Couple weeks ago, the most extraordinary example of resilience and leadership took place in Tampa Bay, in Florida. Tom Brady, the Greatest Of All Time (The GOAT) won at 43 years old his 7th Super Bowl.

“Ok thanks, I don’t like sport, why should I care?”

The backstory is extraordinary, and goes beyond sport! 

Boston is a lovely human size city. It has a lovely atmosphere with world class universities such as MIT and Harvard and a strong European flavour, Irish particularly as this is where a lot of Irish people settled when emigrating from Ireland. Boston doesn’t brag like NY or LA, doesn’t shine like Miami or vibrate like New Orleans. It is a rather discrete and hardworking city. It had its sport glory days in basketball with a team called the Celtics back in the 80s, but since then nothing.

All Boston’s collective sport teams (basketball, hockey, baseball, American football) have been pretty shit. Until 2001.

In 2001, the Boston American football team, the New England Patriots, hired a new player by the name of Tom Brady. As I lived in Boston at the time, I still recall a conversation with one of my work colleagues in the sports shop I was working in at the time “It’s hard to support a team that never win!” That team had never won anything! Zip! Nada! Nichts! 0 trophies since 1959! 42 years, a lifetime!

Fast forward to 2019, this team had become the most successful (and financially appreciated) franchise with 9 Super Bowls (the final in that sport), with 6 victories, making Tom Brady the most successful athlete in American football. He equalled Michael Jordan with 6 titles.

Like Jordan, great team, great coach, etc. but the story diverges.

Tom Brady left the New England Patriots for the Tampa Buccaneers in 2020. By then, Tom Brady had the highest winning rate of all players in the four major US sports, the Buccaneers had the lowest winning rate of any team of the four major sports. It could not have been more polarized.

This year was therefore Brady’s first year in his new team. Yet he won. Plain and simple. 31-9. Not even a hiccup or a question on the scoreboard.

10th Super Bowl, 7th victory, 2 different teams, 43 years old 

We could discuss Brady’s personal hunger (as the US was in lockdown, he was fined as he trained outdoors in a park alone during preseason), or how he leads and elevates people around him. His is a textbook example and would be worth discussing at length.

But the story with Jordan diverges further.

What I find the most staggering is that back in 2001 Tom Brady was picked 199th in the draft at the time!!!...199th! 

What is the draft? Remember at school when you were in break outdoor and you played any sport with your school buddies. Two people are captains and pick teams one person at the time, always picking first their friends, the best, most skilled, etc. OK, you got the picture? I simplify a wee bit but it is kind of like this.

Well Tom Brady was not picked in the first 5 rounds of 32 teams. He ended up as the one player no one wanted. He was not the fastest, the most athletic, or the best, YET. And even joining his club he was the fourth choice in his position….

One day the lead quarterback got injured, and the second too. Brady was given an opportunity, put a shirt on and fit it rather well. He was preparing for that moment. He didn’t look back. The rest is history.

With focus, perseverance, an underdog mentality, hard work, vision and leadership, he became the Greatest Of All Time and has pushed aside any newbie that comes his way.

As you got it this story has nothing to do with football, or just sport for that matter.

We all are 199th in something that we want to do, become, or achieve. Brady is a strong example for us all. Keep up the hunger, focus and build a team around you for success. 

From 199th to the top, a GOAT showed us that it is possible.

QUESTION

How vulnerable are you in what you do, and show to the world?