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Tom Brady is again in a conference championship game. In a vacuum, this statement is nothing new. After all, he’s now crossed the Super Bowl threshold 14 times in his career, which is by far the most of all time. What is different, however, is the team he will take with him as he tries to reach the big game. Instead of being the New England Patriots, the club he won six Super Bowls with in his two-decade career, Brady takes the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to the conference title game in his first season with the club.
Besides the different jersey, Brady’s first season in Tampa has apparently been a night and day experience in another respect: coaching. It’s not hard to spot the differences between Bill Belichick, who takes a more militaristic approach, and Bruce Arians, who takes a more laid-back style. While the two coaching techniques produced similar results with Brady at the helm, the Arians highlighted how he unlocked an aspect of Brady’s game that was largely capped at Foxborough.
“An accomplished leader,” Arians told NBC Sports’ Peter King of Brady. “It’s been all year. I seem like the confidence that permeates our team every day. I allow him to be himself. Like, New England didn’t allow him to coach. I allow him to practice. I just sometimes sit and watch. “
Buccaneers linebacker Devin White also praised Brady’s ability to coach the rest of his team.
“What I love about Tom is that he still teaches,” White said. “Teach me how to be a great leader. Every day, at every training, he puts the team before him. The first few days he’s in the locker room we’re all like, ‘We’re in the locker room with the best quarterback ever! Like, I wanna talk to him, I wanna take a picture with him. But then, it’s your teammate. You are here for a reason.
“A few weeks ago I was a little upset that I didn’t do the Pro Bowl. He’s like, ‘D, there’s a bigger bowl I’m chasing. We’re all chasing him. Come on.’ I just thought, man, it’s a blessing to hear that. I need to hear that. This stuff is about us. He’s still chasing those bowls in his forties. I’m so grateful that I can spend that time with him. “
This ability to have a bigger voice within the Bucs organization was perhaps one of the most appealing aspects for Brady leaving the Patriots last offseason. It’s probably a lot easier for him to use his aura of being the greatest of all time on a whole new team that includes a coach more receptive to Arians than the situation he had in New England. After all, trying to train the way Arians has highlighted can be a difficult path to join with Belichick, especially after spending decades going through a certain routine.
Whichever way you prefer it, however, you can’t dispute the results as Brady regularly had his Patriots in contention and now has the Bucs firmly in the Super Bowl conversation. He will now try to reach the Super Bowl for the 10th time in his career when his Buccaneers travel to Lambeau Field to face the Packers on Sunday.
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