01x08 - Nobody's Business

[bunniefuu]

And for the fourth time in seven years,

Super Bowl, here we come.

When you're in successful places,

you know, a lot of people

tried to tear us apart.

They're pretty bad.

They just don't have the players.

The end.

You know, we had all gotten,

I think, spoiled.

We did it, Josh.

The greatest comeback

in Super Bowl history.

Sometimes when you

have a lot going for you,

you nitpick about things

that are relatively unimportant.

There were some

audible boos coming from the crowd.

They're still not getting it done.

The New England Patriots are defunct.

You know, there's no longer the ability

to sell stories saying, you know,

"Oh, they won another game."

People need the drama.

I have a lot of conversations

with him, so

Those are private between he and I.

People need the

"Real Housewives" conversations,

and I think, you know, that's

so much of what things became

in a very short period of time

because there was people

creating division.

You kind of feel like

he's hiding something

or he doesn't want to

divulge some information.

Would you say that was true?

I said I don't want to get into it.

Things were good, but, you know,

well, why not nitpick at certain things

that, you know, are chickenshit?

In the end, it just doesn't matter.

♪♪

Football has been

that meditative place for me in my life.

I think it's been a place where I knew

that I could control what the outcome was.

You know, I'm the one

with the ball in my hands.

I ultimately have the last decision

whether to snap the ball or not,

what play we're in.

That's a very comforting place for me,

and it's been that way for a long time.

That locker room has been a place

for the last 30 years of my life

that has been surrounded by all my friends

doing stuff we love to do,

and I feel like in a lot of ways,

we never had to grow up.

You didn't have to take on

all the issues of the world.

Part of it is nourishing

your soul in a way,

because the football field for me

is the one place I can go

that I can be myself

and be in the present.

And then when you leave that,

man, we all got different lives, you know.

Everyone is going home

to a different life.

Some people have kids.

Some people don't have kids.

You know, some people

are going home to family issues,

friend issues, you know.

Whatever it is, you know, everyone's got

their sh*t, you know.

'cause it's their life.

Tom Brady was down 28-3.

We gotta play tougher.

Harder, tougher, everything.

It is the greatest comeback

in the history of the Super Bowl.

This was it, I concede.

I have nothing to say.

It's the greatest performance

I've ever seen.

He's the

greatest quarterback of all time.

Over his career, he has done

nothing but win football games.

He is the Michael Jordan of football.

The beginning of the 2017 offseason

I was still so singularly

focused on football,

but there were off-field things

that were happening

in terms of work and business

that were exciting for me

because they were

beginning to really grow.

And I wanted to support those things

because they were very much part

of what, you know, my goals were.

To teach people kind of

the things that I've learned.

You know, I had so much

information I wanted to share

beyond my playing career.

So Tom Brady's trainer

is Alex Guerrero,

and they met years and years ago,

and they've been inseparable.

He has unconventional methods.

There was a turning point

in our relationship

where I was recommended surgery in 2008,

and we decided against it.

I'd worked with Alex for three days

and essentially got rid of the problem.

That experience I had

just decided I was gonna be

holistic and natural with all

my recovery and rehabilitation.

A lot of the trainers,

doctors for the Patriots

don't buy into Tommy's guru.

People thought I was always full of sh*t

and I couldn't play this long

and my methods were crazy

and the way that I was training was crazy.

You know,

"Band workouts never work," you know?

Or "What are you

talking about, pliability?

I don't even know what that word is."

Alex and I have found

an amazing relationship

not only as business partners,

but way more than that.

As a brother, as a confidant.

Tom Brady's personal guru

is a glorified snake oil salesman, right?

He and Brady are going into business,

hawking their wares, which is a lot of BS.

It's all, you know, nonsense.

I never really gave much energy

to those words.

I just never wanted to

give much power to them.

That feels good.

'Cause the reality

of it is at the end of the day,

I knew that Tom knew who I was.

I know who I am.

That force gets transferred evenly

And so we worked together, much like

what a coach and a player would do.

It's a really good partnership.

You know,

you have a football coach.

He was a body coach.

He was someone that took care of my body.

And there wasn't

one thing to describe him.

And my relationship, I mean,

how we've grown together,

we have a bond that's unbreakable.

You know,

we deal with his physical body.

We deal with his emotional body.

We deal with his, you know,

mental/spiritual body.

The idea is to find harmony

or balance, right?

It's the balance between yin and yang.

We try to help people understand

the values of what traditional

Chinese medicine can bring

and what Western medicine can bring.

And you meld those two together,

seeing the body as a whole:

physical, emotional, mental, spiritual.

I've been extremely fortunate.

I have a lot of wonderful people

that have come into my life

that have moved this forward for me.

I had met Willie McGinest,

and I was coming out to New England

at the time to see Willie.

Willie gave me the opportunity

and the consciousness

and the awakening of

okay, there's a different

way than some people do it.

One day,

Willie's, like, "Hey, you know what?

Tom Brady's gonna

to come over to the house.

Can you see him?

He's got some elbow issue."

I'm, like, "Sure. No problem."

And we worked on his elbow

and spent three days together.

We've grown together

through a lot of amazing moments,

challenging moments.

After the 2008 season

when he tore his ACL,

you know, he was out in LA

and we were doing the rehab,

and it was most of the day.

When you're laying on a table,

you've got a lot of

personal time with someone.

I think they get to know you really well.

And I think it's nice to have

someone that you can trust implicitly

that you're with and connected to,

and you know that it doesn't

go any further than their ears.

Our personalities really matched,

and so we're always looking for ways

to improve on what we're doing.

If this is good, then what's better?

And if this is better, what's best?

There's basically no precedent

for a quarterback to play

at the level that Tom Brady did

beyond the age of 40,

which is what Tom Brady

turns in less than a month.

Tom Brady may be starting the slow slide,

the slow decline at age 40.

Even the great Hank Aaron,

he sort of fell off the cliff.

I was going into

a really unprecedented time.

I was going into being 40 years old.

Brady is about to hit the cliff

like everyone else who's ever lived.

There was more talk

about him falling off the cliff

than his ability to perform,

and that really drove us.

All right. Well, I'll just go show 'em.

I'll go prove 'em wrong again.

They didn't learn their lesson

last year, obviously,

or they didn't learn their

lesson the year before that,

or they didn't learn

their lesson year before that.

I often hear

people will say, you know,

Tom's like a cyborg,

or he's not built like everybody else.

It's just who Tom Brady is.

And my answer to that is, like, no.

♪♪

- What? What?

- Yeah.

Tom bleeds and he cuts and he breaks

and he gets bruises and bumps

just like everybody else does.

He just works really hard

at recovering from those things.

Let me ask you this quickly.

If Tom Brady stays healthy

and is able to start all 16 games,

is there any reason this team

can't be better than it was last year?

- No, no.

- I think we fully expect them

to be better than they were last year.

Wow. All right.

This roster is

built to win the Super Bowl,

and I think they'll get there.

We had a great team in 2016.

That was probably one of

the most talented teams

I've ever been on.

In 2017, we had very much the same team.

We had a damn good football team.

You know, Gronk was there.

Gronk was healthy.

♪♪

I always thought the NFL was, you know,

catch a touchdown, you party.

I'm Rob Gronkowski.

I am Tom Brady's teammate.

I'm his tight end,

if you know what I mean.

I'm a guy that blocks for him,

catches his ba*ls.

He's my quarterback.

I love being out there with Gronk.

He's as tough as they come.

He does all the dirty work.

He's a matchup nightmare.

He is.

How are you going to stop him?

You're not gonna stop him.

He's gonna make his plays.

To build up chemistry with a quarterback

takes a lot of work, takes a lot of time.

That was unbelievable.

How the did you catch that?

Gronk was very much

the linchpin of our offense.

Gronk, you got the post up.

Just like we worked on last week.

He knows where

I'm gonna be on the field.

I know where he's gonna put the ball.

We practice so many times with each other.

You can't just substitute in

anyone for Rob Gronkowski.

Gronkowski has a step,

has a touchdown, Patriots!

The early days,

like when I was a rookie, second year,

it was just all about grinding, you know.

Get out there and just work,

work, work, work, work.

And Tom was, you know, just on point.

Like, just acting like a coach. I mean

You made a good decision on that.

They squeezed you both ways.

What is that word I'm looking for?

- Uptight?

- Yeah, uptight.

There you go. That was easy.

I don't think I was uptight.

I just was, you know,

expecting him to do the job the right way.

I just felt like, you know,

it just totally wasn't my style.

I don't even know how I did that.

Because I was trying to be out there

and have some fun with it.

When I was

first drafted with the Patriots,

right there on the stage,

I just started losing my mind,

like jumping up and down,

putting the helmet on.

Aah!

And I would say it started there.

When we drafted Gronk,

Wes called me, like, "Did you see

what he did on the stage," you know?

"That was crazy with his brothers."

The party boy/playmaker Rob Gronkowski.

All the older guys were looking at me

like, "Man, Rob's crazy.

Like, you're just

getting away with everything."

And I'm, like,

"Dawg, like, I'm just doing me."

Big bad Gronk coming.

The Hulk.

You know, Gronk does things his way,

and everybody that gets to be

in the presence of Gronk

feels that same energy.

But I would say

I was getting away with it, though, too,

because I was showing up every day.

When you're putting

the work in at practice,

you're making the plays

and you can do whatever.

I just had that mindset

right from the beginning.

- Could make a play.

- I ran that last year.

Gronk now has a chance

to become the highest paid tight end

in the NFL in 2017, but he's gotta play.

He's gotta produce to earn it.

Unfortunately,

he has a history of back injuries.

Going back to 2009,

he missed a ton of time.

2013, missed a little time.

Third go-around with back surgery,

back injuries.

Oh, man, I broke my forearm.

You know he's 6' 7", 265.

Then I broke it again when

I came back for the playoffs.

When people hit him, they hit him low.

They're not hitting him high.

They're gonna hit him low.

And then it got infected,

so I had a couple more surgeries on it.

And when he falls, he's falling hard.

I've had three back surgeries,

microdiscectomies.

It's extremely violent

for a player his size.

I had a bad sprained ankle

that I had surgery on,

and I had surgery on my ACL/MCL.

Gronk is a shell of himself.

Yes, he is.

Rob Gronkowski is basically Frankenstein.

They're piecing him together

so he can get on the field and compete.

When you're beat up,

when you're shot,

that's when the game

can take a toll on you.

Gronk had a really tough 2016 season.

He hurts his hamstring in training camp.

Plays a little bit.

Has four really dominant games,

and then has a back injury.

Has to have another surgery.

Rob had some issues,

and I remember Tom brought him in

to get some work done.

Basically said, "Tom,

I just wanna do what you're doing.

I just wanna"

you know, "I wanna feel good.

I'm tired of all these back injuries."

Everybody's injury is unique to them

because they would be

thinking something different

at the time of their injury,

or they would be having a different,

you know, family dynamic situation

at the time of the injury.

So there's a lot of different emotions

that come into play

when you're helping an athlete

get through a physical ailment.

You gotta learn ways

to be able to get over those humps

and enjoy the game again.

Really committed himself

to eating different foods

and getting more treatment

and, you know, making sure his back

was in a good place

so he can continue his,

you know, his football journey.

We talked about

this is what you can do to transition

from, you know, this type of workout

to this type of workout,

and he bought in.

You feel like the work with Alex Guerrero

has helped you?

Yes, for sure.

- Less sore? Less anything?

- Yes.

Anything specific? Just yes?

Yes.

We get it started tonight in Foxborough,

where the Pats hang up another banner.

You know, any time

you're the Super Bowl champ,

you kind of have this offseason

where you feel like, well,

it'll just be just like last year.

Let's just run it back, you know,

do the same thing,

and we'll end up being champs again

because we won it last year.

And that's not the way it works.

Alex Smith out of the shotgun.

Zings it for the end zone.

Caught! Touchdown!

Up the middle.

Touchdown, Patriots!

"Oh, don't worry.

The Patriots are at home.

We never lose at home.

We never lose against AFC teams at home."

In, like, the middle of the third quarter,

we just went flat and they turned it on.

And the season opener,

we got our a*s kicked.

A significant dose of reality.

That second half was a complete beatdown.

We had it handed to us on our own field.

And, you know, the only people

that can do something about it

are in that locker room.

And we gotta dig a lot deeper

than we did tonight,

'cause we didn't dig very deep tonight.

I didn't feel the fight in us.

I remember going to

the locker room after the game,

and I was pretty fired up.

Like, this isn't the way it's gonna be.

You know, we're not dealing with this sh*t

for the rest of the year.

When you play the New England Patriots,

what do you say coming into the game?

They're gonna be well-coached,

they're gonna be disciplined,

they're gonna be at the right place

when they are supposed to be there.

Not this team.

I believe they'll get it figured out,

but right now it's bad. It's a bad look.

The beginning of the season was,

"Oh, who are The Pats playing in

the AFC Championship this year?"

No one really cares

what happens in October and September.

You know, "Who do you think

will be in the Super Bowl with the Pats?"

Which, you know, there's a lot

of work that goes into that.

I think a lot of people

take those things for granted.

The New England Patriots

are going to be just fine

because by virtue of

the division that they play in,

they'll be in the postseason by default.

I think everyone got a little entitled.

The last time we threw dirt on 'em,

guess who was the problem?

Tom Brady.

Boy, this is a team that we were asking

by how much will they go 16-0?

Very Patriots start.

You know, get off to a slow start.

Figure out what we're not good at.

They were the best odds-on favorite

in my memory heading into an NFL season.

Losing's tough,

but I think on the field

we were getting to be

better and better and better

as the season went on.

It was a tough season.

It was a grind season for sure.

Let me tell you, it wasn't

really that fun of a year.

It was just a little eerie,

the atmosphere, uh, with the Patriots.

And every day felt like there was

some type of dark cloud

over what we were trying to accomplish,

for one reason or another.

We all agree on reputation,

but not in fact so far.

They just haven't been

the Patriots so far.

And then, uh, we were

in the middle of the season

when it happened.

The New England Patriots

have traded quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo.

With Jimmy being traded and

You know, I think

a lot of people were confused.

It is all on Brady

for the foreseeable future.

Jimmy was gonna become a free agent,

and there was value

in getting a pick for Jimmy.

There was unfortunately

a lot of false narratives

that were being spread

about his relationship,

my relationship,

or how that all went down.

I believe Coach Belichick,

win, lose or draw,

was ready to move on without Tom Brady.

He was threatened by Jimmy Garoppolo.

It was just drama,

and it was just soap opera stuff.

Belichick wanted to clearly

have a succession plan

to give it to Garoppolo.

Tom Brady interfered,

and it will cost the Patriots.

I think people are tired

of the Patriots winning every year.

People don't care that

it's hard to win every year.

They just wanna see someone else win.

Even though

we were being very successful,

even though I was playing great,

it didn't matter

because I was still dealing

with the constant negativity.

But it's unclear as to why Tom

doesn't want to answer questions.

Obviously he's probably

answered a bunch in the past,

and he's kind of fed up at this point.

The media were gonna cause division,

make people take sides.

Every thought, it seems to me,

is bent on winning the Super Bowl,

but he doesn't quite

take a stand, does he?

I think the noise was just getting louder.

The Patriots

are headed to the White House,

but quarterback Tom Brady

was a surprising no-show.

Their best quality is

they tune out the noise

better than anyone.

This has been

the loudest offseason for them.

The loudest, and the elephant

is bigger than ever

that's in the room.

So even though you block it out,

it'll be louder to make sure you hear it.

I'm not getting into any of that.

And like I said, I speak for myself.

Choose a side. Choose a side.

What do you stand for?

What do you believe in?

Do you agree with it?

Do you not agree with it?

You're gonna do this.

You're gonna do that.

What does this mean to you?

You can never expect Tom Brady

to give an answer.

But our team was very unified.

You know, we're all in a good place

and we're all supporting one another.

We wanna support the guys

that we love and care about,

we wanna go to battle with,

and we were responsive to the actions

that guys wanted to be a part of

or didn't want to be a part of.

He's a guy who is someone

who's really a man of the locker room.

You know, more and more I think the joy

was being taken away

because it wasn't about

my football performance anymore.

It was about so many other things.

What is your reaction?

I'm just gonna talk about the game.

I think people

always use the word humanize.

"Oh, you're such a human.

I'm, like, no f*cking sh*t I'm a human.

- And the cheating scandal.

- Spygate.

More in favor of the status quo.

Everybody was saying the same damn thing.

And they didn't win the right way.

Isn't it fun?

Everyone feels like they're entitled

to everybody's thoughts

and opinions all the time.

Mind your own f*cking business.

You know what I mean?

Like

Do we have any fight? Are we gonna fight?

Or are we gonna lay down?

The emotion of the game

where you see, you know,

an angry Tom comes out on the field

or the gritty Tom comes out on the field,

or the determined Tom

comes out on the field,

I think his ability to play

with joy on any given Sunday

is really based on his ability to find joy

the week leading up to the game.

The emotional aspect

was very challenging.

It was very fatiguing.

That was huge. We needed a win

like that, and you know it.

There's a lot of guys, including myself,

that just weren't really

having a good time.

We would just show up

to show up, go out to practice.

I mean, we did what we needed to do.

We were winning games still.

That's Gronkowski along the sideline.

It definitely was taking a toll on me.

That was a time

where Gronk was getting called

for a lot of penalties.

Every time Gronk would touch someone,

they would throw a flag on Gronk.

Pass interference, number 87.

I would do, like, a little push-off,

and they would throw a flag on me.

So I was like, huh?

But then at the same time,

they could drape their arms all over him

and not get called for any penalties.

I got no help.

The referee is like,

yeah, you're just bigger,

so we're just gonna let it be,

Our own team started, you know,

getting on Gronk for that,

and Gronk's,

"I'm just trying to play ball."

All over Gronkowski.

And then finally, you know,

in that Buffalo Bills game.

I was just getting held again,

Going in on the end route, I got held.

Coming back out, held me.

And boom. There was no flag.

White's definitely holding Gronk.

- That wasn't called.

- Then he's holding him again

and then gets away with it.

Just right there, I just lost it.

And, like, right when I was going down

I was like

Oh, sh**t. Like,

"I shouldn't be doing this."

Like, I swear, when

I was going down, I let up.

White intercepted a pass from Tom Brady,

and Gronk ran toward White,

dove into his head,

and it resulted in the rookie corner

being placed in concussion protocol.

I was just

really frustrated at that moment.

It just happened naturally

through emotions and frustration,

and just wanna apologize

to Tre'Davious White.

Emotion has to come out at some point.

On a football field,

there's so much emotion anyway,

and aggressive emotion,

it wasn't surprising to me

that that emotion came out.

We'll debate what punishment

the league should level against Gronk.

I think in the beginning

he'll definitely be suspended.

Gronk with an egregious cheap shot.

Well, they should definitely suspend him.

I just got suspended a week.

I was happy. I was finally happy.

I was, like, yes, I'm away

from football for a week.

I get to recover my body.

I mean, when you're running

full speed into people,

definitely was taking a toll on me.

Football, such a grind week in, week out.

It is physical. It's violent.

And you're just running

full speed at people and

you need to recover from football,

and that's what a lot of people

don't understand out there.

You know, it's just grind, grind, grind.

You know, I lost a paycheck.

I lost a game check.

And it was about $300,000,

that game check.

I didn't even care one bit.

I was just glad

I had a week off from football

because I needed it.

We spent every day

during his suspension together.

You know, if I was, you know, practicing,

I'd be practicing three days, full speed.

Like, I didn't need that.

I don't need to be

grinding my body into the dirt.

It wasn't just helping him

through his physical issues.

It was also talking to him

through some of the,

you know, mental, emotional

things that he was experiencing.

It's tough for him,

but tough for everyone, too,

what he's capable of doing on the field

when he's healthy and excited.

I was so beat down from the season.

I was like, I'm good.

Rob is much more close-knitted

to the emotion of joy

than other athletes are.

So when you can bring out

and make it a joyful experience for him,

you will get his best.

He makes the biggest difference

when you look at the success

New England's had against Pittsburgh,

Gronk's been the number one weapon.

I got to remember that I was Gronk again.

You know, started feeling fresh,

started feeling confident

about myself again,

and went out there to the Steelers game.

Just telling everyone

I was already gonna ball out

before the game even started.

New England-Pittsburgh.

At long last, week 15

in the Steel City has arrived.

And then what happened?

Brady stands and throws it

down the left side for Gronkowski.

He was ready to take over.

Just another moment

for him to show his greatness.

I'm catching fade routes.

I'm catching slants.

And I was trying to get him the ball

every possible time that I could.

I'm just catching everything

Tom's throwing me.

When he's determined,

you know, he's a force.

That was a game I was in the zone,

and when you're in the zone,

I feel like I can do anything.

No one can tackle me.

Just that thrill of having

not just one guy, two guys,

three guys trying to take you down.

I mean, they couldn't stop him.

And I remember

I did my favorite first down celebration.

Makes the grab at the 40.

I was on my back,

and I just went like that.

I re-watched that, like, five times,

and every time, I just die laughing at it.

And on the final drive of the game,

I was still feeling fresh.

I still had energy flowing.

I threw one ball that, I mean,

he must have caught

one inch from the ground.

What an amazing catch.

For a guy that size? Come on.

Tom hit me, like, three passes in a row

down the field.

Made play after play.

He had a two-point conversion.

Holy

What a game, baby.

What a game. What a game.

I love you, man.

Awesome.

Hey, how about that? Let's go!

Gronkowski is

the best tight end in the game.

This is the best receiver on this team.

It was the Gronkowski show.

That was great. That was a lot of fun.

Meanwhile, there was

a report in the Boston Globe

that Tom Brady's personal

trainer, Alex Guerrero,

has had his sideline privileges revoked

due to a rift between Guerrero

and head coach Bill Belichick.

Could the NFL's most perfect marriage

be coming to an end?

Apparently divorce

in Foxborough is looming.

How would you describe just the dynamic

with you and Tom in terms

of the working relationship?

Has anything changed this year?

Well, every year is different.

Bill never told you

that he was removing Alex

from the sideline

when the team plays?

I'm not saying anything.

How do you say that he said anything?

You don't know anything about that.

I think we're in such an era of life

where everyone thinks

that they should get to know

everything, you know.

And the reality is, I don't

believe you should, you know.

I think there's things about relationships

that are just private.

When two people have conversations

that are in a private room,

they should remain private.

So I saw the reports this weekend

that he's traveling with the team.

Was he on the sideline on Friday?

Yeah. All right, guys,

Have a great day.

I'll talk to you later.

Two different people in Guerrero's camp

and then the Patriots' training staff

that have difference in philosophies

and how they get guys right.

And I think ultimately

that's what came to a head.

There's a little treatment room back here.

You know, I'd always

gotten my treatments with Alex,

my pliability treatments

in the locker room.

But at that point, you know,

we were having to find

unique places to do it.

I really didn't care where we worked,

to be honest with you, it could be

Whether it was up in a suite

or it was in a broom closet.

We got put

in this, like, maintenance shed,

so I was in there with, like,

the John Deere tractors.

And, you know, I had some

pretty funny laughs with Alex.

Like, it was just just perspective

on kind of how things were changing.

Brady and Gronk both

are aligned with this doctor,

who's not a doctor.

When you work with

a high-profile athlete such as Tom,

he can cast a very large shadow at times.

No one really understands

what it's like to be in that shadow

unless you live it yourself.

So I think there's a lot of assumptions

and it's easy for people to say

things without really knowing.

Not only is Tom getting attacked,

the TB12 method's getting attacked.

That ended up being

the subject of conversation

for so many people about who he was

and what he was capable of doing.

Alex has been a huge part of what I do,

and I'm so fortunate

to have him now as a friend,

but everything that we've

been able to do together.

And Alex has been a, you know,

a huge, huge reason why I'm still playing.

I was very fortunate to have Tom.

I mean, it was really

one of the only ways I made it through.

My wife,

certainly my children,

and Tom.

You know, of course

I'm sticking up for him,

and I know what's in his heart.

I know what he was trying to do:

Help me accomplish

what my goals were, and

Which then helped our team.

I believe that

you should be good and kind.

I believe that you should be forgiving.

Because I believe that

to find joy and happiness in your life,

that you can't sit and wade in the muck.

Any time you're

in 20 years' relationships

with different people,

one year or one experience

doesn't shape my relationship.

And then some relationships got strained,

and that's just that's what they were.

The one thing that I learned from Tom

over the years,

he has an unbelievable way

of being able to not look

in the rearview mirror.

And he's continuously moving forward.

When you're in the middle of the year

and you're going through all this stuff,

it's tough 'cause there's no

light at the end of the tunnel.

You know, football season's tough.

It's a marathon.

When you're in mile 11 of the marathon

and things aren't going all great,

man, it's tough.

But then once you get to the playoffs,

everything that happened

up to that point is gone.

It's the start of a new season,

and the team really comes together.

Welcome to Foxborough's Gillette Stadium

for this AFC Divisional playoff

between the number one seed

in the American Football Conference,

the New England Patriots at 13-3,

and the 9-7 Tennessee Titans.

Let's go! Let's go!

As much bullshit as we dealt with,

we'd still got to the place

that we needed to get to.

And now we're going up against a team

that we had confidence we could beat.

7-0 deficit for New England.

It's a shovel pass to White

in motion to the left.

He's gonna sprint to the pylon,

then dive for a touchdown, Patriots!

You know, went out

and played a great game at home.

Danny played great, Gronk played great.

For a team that was really good

that we were playing against,

went out there

and beat 'em pretty handily.

It wasn't our best,

but it was good, all right?

These are tough to get.

Enjoy this one, all right?

We need our best game next week, fellas.

How you guys doing?

Morning. How's your hand?

Not talking about it.

Thumbs up or thumbs down for Sunday?

We'll see.

We're in practice.

It was a period where we're working on

a lot of different run plays.

Rex thought we were

running the play to the right.

I had changed the play.

We were running the play to the left.

And we ran into each other.

After I handed him the ball,

I felt this immense pain.

The ball got pinched against my body,

and the thumb got bent back so far

that it ripped the skin on my thumb open

from in the web all the way

through the bottom of my thumb.

And I looked down at my hand,

and it was just, like, this bloody palm,

like a pool of blood.

And I was like,

you know, I'm f*cked.

You know, that's what I thought, you know,

I thought, that's it.

I was away.

I got a call from the athletic trainer

and said, you know,

Tom just injured his thumb.

You need to get over here.

In my mind, I'm thinking,

okay, injured thumb.

Like, how bad could it be?

So when I got there and saw it,

I thought, "Oh, my gosh."

'Cause it was just,

you know, completely split.

And I remember the look

of just how distraught Tom was.

And he thought, "This is this is it."

Like, "This is the end for me.

This could be completely over."

Wednesday night was a really long night.

Thursday was a long day and night.

It's Thursday. We're four days out.

He didn't take one single snap.

It was funny

'cause the trainer, Jim, said,

"Man, we've come a long way this year.

We're not ending this season

on a handoff."

What was amazing was

the hand got bent back so far

that the skin ripped,

but there was no structural damage.

I didn't end up tearing any ligaments.

Hand doctor came in, did an amazing job.

Then we were able

to get to work and do our thing.

The reality was

am I gonna be able to grip the football?

'Cause I couldn't squeeze it.

Alex was working way overtime

trying to get as much swelling

out of the fat pad in my hand as possible.

By Friday,

when he started to grip the ball

and felt that he could,

he's like, "Okay."

And I can start to see that confidence

to come back in him.

Between the two of us,

we have great understanding

of what we need to do

to get my body to feel

the way it needs to feel.

Understanding we're hearing

what the doctor is saying,

we're hearing what the advice may be,

but also what makes sense for me

based on my knowledge,

the understanding of my body

and what I needed to do.

Basically, you've had a season

where he's missed practice time

due to the Achilles,

he's had a sore shoulder.

Now has the finger,

and it's a long season,

especially for a 40-year-old quarterback.

I wasn't sure I was gonna go.

It was really a game-time moment.

The greatest quarterback of all time

is going into a championship game

against the best defense by far

he will have faced all season,

and he has an injury to his throwing hand?

We the only ones out here!

Everybody else watching us.

Hey, do your job, right?

We don't need to do the impossible.

Let's go down and score, huh?

There was only stitches were on

for four days at this point, you know.

It was still a very open wound.

It was gonna be

an uphill battle, certainly.

Defensively, they had a lot of confidence.

Under pressure.

Tom moves around in the pocket.

Try to dance his way to the left

and he goes down.

The only way to beat

that speed was physicality,

but they were physical, too.

He throws downfield.

Looking for Gronk.

Goes up, makes the catch!

No, the ball was jarred free

as Gronkowski got drilled from behind

by a safety.

Barry Church, pretty big guy.

You know, he got

a pretty good piece of me.

Get up. Get up, Gronk.

Cheap shot. Gronkowski is not right.

We go into the second half of that game

without Gronk, and we were losing.

I've watched him play

a lot of football over the years,

and I'm nervous and anxious

from the very start of the game

until the very end of the game,

but losing Gronk is tough.

I was just dazed a little bit.

It wasn't a major, major concussion,

but it was the

AFC Championship Game, you know.

It sucks to get knocked out,

and, you know, miss the second half,

but let me tell you, man,

the boys picked it up.

Brady shuffles left,

throws down the middle

and a catch is made

at the 46 yard line by Amendola.

Play off Dola right there.

Catch by Amendola!

Turns to the outside,

dives to the end zone!

It was unbelievable

what they did in the second half.

And New England has taken the lead!

It was still

a tough atmosphere, I feel like.

But we kept winning. We kept winning.

Everyone's been clamoring since Wednesday

to know as much as we can

about the injury.

What can you tell us now?

Well, I said "We'll see." So how'd it go?

By the time you get to Super Bowl,

you're, like, "This is the end."

No matter how hard it's been,

I don't care about what happened.

This is the last 100 yards of the race.

This is where I'm gonna sprint

and try to get it done.

From the moment the game started,

it was tough.

All the things

we had kind of prepared for,

they had chose to do

some different things.

And not that we weren't

being productive against it,

but we never really had 'em on the ropes

because we could never get a lead.

Foles fakes.

He steps up. He is going deep.

Caught by Alshon Jeffery for a touchdown!

That eerie

atmosphere just continued

going into the Super Bowl, too.

Low snap. Ball put down bad.

The kick is up. Hits the upright!

No good.

First half, personally for myself,

I was definitely slow.

Broken up at the goal line.

I wasn't feeling it all the way.

Across the 20, the 15,

the ten, the five.

The train is in the end zone!

We were playing catch-up all frickin' day.

Slips a hit at the 15.

Driving off a tackle at the ten.

Touchdown, Patriots!

Gonna be a dogfight, boys.

- We'll be watching.

- We knew it was.

We knew it was.

We call this play.

It was called "Clemson,"

'cause we got it from Clemson.

We used it in the 2015 season

against the Eagles.

They really don't account

for the quarterback,

you know, going out for a pass.

I caught it, and I ran for like 35 yards.

So I always like having that play in,

and Josh was always, like, "Dude,

I'm calling this play close enough

so you can get it in the end zone."

We're on about the 35, third down.

You know, I had the stitches

that I had removed from my right hand.

I had a glove

that was tucked into my pants.

Josh called in the play,

"Clemson, Clemson."

I reached down for the glove,

and I felt the glove in there.

I was gonna pull it out and put it on.

But looked up at the clock,

and I was, like,

"I'm too rushed, I'm too rushed.

I'm not gonna do it."

Brady before he summons White

into the backfield,

We give the ball to the back.

He gives it to Danny.

I'm running out to catch it,

and, man, I'm in space.

Danny literally throws a perfect ball.

I look up for the ball

and I see it and I reach out.

And just as I reach out to catch it,

I don't come down with it, you know?

Brady, off his hands, incomplete!

Come on, Tom!

At all the moments

for me to make a play

to help us win,

That was the one that

in that game I really look back on.

I mean, unbelievable.

Like, however many plays later than that,

they run Philly Special.

Here we go. Here we go.

Set hut!

Easy, easy.

k*ll, k*ll. Blade, blade.

Moves to the right.

It goes directly to Clement, reverses it,

and the pass goes into the end zone,

and it is a touchdown!

To Nick Foles.

And it just happened so quick, you know,

and they ex*cuted to perfection.

Like, you can't be

too rigid in your thoughts,

and emotionally, it's the same, right?

You can't be, you know,

too caught up in an emotion

to where it begins to impact your ability

to stay centered or in a relaxed state

to be able to perform your best.

I think you find that,

and you see that in Tom.

Like, he's very good at it.

He never gets too high or too low.

When he does, when he feels himself,

he knows how to bring himself

back to center.

In the second half, that rhythm picked up,

and then all of a sudden

we just started clicking.

You could tell coming out of the gate

they want to get the ball to 87.

We're just making

big plays left and right.

He throws to the middle of the end zone.

Touchdown, Gronkowski!

We were just putting up points.

But the Eagles, they were

putting up points, too.

The game was just going

back and forth, back and forth.

Some of the best execution

we've ever had on offense.

Gronk made one of the all-time

great catches in the Super Bowl.

And the Patriots have gone in front.

I was, like, we finally

got a lead, you know.

Unbelievable. We did it.

We finally got control of the game.

I was, like, all right, man.

This is cool, right? Another Super Bowl.

I caught the game-winning touchdown.

Like, this is incredible.

Way to go, boys.

And, um

they got the ball back.

Empty backfield.

Four receivers right.

Back goes Foles.

Fires, slant, touchdown!

Zach Ertz.

2:21 remaining in regulation.

Much, much too much time

for Tom Brady and that offense.

Now we got a chance

to go down and win with a touchdown drive.

I'll take that ten out of ten times.

Football has been that meditative place

for me in my life.

Been a place where I knew

that I could control what the outcome was.

You know, I'm the one

with the ball in my hands.

That's a very comforting place for me.

We got the ball. We got the ball.

We got the ball.

And the kick is good.

Now it's pure desperation.

We were just getting

as close as we possibly could

to the end zone

so it was a reasonable Hail Mary.

It was one of the most epic Super Bowls

that I've been a part of.

One of the most epic Super Bowls

that's ever been played.

Probably one of the things I remember most

from that Super Bowl,

you know, the way it ended.

That's two Super Bowls I've lost that way

with the ball just kind of

falling to the ground and

With our guys near,

but in the end, not there.

I literally gave it all I had, you know.

Even though I was beat down,

we almost had a chance.

The bounce almost went our way, but

wasn't meant to be.

There was so much

great energy going into that.

I knew how much we'd overcome.

Based on the way

that that season had gone

Well, it's all, you know, nonsense.

You know, winning would have been

like a warm blanket.

So losing, I was just pissed.

Numb, you know, I think is the word.

Get to the locker room

and there's a lot of hugs with

a lot of guys you bled with.

A lot of guys you shed tears with.

A lot of guys that are your brothers,

you know, that you're never gonna have

the same team the same way again,

and, um, it ends pretty quickly.

Just walking into the shower,

talking with a couple players.

Like, yo, man, great season,

but, like, I'm glad it's over, man.

Like, it needed to be over.

It was long, it was eerie

through the whole year.

The energy, the atmosphere

was just always off.

It felt good to walk off the field

and know that I didn't

have a game the next week.

I just remember leaving that stadium

and in my mind going,

"Wow, that was that was really tough."

Tough season, tough game.

We gotta put that one to bed.

Football is tough.

I mean, you gotta really have joy

in order to play the game of football,

'cause it's so physical

and it's so, like, mentally draining, too.

You gotta be enjoying that, no doubt.

And, you know, when you're not,

it just becomes like a job.

So once the joy is gone,

I mean, you gotta walk away from the game.

I learned a lot about people that year,

learned a lot about relationships

and who was in your corner and who wasn't.

Based on how things were going,

I maybe in a way held out hope

that I would begin to have

a different type of feeling

toward going to work every day.

That maybe, you know,

I could find more joy.

But I did know that if things

were gonna continue

the way they were heading,

that I couldn't do it anymore.