes (Welker) and Jab (Gaffney). It is pretty much everybody. That leads to better execution. And if you can execute more consistently, then that
will help over the long term.”
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NFL 2008-2009 (Read 64,503 times)
