Tom Brady, obviously, is on the back end of his NFL career, but it appears his significant other isn’t pushing him to hang up his cleats.
A few days after Gisele Bundchen was asked by Ellen DeGeneres about Brady’s eventual retirement, the New England Patriots quarterback provided some clarity about his wife’s stance on the matter during an interview with Jim Gray on Westwood One radio.
“She doesn’t talk to me about it at all,” Brady said. “She’s so supportive. She wants me to be happy and do something I love to do. I think any wife wants you to be happy and healthy. And, you know, football is a physical sport. She’s been watching me do it for a long time and she knows how much I love it.”
While Bundchen and the rest of Brady’s family might not talk about retirement with him, the five-time Super Bowl champion can understand why his loved ones would be wary about him continuing to play.
“I chose this sport that it’s a physical, violent sport,” Brady said. “You see plays that change people’s lives and careers. One play changed Joe Theismann’s career. Look at the devastating injuries this season. It’s hard for family members who love you and care about you to encourage you to get back out there, deal with physical pain and they know that pain is inflicted. But I think for me, it’s been something that’s such a part of my life and I love the sport. I’m out on the practice field today and I’m just sitting there thinking, ‘there’s no place I’d rather be.’ When you love something as much as I do and football has been that thing in my life that I’ve loved, I want to do it until I can’t do it anymore, can’t do it at a championship level. And that’s what my goal has been. She knows that, my family knows that and they’re all supportive of those things as well.”
Not only has Brady’s passion for the game not wavered, but his skill level also hasn’t shown much decline either, making it nearly impossible to pinpoint when TB12 might ride off into the sunset.