Fans who were alive to watch Brady get drafted and do everything he did for the patriots beginning to end, what was it like?
Fans who were alive to watch Brady get drafted and do everything he did for the patriots beginning to end, what was it like?
50 comments
It was pretty sweet, I remember watching the AFCCG at Pittsburgh in 01. Granted I was like 10 but it was awesome
Incredible
That was awesome.
No one remembers him being drafted. No one was focused on him because we had Bledsoe (who is criminally underrated by most of the fan base). Brady came out of nowhere and it was great.
I remember We already had our guy
I thought Bledsoe would take us very far.
After two seasons of Brady I never looked back
The problem was that I got so used to winning. lol
My Dads a falcons fan
My brother a Seahawks fan
Ha ha ha
Best years of my life
We got the Sox, Bruins and Celtics all winning g I between as well
My first legit pats memory is 07 Super Bowl run. The Seahawks Super Bowl was while I was in high school. I will never forget where I watched it, who I was with, running in the snow in just boxers after
The first thing to realize is how much Drew Bledsoe was the man at the time…anyone who tells you they knew Brady before that playoff game is lying…he really came out of nowhere.
Honestly…you only got how amazing it was near the end. He was a great manager early on who developed into the GOAT. 07-11 was the downfield years, but near the end he was the total package who could face any situation and dominate. Favorite feeling ever was beating KC in arrowhead that last run…
So many back to back years of sustained greatness that you ALMOST took it for granted. Almost. The only Super Bowl I expected them to lose in the Brady era was the first one.
It was a blast.
2008 was a wild year though with people wanting to keep Cassel over Tom. I know you are out there still. People don’t forget
Chat is this AI? If so boo
fun
A month before the ’01 opener Bledsoe blew off an autograph event at the last minute. I waited in line for hours, I had every Bledsoe card printed at the time. I was devastated. I decided I would never watch another Patriots game while he was the QB.
Little 10 year old me was about to go on a ride, and it was fucking glorious.
My fandom started in the Bledsoe years. I had become accustomed to getting close but losing in the end. It completely changed everything. Not to mention the Red Sox, Bruins and Celtics all had championships during that stretch. City of Champions!
It was pure magic
I was a big Bledsoe fan as a kid, had the trading card and jersey and pictures on my wall. I was upset at the time when he got hurt, but that quickly morphed into one of the greatest runs in the history of professional sports. We, as fans, were absolutely spoiled to have Tom for as long as we did.
Euphoria. Every week was must watch and you went in expecting to win every game.
Surreal. I was a junior in highschool in 2001. I went through just enough heartache in the 90s so that I could really appreciate the insane success that flowed after that first SB win.
I remember when he got drafted (big draft nerd) and being pissed that they took a quarterback when we already had Bledsoe, Bishop and someone else. It was basically “who the fuck is Tom Brady”
Words can’t describe it.
Every year, we had a chance. Back to back losses was unhead of… for DECADES. I remember crying in attendance of the 2008 Home Opener because Brady went down, and for the first time I had a taste of doubt heading into the season.
They used to play “Meet the new Boss, same as the old Boss” after wins at Gillette, followed by “Glory Days” and boy oh boy were they ever.
It was a sense of comfort and confidence that carried you through your entire year. Something you could permanently count on. It made sports a lifestyle, not for fare weather. It created titletown, which is unanimously.. Boston.
it was the fucking best
I was 8 when we won our first SB. I knew nothing but winning until I was an adult and buying a house. It was nice but I’m honestly more invested now than I was when we were winning all the time.
Back then when I turned the game on I KNEW we were gonna win so it took some of the fun out of it. Now I hope we win and am more invested play to play, game to game
It was epic.
I distinctly remember Bledsoe getting hurt and Brady being put in and my reaction was “who the fuck is Tom Brady?”
I remember Belichick keeping him the starter when Bledsoe was ready to return. Brady earned the starting spot and the rest was history.
It was special
I remember skipping school to go to the parade and dodging glass bottles being thrown everywhere. It was amazing
The state of Boston sports before Brady was depressing. Take 1986. The 85 Pats with their new first round QB and first overall pick WR made the Super Bowl but got embarrassed. Team went downhill and stayed a laughingstock for a decade. Later that year the Celtics won the title but lost Len Bias the day after drafting him 2nd overall. Of course then came the Reggie Lewis death and the Rick Pitino hiring. The Red Sox were going to make us all feel better in the fall of 86, but of course, Bill Buckner happened. I was 20 years old and thought we must be cursed as sports fans. I thought of my father and grandfather who had never seen a World Series or Super Bowl win. The 1986 World Series was final kick, and it was literally depressing to be a Boston sports fan. We finally got a good run from, the Pats in 2001, but they were on the verge of BLOWING the Super Bowl as well, to add to the Boston misery. We blew a 17-3 4th qtr lead, and Boston was going to have not just a lost Super Bowl, but a blown Super Bowl to add to the misery. Then, with 1:21 remaining in the game……..Tom Brady took the field.
I was 10 when he got his first start. Looking back I realize how fortunate our fan base was to be able to walk into any game with a feeling that we could win. It didn’t matter who we were playing, where we were playing, or what injuries our team had. As long as 12 was on the field I always felt like we had a chance to win until the clock hit triple 0’s. He was a great role model, always said the right things win or lose, never threw anyone under the bus and always shouldered the blame. It was amazing being able to watch his game evolve over the years from being a “game manager” into the greatest quarterback of all time. Even with all that said I still took it for granted. And I miss watching him play on Sundays. He was a massive part of my child, young adult, and adult hood. I wish I could meet him and thank him for the impact he had on me and our fan base. I will love TB12 until I fucking die.
No one paid attention when he was drafted. It was when he took over for Bledsoe. And even then it wasn’t confirmed for another year or so. For me it was disbelief for several years when we started winning. Like I was waiting for the other proverbial shoe to drop. And it never did. Then it just became routine. It was crazy.
2001-2006 was awesome, the franchise was relevant and the D was always a problem, Bill was seen as one of the best ever coaches and Brady was seen as a Hall of Fame QB, but not best ever.
2007 to 2013 were rougher. We had probably the second biggest choke job of the Bill/Brady dynasty in 2006, in 2007 weight of the perfect season tarnished, the ACL, the Giants beating the Pats AGAIN in 2011, and then also the BS cheating scandals (deflategate and spygate). People started talking that Bill and Brady couldn’t win without cheating, and the narrative backed them up (not in W/L record but in Super Bowls, at least).
Then 2013 to basically the end was honestly the best run in fandom history, in my opinion.
2014: Revenge of Deflategate, incredible Super Bowl, first SB in almost a decade. Brady in the conversation as best ever.
2016: Greatest Comeback of All Time, across any sport. Brady the best ever and hard to argue otherwise.
2018: GOAT and other fanbases are basically forced to agree.
2020: He does it without Belichick, maybe the last knock anyone had on him.
The game Bledsoe got knocked out I put the Patriots QB backup in on my fantasy league. Which I won. Not saying that had anything to do with the first Super Bowl but at the same time I am also saying it didn’t have anything to do with the next 20 years
glorious, i remember my grandmother yelling at Bledsoe, ” throw the damn ball!!!!”
When Bledsoe got hurt my reaction was basically, “Oh, that poor un-athletic bum is going to get torn apart by this town…oh, wait. WTF?!” and a few years later he was a god. It was pretty crazy, to say the least.
I loved being hated by the rest of America
The absolute best.
I was in middle school when he came in for Drew, and I was in my 30s and deep into an office job when he left. I experienced so many life changes, phases, and places over those 20 years of growth – and the only constant was that every fall – Tom Brady would lead us on a deep playoff run every fall. Every. Single. Year. It was the absolute best.
What a ot of people forget that we had the whole country (outside of NY) rooting for us for the first couple years. We had been garbage forever & had the rookie underdog story PLUS all the post-9/11 nationalism.
Then we just kept winning. Then Brady morphed from a rookie game manager with the clutch gene to a fucking STUD. Bill morphed from Senator Palpatine to Darth Sidius. This is where people started to hate us. We set records for longest winning streaks that will probably never be matched
Then we got Brady weapons. 2007 happened. I’ve never seen a country so united on hatred of a single team.
We pivoted from a defensive to offensive juggernaut, but Brady couldn’t win again. Until he did. Then all but the most staunch haters agreed that he was the GOAT. Then he won 2 more, while being surrounded by actual garbage.
Then we let him get away and within 3 months a plague swept the earth and the world hasn’t been right since.
We expected to go to the Super Bowl every year. We expected to win every game and we pretty much did. You get spoiled you sit down on Sunday and you know your team is gonna crush some other team. That’s actually very good. It was fun if the Giants didn’t totally walk out in the first game And kind of the second game with them too they could’ve won eight. Belichick also traded Bledsoe the off-season to a team in his division which pretty much told you what he thought of Bledsoe. The roster was full of players that made great plays when they had to like Teddy Bruschi, Troy Brown and three first round picks on the defensive line. Brady had a great coach and he had a great team around him. That knew how to win and he certainly knew how to win. That’s why we have so many Lombardi trophies I just wish other players got more recognition for their contributions. You only hear about Brady and Belichick. I mean Adam Vinateri made every clutch kick in any kind of weather, including game winners and two Super Bowls and an AFC championship from their first Super Bowl run. You just knew no matter how things were going they were gonna win through a win the Red Sox winning a few Bruins and Celtics got one eachgreat 20 years to be a Boston fan.
A dream
It was the best man. He was the best.
The season didn’t start until January
Glorious
Those of us who were alive. I don’t need to be reminded how close I am to death.
Is this AI??? That “dirt” looks fake as hell
Alive? I was a Pats fan for about 30 years when it started. It was the impossible dream, like the ’04 Sox but it kept going… and going……
TBH, winning became an expectation, so losses hurt even more. (2010-11 playoffs were crushing. 2007 SB.) I like the past few years, things were pretty bad for a while, looking forward to a good rebuild, and this sudden success and a bright future is refreshingly great.