Tom Brady "Officially" Retires from the NFL

After 22 seasons Tom Brady is calling it a career. 

The former New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback, winner of seven Super Bowl titles and three MVPs, officially retired on Tuesday. 

The announcement of course comes off the heels of Saturday's messy breaking news by ESPN that claimed Brady was in fact retiring, only to have that story denied by the Buccaneers and members of Brady's inner circle, who said the quarterback hadn't yet decided. 

On Monday, Brady said on his "Let's Go" podcast that he had not yet made up him mind on playing a 23rd season. 

Those sentiments quickly changed on Tuesday morning when Brady took to social media and wrote a heartfelt nine-part good bye letter to the sport he dominated for over two decades. 

Ironically that heartfelt good bye never even mentions the New England Patriots, owner Bob Kraft nor Head Coach Bill Belichick, leading many to speculate that Brady still harbors ill feelings to the way his exit transpired in New England. 

Brady thanks the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, General Manager Jason Licht, Bruce Arians, his agents Don Yee and Steve Dobin, and his personal trainer, Alex Guerrero, whom Belichick didn't approve of during the later stages of Brady's time in New England.  

Brady's unheralded career which began as a 6th round draft choice of the Patriots in 2000, became the story of legend. As we all know it began when Jets linebacker Mo Lews TKO'd Drew Bledsoe on a hit so vicious there were fears that Bledsoe could have died. 

Brady eventually came into that game against the Jets, falling short of leading a game-tying drive. That was only the beginning. Brady would get the start the following week for an 0-2 New England team, and would beat his career nemisis Peyton Manning and the Colts in his first professional start. That was the beginning of the rest of the story.
 

We all know the rest. The Patriots would win the AFC East, beat the Raiders in the Tuck Rule Game, and eventually beat the then-St. Louis Rams in the Super Bowl. It was the first of six with New England. 

Through it all, Brady and the Patriots dominated the sport. He had a great rivalry with Manning that spanned 17 match-ups between the Patriots and Colts, and, later, the Patriots and Broncos. Both quarterbacks won their fair share of battles, especially in the playoffs. 

We saw Brady at the height of his powers in 2007 when he took the Patriots to 18-0 and Super Bowl XLII, only to lose to Eli Manning and the Giants in the Big Game. It was one of two Super Bowl losses to the Giants that Brady would suffer in his career. The Giants would get the better of the Pats again in Super Bowl XLVI in 2012. 

We saw Brady involved in various New England-created controversies: Spygate and Deflate-gate. 

Deflate-gate was a controversy of Brady's own making. He asked for the balls against the Indianapolis Colts in the 2012 AFC Championship Game be deflated. The Colts found out about it, wanted it investigated. It didn't make that much of a difference, considering New England trounced the Colts in that game. Still the dye was cast, Brady, like Bill Belichick during Spygate was perceived a cheater. 

Brady's biggest comeback in a Super Bowl came in Super Bowl LI, when he led New England back from a 28-3 deficit to the Atlanta Falcons, only to tie it at 28, force overtime, and beat the Falcons 34-28, sparking years of memes that the Falcons have never lived down. 

Brady's final Super Bowl triumph with Patriots came two years later in 2018 when he beat the Rams again, now known as the LA Rams, 13-3 in a defensive slugfest. 

After a acrimonious ending to his time in New England, one mostly defined by Belichick's desire to move on from the aging Brady, he decided to sign with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during the winter of 2020. 

Upon joining the Bucs, Brady reveled in the much more relaxed atmosphere of Bruce Arians Bucs camps, compared to the strict, boot-camp like atmosphere created by Belichick up in New England. He even had his Patriots buddy Rob Gronkowski join him. The Bucs went on to win Super Bowl LV last winter, Brady's seventh and final title. 

After all those seasons, all the victories (especially against the Jets, Dolphins and Bills), controversies, Super Bowl titles and so much in between, Brady finally hangs em up. 

No matter how you feel about Brady, one thing is for certain, we will never see the likes of him again, ever.