It’s been assumed Tom Brady will be motivated as ever to prove he can succeed outside of New England, where he won six Super Bowls over two decades.
A former Patriot seems to believe Bill Belichick’s bunch will be just as determined to make a statement without the future Hall of Fame quarterback.
As Matt Light explained during a recent appearance on NFL Network’s “Good Morning Football,” Patriots players — and most across the NFL, for that matter — won’t admit to being influenced by anything outside of the team’s building. But given the magnitude of this transition at quarterback, Light believes Brady’s exit will serve as a little extra fuel for the 2020 Patriots.
“Most guys in the NFL will tell you, ‘We don’t need motivation. We’re here. We work hard. We’re doing everything we gotta do. We don’t need the outside influences,'” Light said. “But I’m gonna tell you, it weighs in and that weighs on each of those players because the coaching staff is gonna be a little bit tighter. There’s a lot of question marks. There’s a lot of things they gotta figure out. Bill Belichick, his system, ‘do your job,’ work hard, be attentive, put the team first. All of those things he instills in those players week in and week out. Well, this is the real test. All of those guys are going to feel the weight of it. Are they gonna have motivation to go out there and prove they can win without Tom Brady? Yeah, they’ll use this.”
Quite frankly, the Patriots probably should use anything they can that might boost their play in the upcoming campaign. In addition to learning life with a new signal-caller, New England will have to go through arguably the league’s toughest regular-season schedule. The odds are stacked against the Patriots, but perhaps that’s just how they like it in Foxboro.
