Tom Brady has become a god-like figure to NFL fans, particularly to those in New England. As such, it’s easy to forget Brady spends much of his time doing normal dad/husband stuff.
Tova Katz, a fellow resident of Brookline, Mass., recently wrote a blog in which she praised Brady’s parenting. Katz claimed her son was a youth sports teammate of Benny Brady’s for several seasons. The post, titled “Our Kids Played Youth Sports Together…Here’s What I Learned About Tom Brady,” contains a few anecdotes that Patriots fans likely will find fascinating.
Here are some excerpts:
— “You are so many things, Tom: star athlete, husband, dad, son and brother, record holder, six-time Super Bowl champion, four-time Super Bowl MVP, beloved son of New England. But possibly what’s most impressive is that you are simply a mensch: a decent, kind human being, a leader and role model for our children.”
— “For multiple seasons, our sons played hockey together on the Brookline youth hockey team. Like all the other parents, you brought Benny up the hill to the outdoor Larz Anderson rink and waited outside in the wind and biting cold, standing on the snowy practice ice, as the kids skated under the stars. After practice, you lined up with other parents to bring a bumper to the storage shed — just another hockey dad there to help. I remember a Sunday night hockey game in late January, just hours before the Pats boarded buses to fly out to Houston for Super Bowl LI. You were there, like any parent grabbing some last-minute quality time with your son before the demands of the workweek crept in on Monday.”
— “Decades from now, when my grandkids ask me about what it was like to live through the era of the great Tom Brady, I’m not going to tell them about passing records and rings. I’m going to tell them about the dad in a big down coat and wool hat who stood next to me on a freezing night at Larz Anderson rink watching his kid discover the joy of sport — a joy that you, Tom, instill in so many of us grateful fans. On behalf of the parents of New England, from the bottom of so many hearts: Thank you.”
Whether Katz’s days of watching youth sports with Brady are over remains to be seen. In addition to rumors of he and his family moving to Connecticut, Brady is set to become a free agent March 18.
Regardless of what the future holds for the Patriots legend, Brady already has left a lasting impression on people like Tova — both as a father and as a once-in-a-lifetime quarterback.
