Tom Brady’s NFL broadcast debut is right around the corner, with the Patriots Hall of Famer set to call the Week 1 matchup between the Browns and the Cowboys on Sept. 8 alongside Kevin Burkhardt. And while football fans will have to wait 80 more days to hear the new leading duo break down plays, they got a sneak peak into what to expect from the ‘GOAT’ this fall.
The six-time Super Bowl champ joined Fox’s Colin Cowherd on “The Herd” Wednesday, discussing everything from quarterback development to how he’s preparing for his next major career move.
Here are four takeaways from Brady’s sit-down interview.
He sees a lot of room for improvement.
After months of practice in the studio, Brady joined Curt Menefee and Joel Klatt in the booth for the UFL championship game Sunday. The broadcast rookie, ever the perfectionist, graded his performance carefully.
“There’s still so much more room for improvement. Almost like when I was a player, I never felt like I did things the right way,” Brady said. “There were games when I’d go in afterwards and think ‘God, I’m the worst quarterback in the NFL, why would they even want me to play quarterback for this team?’ and I’m sure I’m going to feel that way here at Fox.”
But, like football, broadcasting is a team sport. So while Brady navigates the drastic leap from athlete to analyst, he’s learning to lean into his old pre-game habits.
“I think for me, so much of this is going to come down to the preparation. Did I feel like I was prepared? Did I feel like our crew was prepared? Did I give them the best over the course of the week so that we could give ourselves the best opportunity to be successful for the fans? The game is the show. We’re there to add our take on it and our analysis.”
He’s critical of today’s quarterbacks.
Sure, two of Brady’s strengths as a player were his elite accuracy and reliable arm. But what arguably set him apart the most from other quarterbacks was his ability to delineate a defense’s strengths and weaknesses.
That skill, however, was coached into Brady. Now, he believes it’s the key to developing young NFL quarterbacks.
“The ability to develop that player to give him the tools, so when he gets to the line of scrimmage and he sees: blitz. He thinks, ‘Okay if they’re blitzing me, these are the two protections I can use when they blitz, these are the two or three routes I can signal to my receivers that can beat the blitz.’
“There was always a reason why I did something,” Brady said. “Everything was intentional. There wasn’t a time, I would hope, that I would have ever snapped the ball into a bad defense.”
During the interview, Brady mentioned that he thinks there are only about six truly excellent NFL quarterbacks in the league at any given time.
Everything revolves around No. 1 wide receivers.
Randy Moss caught 39 touchdown passes from Brady during his three seasons in New England, the most by any wide receiver to ever play with Brady.
And while Moss complemented Brady with spectacular plays, the former quarterback admitted that he felt a responsibility to involve his top receivers in games right away.
“You always felt like you had to do something to get them the ball,” Brady said.
Targeting players like Moss, however, didn’t feel like an obligation. Instead, Brady saw it as a way to ignite energy amongst the offense.
“I wanna see the best players touch the ball early, so they can break a sweat, so they can get into the flow of the game,” he added. “The last thing you want is your number one receiver go two and a half quarters into a game and not see a ball, to get one target. Because he’s gonna get discouraged.”
Julian Edelman’s stories are true… mostly
Julian Edelman has become quite the media personality since his retirement in 2021, even appearing as a guest on “The Herd” alongside Cowherd.
At Netflix’s “The Roast of Tom Brady” in May, Edelman brought the house down with a set of humorous and highly-censored stories about his former quarterback. Many of the jokes were so LOL-worthy, that Cowherd himself wondered if they were true.
“They’re mostly true, often embellished,” Brady said. “That’s part of Julian. Julian has become a great storyteller.”
Touching on Edelman’s success from his podcast “Games with Names,” Brady complimented his ex-teammate’s work-ethic. Like Brady, the former wide receiver is always prepared. In fact, he spent months rigorously preparing for his the Netflix roast.
“No one is gonna out-work Julian. He’s gonna put the time in, he’s gonna try to suck up all the information he can from people to use it, and he’s got a great personality,” Brady said.