For those who boycott King but are still curious .. here some quotes:
(I suggest reading the article bc no matter what you think of the author its a great read)
“I’d like to play until my mid-forties,” Brady told King. “Then I’ll make a decision. If I’m still feeling like I’m feeling today, who knows? Now those things can always change. You do need long-term goals too. I know next year is not going to be my last year.”
“Other than playing football,” Brady said, “the other thing I love to do is prepare to play football. I've worked hard to get a system in place that really works for me and I know could work for everybody else if they just did it. That enables me to play 99 plays [in Super Bowl 51, the most of his career in one game] as a 39-year-old in the last game of the season … Football to me is more than just a sport. It has become my life. Every choice that I make … what I have for breakfast, how I work out, all of those things. I love the game. I love playing.”
__
He held his arm out, flexed, and I felt the underside of his forearm, and it was not a rock. It was pliable. That’s the way he wants it. He doesn’t want to have solid muscles; he wants them to be flexible and malleable, but strong.
“Strength is very important to your job,” Brady said. “But how much strength do you need? You only need the strength to withstand the hits and throw the ball and make your movements of being a quarterback. You need conditioning because you need to be able to do that over a period of time, certainly a season. You need muscle pliability—long, soft muscles in order to be durable.“
How do you work on durability? That’s what I’ve figured out. I know how to be durable. It’s hard for me to get hurt, knock on wood. Anything can happen in football. But I want to put myself in a position to be able to withstand the car crash before I get in the car crash. I don't want to go in there and say, ‘Oh God, I know this muscle is really tight and ready to go, let’s see if it can hold up to someone falling on me who is 300 pounds.’ Then someone lands on you, and a rotator cuff tears. I could have told you that was probably going to happen. It’s going to be really hard for me to have a muscle injury, based off the health of my muscle tissue and the way that I try to take care of it.“
“There's a lot of kids that look up to me. I want to be able to show them a different way, the way I learned. I can be an ambassador to play this great sport of football, a contact sport, but also how to take care of yourself ... It’s about making the right choices. It’s not more effort. Everyone puts in effort. Everyone wants to do the right thing, they just don’t know what it is. I want to be the person that proves to other people: this is the right thing. This is going to be the norm in 10 years. I actually think it's going to make for a more competitive game, when you have so many players that are so healthy for long periods of times.“
__
“... I can enjoy other experiences with my friends that don't have to happen at 1 a.m. I can have my friends at a Super Bowl game as a 39-year-old. That's a pretty amazing feeling. So it doesn't ever feel like a sacrifice to me … That's making lifestyle choices that support dreams and goals that I have. Football is a job, but it’s never felt like a job for me.”
“I have the answers to the test now. … “You can’t surprise me on defense. I’ve seen it all. I’ve processed 261 games, I’ve played them all. It’s an incredibly hard sport, but because the processes are right and are in place, for anyone with experience in their job, it’s not as hard as it used to be. There was a time when quarterbacking was really hard for me because you didn’t know what to do. Now I really know what to do, I don’t want to stop now. This is when it’s really enjoyable to go out.”
That’s great news for Patriots fans, though Brady said it’s “impossible” to know if he’ll stay in New England for his entire career. “I don’t ever want to play for another coach,” Brady said. “I don’t want to play for another owner. But this is professional sports. I’ve seen some of the best players I’ve ever played with on other teams. I’ve seen Jerry Rice play for the Raiders, Joe Montana play for the Chiefs, Brett Favre play for a lot of teams. You never know. That’s why I want to keep taking care of what I need to take care of. That’s what it comes down to. I want to take care of Tom Brady. I want to make sure Tom is available to the team, Tom is playing at a high level, so the team wants to keep him.”
___
“When you play professional sports there’s a choice that you're going to be … you subject yourself to a lot of criticism. After 17 years in the NFL, there’s a lot of criticism. I started experiencing that in college. College wasn’t an easy go for me … But I guess the point is, when you subject yourself to a lot of criticism, what I’ve learned from myself is, I don't want to give my power away to other people by letting my own emotions be subjected to what their thoughts or opinions are. So if someone calls me something, that’s their problem. It’s not my problem. I’m not going to give away my power.
But this was someone taking you off the field for a month. And you responded in a placid way, not a fighting way.
“Well,” he said, “what’s the best way to fight? There’s only one fight I can win and that is how well I play. That’s the only one I can control, because I tried to play for 18 months and it didn’t work. So finally I said … ‘My team is going to go out and play great, I know they are going to, and when I come back, I am just going to do what I’ve always done.’
___
“I have so much respect for Coach Belichick because I think there are two things that he wants in his players because there are two things that he gives us as a coach, and that is consistency and dependability. He is the most consistent coach that I could ever imagine playing for. Every day is the same. … He comes in and says, ‘We are going to put you guys in the position to win and you guys gotta go do it. Don’t count on the crowd, don’t count on the refs. Don’t make excuses, just do it. Just get the job done … And when you come to the team you buy in because it works and it is the truth.”
