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01x07 - Surrender

Episode transcripts for the TV show, "Man in the Arena". Aired: November 16, 2021.*
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Tom Brady shares a first-hand account of his Super Bowl appearances, and deconstructs the milestones of his legendary NFL career.

01x07 - Surrender

Post by bunniefuu »

At that point in my life,

physically I was still doing really well.

Mentally, I was still very sharp.

Emotionally, I had to deal

with some challenges.

And I read "The Four Agreements."

You know, don't take things personally.

It's not about you all the time.

Don't make assumptions. Try your best.

You know, be impeccable with your word.

And I got pretty good at

applying a lot of those things.

We can do better than that, all right?

Let's get in the end zone.

I've tried to really

be a leader in that sense

for the people that I'm around.

Hey, we gotta put together

a drive, huh?

It's two minutes left in the game.

You're down by ten points.

Should I whine?

"Oh, what happened in the first quarter?"

"Oh, what happened in the second quarter?"

Like, no. This is the situation we're in.

What are we gonna do about it?

Are we gonna fix it,

or are we gonna cry and b*tch,

complain that it's not the way we want it?

He caught it!

What attitude are you

gonna take on, you know?

Are you going to take on an attitude

that you're gonna overcome the challenges

and obstacles

and adversities that you face?

Are you gonna be part of the solution,

or are you gonna just complain?

'Cause if you're gonna complain,

that's not gonna solve our problem.

We all sit around and have b*tch sessions

about all the things we don't like,

and blame this,

blame that, blame this person,

blame the ref, blame the weather,

blame your sister, blame your agent.

There's some battles you have to fight,

and some you can't.

You can't fight them all.

It's gonna exhaust you.

I have a belief that I'm

gonna inspire through action,

and I wanna inspire people

through doing the right thing,

trying to portray a positive attitude.

Oh, yeah!

You tell me what works.

You look at my body of work

and tell me if that works for me or not,

and if it's worked for the

people that I've been around.

- Oh, my God!

- We did it, Josh.

- I love you, buddy!

- We did it!

I believe that you gotta bring people up.

If you want something different,

you gotta bring

the best out in other people.

It's not just bringing

the best out in you.

But you're only gonna bring

the best out in other people

if you empower them to be their best, too,

which you encourage 'em, you support 'em,

you care for 'em.

That's what leadership's all about.

It's the alleged cheating scandal

launching a thousand

saucy headlines: Deflategate.

The NFL, quote,

"was investigating the possibility

the Patriots deflated footballs."

I didn't, you know, have any, uh

you know,

I didn't alter the ball in any way.

Who handles the ba*ls

after the ref hands them

back over to team custody?

I have no idea.

That's not part of my process.

I don't know. I don't,

you know, I didn't

I don't have any, you know

I'm not a conspiracy theorist.

I don't I have no explanation for it.

I don't know what happened

between the time that I touched it, and

You know, really till Monday morning,

I have no idea what

happened with the ba*ls, so

Like I said, sometimes

some of the toughest things you deal with

end up being the best things

because you realize

the people that you can rely on

that love you and support you

through, you know,

something like this, so

The pass is intercepted at the goal line

by Malcolm Butler.

And after the wackiest lead-up

to a Super Bowl ever,

the New England Patriots

are the NFL champions.

So I'm the oldest, the wisest.

You're watching.

My name's Julie,

and I am the second oldest.

My older sister Maureen, then me,

and then Nancy, and then

Tommy's our little brother.

To open the ball

I'm Nancy Brady.

I'm Tom's third sister.

Older, wiser.

I think that we all four,

you know, have similarities.

Okay, Julie.

Probably personality-wise,

Tommy and Julie are probably

the most similar.

I think competitive-wise,

Tommy and I are probably

Probably the same person.

What do you think makes a good

He was just the cutest little brother.

I don't know.

Always supporting all of us sisters.

He was very much involved in our lives.

With the older siblings,

you're always going to their practices,

and he just kind of would tag along

up to wherever we had to go.

I mean, I was older.

I was kind of doing my thing.

I was busy all the time,

you know, going to practices.

So they would just be the ones

kind of tagging along.

When I would be pitching

in the All Star Tournament,

I remembered, you know, turning around,

and I saw my brother,

like, up on the lightposts

watching the game.

He would just be always

supporting me and just watching.

Tommy was always watching.

He had three older athletic sisters

who always wanted to check on him.

I think he always kind of

would have liked a brother,

and so he looked at the older boys

with a lot of adoration.

We grew up on a street on Portola,

and there were probably,

like, 30 kids on our street,

and so there's a bunch of older boys

that would go out and play football.

Tommy would go out there

to play with them,

and they would tell him to go deep.

"Run long, Tommy, run long."

And they would never

throw it to him.

And he would get so mad, you know.

At that time he had a voice like us,

so it was very high, and he'd be, like,

"Come on, guys, throw me the ball."

And then the next day he'd come back out,

you know, with the same shirt on,

and he would try and play with them.

I mean,

my parents didn't let him play football

till he got to high school

and so I was already at college.

I remember surprising him.

I kind of drove home from college

to watch his game.

And it was high school,

so, I mean, it was fun watching him,

but they sucked.

My mom loved

Joe Montana growing up.

She loved his baby blue eyes,

and, I mean, we were a 49er team

and would root for them.

But I think when Tommy started playing,

that really changed it,

where it cemented

how much we really loved

watching football.

Good afternoon. My name is Tom Mackenzie.

I'm head football coach

at Junipero Serra High School.

I'd like to introduce

my starting quarterback from

this past season, Tom Brady.

You know, we just loved him,

and I think, you know,

we always were very protective of him,

which, you know,

I don't think that ever changes.

We are so proud of him!

The scandal over footballs

in professional football

will not go away,

and in fact it's taken on new life.

That was a lot about

who had power and authority.

And, you know, what it started out as

versus what it became

are two totally different things.

It started out as,

like, the whole air thing,

and PSI of the football.

So the sequence of events is

in a locker room

that was about 71 degrees,

the Patriots' ba*ls were checked

to be 12 1/2 PSI.

They go to the field.

It's colder.

They have a long time to equilibrate.

What happens to the pressure

when you go from warmer to colder?

It drops, right?

And we'll get to that ideal gas law.

Now, instead of thinking ideal gas law,

they thought cheating,

and everything went downhill from there.

I think when they figured out,

like, maybe that was wrong,

it kind of went into something else,

and then when they

couldn't really fight that,

they went on to something else.

And it was like, wait,

we're not even looking at

what the whole initial issue

was here of this football.

A lot of people

we're waiting for that moment

to kind of dig in.

It was vicious.

People should be more on Tom Brady.

In New England, we should

be upset with Tom Brady.

You think he's welcome back at the house?

And a bad sport, freaking baby.

Tom Brady, who is a cheater

Listen, everybody hates the Patriots.

This never-ending saga continues.

It's been 462 days

since the AFC championship game.

Now, there have been some twists

and turns along the way,

but today for Tom Brady,

it's back to square one.

Brady will have to sit

the first four games of the 2016 season,

and backup QB Jimmy Garoppolo

will be taking the snaps.

Maybe that's a little bit

of a disappointment that you feel

when you do accomplish

something like we did,

that it becomes a distraction.

It takes away from what you believe

this team had accomplished,

and that people want to try to

minimize those accomplishments

by certainly talking about

a deflated football.

I think anybody who stepped on a field

and has defended Tom Brady

or defended any great quarterback

knows there's much more

to being a great quarterback

in the National Football League

than the PSI of a football.

And there's a great line

that I always kind of adhere to.

If you're explaining, you're losing.

So I never like going

"But, but, but, but, you know.

I ee-ehh!" You know.

Wrong. Answer wrong.

So I don't need to defend myself, man.

I've defended myself for a long time.

I said what I had to say multiple times

I didn't alter the ball in an way.

In front of a lot of different people

In court, in public.

I felt I had given them what they needed

to make the right decision, but, you know,

I feel like they had

their mind made up, so

There was nothing that I could do

my mom or dad could do.

Like, we couldn't protect him.

We couldn't

We couldn't rationalize it.

It didn't make sense.

You gotta know when to fight,

and you gotta ultimately know

when it's taking

too much out of you to fight.

I could see on the TV,

like, how he was just

It just was taking such a toll on him.

You know, and I realized

that I wasn't gonna win.

So it's hard to beat

31 billionaires in court.

And, you know, I thought

we gave it a great fight,

but in the end, you know,

just dealing with the results

of what a New York circuit judge

decided, you know,

I was decided to put that behind me

and then move on to the next year.

I think the hardest thing is Tommy

is such a amazing ambassador for football,

and I just think it was a huge injustice.

What's your first impression

when I say "that 2016 season"?

Oh.

That was a hard year.

That was a really hard year.

So, um

Just We had a lot going on with my mom

and Tommy.

I remember getting a call.

I don't remember exactly when,

but there were some concerns that she had

'cause she wasn't feeling great

for a period of time.

She was going in for a little checkup

where they found out she had breast cancer

and she also got myeloma.

The breast cancer,

she had to start

getting treatment right away.

I don't know. I don't think you ever

think about your parents,

who are invincible,

having to face, you know,

a potentially terminal disease.

I tried to remain poised

and said, "Mom, don't worry.

We're gonna get through it."

And then I automatically

Maybe it's a little bit of

a toughening up that I've had,

but maybe I'm not the most

empathetic or sympathetic.

I'm trying to solve it.

"Hey, Mom, come on.

This is what we gotta do.

You know, we got to send you

to this person, this person.

We're gonna fix this."

I think to see my mom

watch my brother

go through this experience,

feel for him and empathize with him.

There was a lot of pain during that time,

a lot of stress during that time,

and, you know, wanting

to protect her baby,

she probably internalized a lot of things.

I think my brother just said, "Enough.

Like, this is enough. It's just enough.

We're just gonna"

you know, "It's just enough."

Oof.

My parents are probably

the two most important people

in all of our lives.

They were very involved,

and my dad, you know,

he would always coach,

and my mom was always at home

when we'd come there after school.

We were literally

the friggin' Brady Bunch.

I mean, my mom and dad are just

They're just perfect together.

We sat down. We ate dinner as a family.

No television.

All right

Thanks again.

Each one of us knew

that we could go out and do whatever,

win, lose,

and their love never wavered.

They really believed in us.

Even when I didn't

really believe in myself,

they believed in me.

My dad would always say, like,

"I'm not gonna beat my child down."

You know, the world is there for that.

I'm just gonna support you and love you.

I think that's

what a parent is supposed to be.

♪♪

I think there was a degree

of all the back and forth

that took a toll on the emotions

of everybody in my family,

my extended family, my teammates,

and I think putting that behind us

was really important.

Knowing that I was gonna be

suspended for four games,

I was gonna use it as an opportunity

for me to find a little more balance

in some areas that I haven't had.

Brady ran a little bit

with the first team,

but for most of the day,

he was on the second field

with the second team.

How unusual was that

to see that all day today?

I was always the one that

was leading the first team reps

since I took over for Drew.

Now, they had talked to me a little bit,

said, hey, you know,

we're gonna prepare Jimmy.

We gotta get off to

a great start during the season.

He's gonna get some reps.

That was the first September

that I had off

since, uh, my eighth grade year,

so I didn't even know

what a September was like

without football.

I actually left the stadium.

I'm not playing in September.

We're already off

for the next couple days.

And I'm thinking I'd

really like to go to Costa Rica

to see my wife.

Get some rest, and then

take two or three days with her.

Jumped on a plane, flew

down to Costa Rica in August.

Again, a new experience.

I had never done that,

but it was really good

for our relationship.

Gisele is so wonderful for him.

She always is looking at, you know,

the positive side of everything, you know.

And she always says,

"Why is this happening for me?"

Not, "Why is this happening to me?"

You know, a very small gesture like that

allowed me to recognize

the things I need to do

in our relationship

to make sure that

she feels supported, too.

Because she supported me

for the previous year and a half.

She held me up when I was weak and angry

and sad and depressed,

and that was a really dark time.

It actually worked out

awesome for them.

He saw our family.

Like, I mean, we haven't

had a family holiday together

in, oh, my God, since he was at Michigan.

My mom was about ready

to start chemotherapy.

I think personally,

that was very difficult for her

to see her son kind of raked

through the coals like I was,

so we wanted to really support her,

and we all decided as a family,

we're all gonna go golf at Pebble Beach.

Imagine: kid from the Bay Area

who dreamed of being at Pebble Beach.

My dad took me late

in the 1980s just to watch.

It was really important

for my mom and dad to see him,

but I think it was probably

really important

to be there for my mom and dad

and, like, for him to be a son.

Like, you know, he's Tom Brady,

a football player,

but he's Tommy: son, father, brother.

One of the great highlights

of my life was on the 18th.

My wife was walking out

with my daughter Vivian.

I had my nieces and nephews

running up and down

the fairway on the 18th.

The Pacific Ocean's on the left.

Waves are crashing, and I was reflecting

and having some perspective

on the situation

and realizing that

this is what matters most,

and being with my family

at a very vulnerable time,

I was gonna do my best

to forget about football for a little bit

and catch up on some

other aspects of my life.

It's a big day

in the big house in Ann Arbor,

as BTN is here to check out

the Michigan Wolverines

as they host the Colorado Buffaloes.

They're happy they don't have to play

against Tom Brady,

who is out for the coin toss today.

I decided to take Jack with me to Michigan

because I wanted him to experience

all the incredible things

that I had seen when I was there, too.

And he was a young age

where he was becoming

more understanding

of what his surroundings were

and, you know, the kind

of things that his dad did

when I was younger, when I was in college.

Gosh, you know, that's the furthest

anyone went away from our family.

I'm silly.

It wasn't like we could be at,

you know, Michigan all the time

or check in on him.

He had to grow up.

You know, it was very challenging

to go from kind of the womb of my parents

and the protection

of San Mateo, California,

being the youngest of four

with three sisters who were protective

and being my dad's only son,

to leaving the nest and going to Michigan

and realizing, "Oh, man,

these guys are way tougher than me.

Come on, Brady, Griese. Hurry up.

I mean, obviously when

you're playing college sports,

you're so busy, so there's not

a lot of time, you know.

When we could get back

to Michigan, we'd watch.

And then of course, on TV,

and that's when I really

started to see him,

you know, like,

"Wow, he's a good quarterback."

I met my friend

who was my mentor, Greg Harden,

and he really challenged me to grow up.

And the point was

stop worrying about what

everyone else is doing.

Stop worrying about

what everyone else thinks.

Just do the best with what you got.

I think he was,

like, the fourth quarterback

on the depth chart when it started.

Kind of like the Patriots.

And he just worked his butt off, you know.

And he always knew he would get his shot.

It's Michigan on offense first

at the 25-yard line.

And that was a turning point in my life.

What do I have to do

to control my emotion?

What do I have to do

to control my performance?

Michigan wins in overtime!

Rather than

place blame on other people

for the way that things didn't go

the way I wanted in my life.

And I think Tommy carried that

throughout his entire career,

where it's like, no excuses.

Um, I think that's something

he always lives by.

If he's not happy with something,

you know, he will change it.

Tom Brady is our star star quarterback,

University of Michigan,

and we understand he's going to

have an outstanding performance.

Thank you, Tom.

Nah, because I'm gonna sack him.

- Oh, yes, yes.

- I'm gonna sack him.

Hey!

What do you say?

Mom, wait. He's tying me up.

And there they are. There they are.

There's the kids, in the mud already.

Aw, kids, kids, kids.

Because of his career,

he's not able to be

at a lot of Jack's functions.

It's just professional athletes.

You know, taking him to Michigan,

taking him to his old college

was very special.

You know, he had never

been to a college football game.

I had never been to

a college football game.

I threw him a touchdown pass

in the corner of the end zone,

and he really ate it up.

I mean, he just he loved it.

I got to talk to the team before the game,

got stand on the sideline.

Got to go out there for a coin toss.

Even though they were small moments,

you know, really brief,

they were really important to me,

and they really kept me going, too.

No Tom Brady.

As you know, suspended for four games.

Jimmy Garoppolo

will get the start tonight,

the first of his career,

and they're minus Rob Gronkowski

and some other key people.

So I watched the first game.

I was in the gym working out,

and the team was working out.

I felt like I wanted

to be working out, too.

I'm nervous, I'm pacing.

These are all my boys out there playing.

I'm kind of living

and dying with every play.

Up the middle

That season we had a lot

of the same backs coming back.

We had LeGarrette.

That's how you run, boy.

D-Lew was coming back off injury.

James White was starting

to really come into his own.

Defense was very good.

And I felt like

we upgraded our tight end room.

We upgraded our receiver room.

We drafted Malcolm Mitchell.

Catch made by Mitchell.

Gets away from the defender.

- To the 20.

- We got Chris Hogan.

Lobs it down the left side.

- Hogan wide open!

- And I remember

getting a call from Belichick.

About getting Martellus Bennett.

I had loved Martellus' game,

so we signed him.

The second game,

the Miami game, I worked out.

Can't play much better

than Jimmy Garoppolo has to this point.

Blount with a hurdle

and extra yardage.

And he got driven into the carpet.

Then the third game,

my wife and I went to Italy.

'Cause we never took

a honeymoon when we got married,

but we figured,

you know, we have this moment.

I woke up in the morning,

and I was just following

because I didn't have it.

I was just following on my phone.

Jacoby Brissett,

the rookie from North Carolina State,

is about to become

Went to the Amalfi Coast

and had probably one of the

best moments of our marriage.

Romantic experience,

obviously just us, the two of us,

but also, she was my workout partner.

They're working on Sunday.

I gotta work on Sunday, too.

We're throwing my big bag

of, like, resistance bands

and football equipment

over the top of this fence,

this little mini soccer field

and she's holding the rubber band rope

as I'm sprinting.

You know, talk about

someone who's supportive.

And the Patriots

have not been shut out at home

since November 28, 1993.

Ended up going back that Monday

after the team had lost to Buffalo

to start again, to start the season.

And I'm someone that is fiercely

competitive,

and if you're not with me,

you're against me.

And I realized that, okay,

this year I just play 12 games,

and I was gonna do the best

with the 12 I got.

And rather than whine

that I don't get to play all 16,

go, "You know what?

Let's use this as an advantage."

As if this dude,

who is clearly an ultra competitor,

who is a four-time

Super Bowl champion, okay,

who's been to six Super Bowls,

as if he needed additional motivation.

Coming off the suspension,

we headed to Cleveland,

and we played great, and we won,

but I knew that the real homecoming

would be week 6 at home

against Cincinnati.

This game was circled by Patriots fans.

The chance to welcome

Tom home after five weeks away

quickly became the toughest and

most expensive ticket in town.

I think everyone recognized,

"Aw, the big dog's still here."

Let's go!

First time home, sixth game of the year.

Here we are again, on to Cincinnati.

I wanted to play great, you know,

and our team wanted to play great.

Let's go, baby.

- I'm rooting for you, Tom.

- Let's go whup some.

I love you.

The support that we got for him

made the whole Deflategate enduring.

Without the fan support,

it would have been a lot harder.

They were so happy to have him back.

They were out for blood.

They were out for blood.

To be able to see him,

like, run on the field,

that's one of the things

that we love to do.

It's sort of silly, but to see

that, like, excitement still,

that love of the game,

I mean, it felt good.

It was like hell, yeah,

he's back, you know.

He's, you know, he's bent, not broken.

- Let's go, babe.

- Whoa!

- Let's go.

- Let's go.

I just remember the crowd

screaming "Brady, Brady,"

'cause I had so much support.

Number 12 back at quarterback.

I wanted to go represent

what I was all about,

and the way I could do that

was on the football field.

And that's how I chose to explain myself.

To the end zone.

I'm gonna show you guys, you know,

kind of what I've always shown you.

Just keep reminding you.

Brady's first home touchdown

of the 2016 season.

Brady!

Number one!

I'm liking the defense.

They were tired. Give me a little time.

Just use these in-cuts.

We just gotta keep working them.

- All right.

- They're there.

Tom takes the snap.

Firing for Gronkowski.

Low throw at the goal line. He caught it!

Touchdown, Patriots!

Home touchdown pass number two

for the big guy, number 12.

Look where that guy was.

I know, but what a throw by Tom.

It was just an unbelievable throw.

I think that's the mark

of a great football team

is to control what you can control.

And I can understand

why they didn't like us.

You don't want the team that wins.

You know, if we're gonna lose,

they gotta come beat us.

Went back to a homecoming game

against San Francisco,

and I remember running out

for pregame warmups,

and the whole crowd

was chanting "Brady, Brady."

And Chip Kelly ran by me, and he was like,

damn, there's more people here for you

than there are for the Niners.

When you win 201 games,

which no other quarterback has ever done,

I think our quarterback deserves

- Yes, indeed.

- Special.

We finished, I think, 14-2.

Got into the playoffs,

and we are ready to win.

Welcome to Foxborough's Gillette Stadium

and the AFC championship game.

On the field,

he's like a lion, you know.

He is the fiercest competitor.

With my folks and us,

he's very, you know, humble and sweet

and kind and loving.

And that season,

he was just always checking on my mom.

The thought of potentially,

like, not beating this,

you know, it wasn't an option.

At the same time,

to see her go through

such pain, losing her hair.

Football for me at that time

was like more of a distraction

from what my mom was going through.

You know, but that year was really hard

because we didn't go as much, you know.

'Cause my mom was sick

and my dad wouldn't go without my mom.

My mom was going through

chemo and radiation

over the course of the whole season,

and my dad was there

every step of the way.

I always call him every week.

"How's Mom doing?"

"She's really struggling today."

It's my sisters, fortunately,

that were there to support my mom and dad

at this time in their life

that they didn't know how to navigate.

I think my dad's probably missed one game,

one or two games in his whole life.

So he was with my mom,

and they would they always

watch, sit next to each other,

hold hands, you know.

They pray. They do their whole

little routine that they do.

You know, my dad

needed a lot of support, too,

It was very difficult for my dad

and very sad and hard to see your wife

go through something

as challenging as cancer, um,

but my mom was a trouper,

and I think she found strength

that she didn't know she had.

And I think my dad found strength

that he maybe didn't know that he had.

I mean, I know them

not being at his games that year

was really hard,

and I remember him telling me

that not to worry, we'll be

You'll come to the Super Bowl.

So just get through all your treatments.

The one thing I know about,

when Tommy says something,

you believe him.

And so probably for my mom,

like, that was what she needed to hear.

They stayed so strong for us kids,

and we tried to stay strong for them.

I tried to be there

while I could for my parents,

and always said, "Mom,

I'm gonna get you to Houston," you know.

"I'm gonna get you there."

16-2 now going into

the Super Bowl at Houston

against a really great

Atlanta football team.

Who would have ever known

that would go down

as the greatest Super Bowl ever played?

Tommy believes

in his team every year.

We always say, you know,

after spring training,

"What do you think?"

"Oh, we're gonna be good.

We are going to the Super Bowl."

I think we all

kind of felt the same thing.

I think when he was saying that,

it was like we believed it

and this is gonna be the payback

and he's probably gonna win.

It's the Brady/Belichick factor,

and then add extra motivation to it.

You like the chip on his shoulder?

The chip, the suspension,

the Deflategate thing,

and then his mom, man,

to win this in front of her, I just

We still weren't sure whether my mom

was gonna make it to Houston,

even as we got into Super Bowl week.

She wanted to come, but she just

didn't have a lot of strength.

Just finished my last chemo,

and just wanted to thank you

for all your love and support,

and I couldn't have done it

without my family.

And I love you all, so

She needs this partner in crime.

Me, too. We'll see what happens next.

She's gonna be great.

You know, I think, on about

Tuesday or Wednesday,

she made the decision that she's coming.

You know, she wasn't gonna

miss out on that game.

You know, it's a lot of tears of joy

saying, "Mom, I told you.

We're gonna get here for you."

Put whatever odds you want against us.

Like, we're still here, you know.

And I think it was running parallel

to, like, everything my mom

was going through, you know.

We're still here.

And it just felt like,

you know, it's not done yet.

The three-time Super Bowl MVP,

Tom Brady tonight,

playing in his seventh Super Bowl,

the most of any player

in Super Bowl history.

I was pretty poised.

We were going against

a really good football team.

Their offense was unstoppable.

They had, you know,

Matt was an MVP that year.

Devonta Freeman, Tevin Coleman.

They had a rookie, Austin Hooper,

who was really good,

damn good offensive line.

Julio, Sanu, Gabriel.

So they were gonna score points.

Hey, get 'em ready, Tom. Get 'em going.

The first part of the game

was they were just fast.

They were fast on defense.

You just didn't understand

that their linebackers ran 4.4, 4.5.

Their safeties ran 4.4.

Couldn't get away from them, you know.

The rush was on us.

Whoo! Whoo!

Break his man!

Break him in the.

We're trying to pound the ball.

We finally got a little momentum

in the run game,

and then Deion Jones made a hell of a play

stripping LeGarrette as we were

getting into their territory.

Blount is tackled

and the ball pops out

and Atlanta's recovered.

Yeah!

And, uh, you know, they got the ball.

Do our job now.

Hey, we're gonna come back, LG.

At that point, it was, like,

not the way you want to start the game.

New England turns it over

on the LeGarrette Blount fumble.

No score in the second period

here at Super Bowl LI.

I'm gonna trust you on that, though.

They'll hand it to Freeman inside.

Devonta starts out.

Wide left. He'll score standing

into the end zone.

He took a big leap,

and Atlanta has grabbed

the lead in Super Bowl LI.

♪♪

He caught it! Touchdown, Atlanta.

And Matt Ryan absolutely shot

a laser in there to the rookie.

Atta way! Let's go!

It was like, are you kidding me?

After everything we went through,

like, are you kidding me? Please, please.

Let's go make 'em pay, fellas.

Let's go make 'em pay.

Third down and six.

Brady in the g*n, takes the snap.

Four man rush. He's pressured.

He throws down the middle.

Pass is picked off.

It's coming back to the right.

Alford on the run to the 40.

Galloping to the 40 of New England.

Goodbye.

Robert Alford makes a hell of a play.

He felt it, and he just jumped the route.

And I, just as I let it go,

literally as it was leaving my fingertips,

I was like, "Oh."

So I took off running for him.

I dove. I didn't have

any chance of getting him.

Um, he was out of my grasp.

And, uh, you know, you look up

and you see this dude

running the other way,

and you're like, ", man.

If we lose this game, you know,

that's gonna be the play."

You know, that's the play

I'll be thinking about

for the rest of my career.

And I remember sitting on the bench,

like

Pick six in the Super Bowl?

Man, that's just that's losing football.

Right from the beginning,

right, of that game,

we just kinda we're losing.

We kept feeling

lower and lower, you know.

Like, oh, God.

Like we gotta get something rolling.

Hey, it's Tom Brady, though, man.

I know, I know. I'm never comfortable.

We about to put up

40 something on their.

What I'm saying, they never

seen anything like this.

Hey, let's go, boys. You're all right.

A lot of football.

If you look at the first half,

it's not like we weren't

moving the ball, you know.

We moved the ball.

We just didn't do anything with it

once we got in the scoring zone.

We crossed the 50,

and we had no production.

I don't know how many times

we crossed the 50.

It might have been

two or three or four times

with zero points.

Come on!

Let's go!

And we finally, right before half,

kicked the field goal.

But we went in at halftime,

and we were like, look,

all this sh*t we got is still good.

Like, you look at that call sheet,

this is all gonna still work.

And so at halftime,

we're just kind of sitting there.

We're were not really enjoying

the whole halftime show.

I remember my kids looking at me,

and they're, like, I just want to go home.

Like, I just wanna go home.

It's gonna be a tale of two halves.

There it is.

Completely different half this half.

Coach Belichick said,

"Fellas, 21 points

is not gonna be enough to beat us today."

Let's go, baby.

- Gonna be a hell of a story.

- Hell, yeah.

Do you believe we're gonna win?

- Yes, I do.

- Let's just play our best half.

I don't want anybody to do

anything that you can't do.

Don't try to make it all up in one play.

- Just play each play by itself, okay?

- Yup.

Come on, boys. Let's see what we got now.

Let's see what we got.

I think that we started saying, "Listen,

all we gotta do is, like, score, you know.

If we score in the first drive,

we're back in it.

Got out there. We got the ball.

We had a really great field position.

Had a chance to hit a third down pass.

Julian and I didn't connect.

Maybe we had a chance

to get it if he caught it.

Kicked it to them and, psshh.

It's a touchdown, it's a touchdown,

it's a touchdown!

28-3, man,

and I was like

We need a lot of to go right now.

28-3, man.

Coach said 21 points ain't

gonna be enough to beat us.

28 points might be enough

to beat us today.

And I remember looking down the row,

and everybody was just,

like, totally defeated.

You know, like, "Oh, my God, it's 28-3."

Are we gonna get blown out?

Like, we're getting embarrassed.

It just felt like

the Atlanta fans were so loud.

Atlanta! Dirty bird!

Oh, my God, you know.

Where are the Patriots fans?

You're not thinking about

winning the game at that point.

You're thinking about

how do we not embarrass

ourselves at this point?

It's a different mentality.

We gotta score, man.

Like, we gotta,

we gotta be proud of the fight.

Come on, boys. Let's go now.

We gotta lock in now. Laser focus.

You know, and we had been in situations

where we had been down.

Now, we'd never been down that much.

You know, usually you're down

ten in the Super Bowl,

it's tough to overcome.

We're down 25

with three minutes left

in the third quarter.

Start playing tougher.

Harder, tougher, everything.

Everything we got.

I just kept saying

And it's easier said than done

But we just gotta get one score.

Like, let's maintain our poise,

maintain our execution,

do our jobs,

and we'll score. We'll score.

And it's a 15-yard scamper

right up the gut for a 39-year-old man.

Yeah, we're down 21-3 at half,

but, yeah, we had an advantage

'cause we ran a lot of plays

and we felt like they were

gonna be pretty gassed.

We're gonna put you right back in.

We're gonna put you I know that.

It's a long game

from the beginning of warmup.

It's a long first half,

then there's a long halftime.

It's a long day indoors, in a dome.

You're gonna overheat.

Let's go make something, you know.

Let's make it happen.

And the way we're gonna do it

is by scoring once.

That is across the goal line!

Touchdown, Patriots.

There's one, and maybe, just maybe

Let's go, let's go.

And I was like, great.

That's what we needed.

Good job.

That's how it starts right there.

All you need is one.

Well, we got the first touchdown,

and we were, like, thank God.

We got a touchdown.

We're not gonna just, you know,

bow down and tap out.

That's what the I'm talkin' about!

I feel like the way he

handled the situation that year,

he taught my kids

you're always in charge

of how you respond.

You know, if you're gonna compete,

you're gonna have to be able to take on

what everybody else is gonna say to you.

Hey, let's go now. Gotta answer.

Gotta answer. Gotta answer.

It is all Atlanta to this point.

Falcons 28. The Patriots 9.

Come on, TB12!

We know it's a long shot, but it.

Let's we got nothing to lose.

Like, we're already down.

Brady looks to the right again.

Now will be sacked.

Oh, my goodness!

Nice job!

Call it again, guys. Call it again.

Brady, flushed, sacked again.

Grady Jarrett has done it!

Two sacks in the drive!

Then we kicked a field goal.

Now it's 28-12.

A lot of needs to go right,

but it's a two-score game.

So with 9:44 to go in the fourth quarter,

the Falcons 28 and the Patriots 12.

Need a turnover, D.

We got plenty of time.

We just gotta score

a touchdown, bro.

All right, we need a play.

My man Hightower blasts Matt Ryan.

Knocks the ball, Alan Branch picks it up,

and we're like

Yeah!

We're in business.

When he friggin' nailed that guy,

it was like, oh, my God,

we're coming back.

The whole energy in our

I mean, at least

in our entire family, shifted.

I just don't ever count Tommy out.

Everybody knows Tommy

as the football player,

but he's so much more than that.

Just to watch him grow

and be humble with all his success and

Touchdown, Patriots!

He's one of the luckiest

people in the world, you know,

to be doing something

that he loves so much.

Pats will go for two,

5:56 to go here in the fourth.

Brady realigns, Edelman in short motion.

Direct snap to James White!

And we got the two-point

conversion to James White.

Yeah! Yeah!

Let's go. Let's go.

And it's a one-score game.

Hey, who's surprised they're making a run?

I mean, it's really amazing how

the line played in that game.

Knowing, down 28-3,

there's only one thing

they're doing at that point:

rushing the passer.

And I still had time to throw.

Hey, this could get interesting.

Yeah, it could.

Hey, it's gonna stop.

Let's go.

Falcons 28, Patriots 20.

Now we gotta go take

advantage of our opportunity

and tie this game up.

And now Atlanta's offense

has gotta answer.

Matt out the back door.

Freeman wide open

and out to the 48 yard line.

There they go.

And now they start crossing the 50.

Max snaps it to him.

New England trying to get there.

Matt throws one of

the most incredible ba*ls.

Julio makes one of the most

incredible catches

on our sideline.

He made the catch!

Unbelievable!

I just shook my head.

It was a game of inches.

That will live

in Super Bowl history right there.

And we had now

a lot of plays in that game.

At that point,

they were in field goal range,

and they had a great kicker, Matt Bryant.

New England trying to get there.

Matt flushed to the pocket,

and he'll take a sack.

And they start going backward.

The holding play, there was a sack,

a negative run.

All those things knocked them

out of field position.

- We got Tom Brady.

- We got Tom Brady.

He the greatest of all time, bro.

Hands down, bro. Like, hands down.

And let this quarterback

get the surgical knife out, and let's go.

We had two-plus minutes

to go down and score to tie the game up

if we got the two-point conversion.

I think the first down was incomplete.

Second down, I took that hit.

Brady slow to get up.

And the ref came up.

He said, "Tom, are you okay?"

And I said, "Yeah, I'm good, I'm good."

I took a good clean hit, you know,

I wanted to fight through it.

No one was taking me out of the Super Bowl

with three minutes left in the game.

I would say from that point on,

it was basically autopilot.

At the end of the day,

he's still my little brother.

That doesn't change.

That feeling doesn't change.

When I watch him, you know,

playing even today,

it's, like, it's the same feeling I had

when he was playing on Portola Drive.

♪♪

The clock stopped at 2:28.

Shotgun snap to Brady.

Stands in, throws

down the middle for Edelman.

Ball's tipped.

I caught it. I caught it.

Oh, my God. We like, it was just

Did he catch that?

- Did he make the catch?

- He's got it!

- He did!

- You gotta be kidding me!

At the 40!

Barely, right?

A couple fingers on the bottom.

The ball never hits the ground.

I mean, that was unbelievable.

And so many other times with the Giants,

I mean, we were one catch away

from winning those Super Bowls.

It just tells you how amazing

the body is, too, you know.

A lot of muscle memory kicks in.

A lot of subconscious thought.

Amendola plucks it at the 25.

And we were going

against an opponent

that played a great game.

They didn't play bad, you know.

Matt Ryan may have had

a perfect quarterback rating.

Touchdown, Patriots!

I mean, if you were to say

that the league MVP's

basically gonna have

a perfect quarterback rating,

I'm gonna throw a pick six,

and we're somehow gonna

find a way to win that game?

I mean, no one would believe that.

That's almost impossible.

57 seconds to go.

A two for the tie.

Well, it comes down to this.

Reaches across

the goal line for a score!

It's a tie game in Super Bowl LI.

Yeah! Yeah!

Don't ever count Tom Brady out.

It's the best I've seen,

and put on a show here.

From the suspension standpoint,

once that was over, that was over.

That was in the past for me.

You know, I wasn't gonna dwell on that.

It was an F-E-A year.

There was a lot of support from my wife,

a lot of support from my kids,

a lot of support from my family.

But it was a mutual unconditional support

for my parents,

what they were going through.

Let's go score and win this thing, baby.

For your mom.

For your mom, bro.

You know, my parents

taught us a lot of lessons,

but they lived it,

you know, and we're living it.

We're trying to watch their example

and how they treat one another

and how they treated us

and how they prioritize.

That's truly what life

is all about, and even sports.

It's learning things,

but it's living things.

F-E-A, man. 'em all, man.

They ain't cheering for you anyway,

so you may as well go out there and win.

'Cause, you know, we're not

gonna go try to please everybody

and get everyone to like us

by losing, you know, that's

that. We're not doing that.

We're gonna, you know,

we're gonna 'em all.

Overtime. 28-28.

Two yards from

a fifth Super Bowl championship.

♪♪

Driving forward!

Diving to the goal line!

- It's good!

- A touchdown!

And a title for the Patriots!

I can't believe it.

They have completed

the greatest comeback

in Super Bowl history,

led by the greatest quarterback

in Super Bowl and NFL annals.

- Oh, my God!

- I love you guys.

That's something for me to remember

for the rest of my life.

If there's one game that signifies

what our team was always about, it's

You are the greatest!

Super Bowl LI.

What'd I say at halftime?

It's gonna be a hell of a story.

I love you, bro.

We are so proud of him!

We were walking to Tommy.

He was looking for us.

He was crying, and we just hug,

and he just says, you know, "I love you."

For Tommy, we couldn't have asked

for anything more than that.

You know, that year

had its challenging aspects of it,

and the way that it culminated

with us all being together

after the game with my mom,

just, you know, giving her a big hug.

And my dad, and everyone was crying,

and it was just a really emotional time.

And we won the game,

but my mom won, too,

and my family won, too.

I've never met anyone

like my brother.

I think he lives his life

to really be the best at something.

He is 100,000% committed

to being better

than he was the day before,

and I just don't know

that you meet many people like that.

But at the end of the day,

it was his family,

I think, that has gotten him through,

you know, some of those really

difficult chapters of his life.

This is my life. This is my real life.

This is not I'm not playing a role.

I'm not an actor, I'm a I'm an athlete.

And I found a way to persevere

with some discipline,

um, some determination,

and through having a lot

of support by incredible people.

We are so happy for Tommy.

You know, just to be able

to say, hey, you know what?

I'm not what you said I was.

And, um, I mean, I feel like

he proved to everybody

that, you know, who he is

and what he stands for.

I just think he's a class act

in the way he handled it.

The inspiration

comes from a lot of people

that look up to me.

No cameras allowed. No cameras allowed.

And knowing that I have more left.

I get to put my best out there

doing what I love the most.

And I don't think you ask,

you know, Bruce Springsteen,

"Hey, you had enough?"

Like, you know, Monet or Picasso.

"You're good, man."

Or U2, "Oh, you're okay."

Or Tom Hanks: "Why you still acting?"

I think that that was a great lesson

for the kids in our family.

It's not what you planned, you know,

and it might not even be the truth

because life is tough

and things aren't always fair

and things don't always go

the way that you think they're gonna go.

And then you always have to find,

you know, the lesson in it.

Why is this happening for me?

And it's always

what you do after the fact.

I didn't want to,

you know, ride off to the sunset

knowing that I had a lot left to prove,

a lot left to prove to me.

When I say "prove,"

I don't need to prove

through wins and losses.

I want to prove that I could still play

at a championship level, you know.

That's what I want to do.

When I know that I can't do that anymore,

that's where I'm gonna hang 'em up.

But I wasn't there yet.

I get text messages

all the time, you know,

and I'll send messages

when I see a lot

of other athletes compete.

"Great win, man. Great job."

And then the text back is,

"Man, that was hard."

And I'll say, yep. They all are hard.

They're all hard,

and you wouldn't want to do it

if it wasn't hard.

You're damn right it's hard,

'cause that's how sports

are supposed to be.

When you reach the top

of the mountain in sports,

it's hard.