Bill Belichick hails Tom Brady as ‘the greatest’ and says it was an ‘honor’ to coach him

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick paid his former quarterback Tom Brady the highest possible compliment by calling him “the greatest.”

Belichick appeared in the first post-retirement episode of ‘Let’s Go!’ from Brady. Monday podcast.

‘Simply the best player. The biggest race. The great, great person. It was a great opportunity and an honor for me to train Tom,’ said Belichick.

‘I guess it has to end at some point, you know, but it’s the best ever. So, congratulations, Tom.

Brady and Belichick have reached a grand total of nine Super Bowls together, won six and are considered the greatest quarterback-coach duo in NFL history.

Their relationship was said to have soured towards the end of Brady’s tenure in New England before he won a Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

But based on Brady’s words during Monday’s episode of the podcast, there appears to be no lingering bad blood between the two.

He said: ‘I think it’s more, what didn’t you do to get the best of me? I was very lucky. … I think Coach Belichick and I developed an incredible relationship from the moment I was drafted. We spend a lot of time together.

“He started to really teach me what football was all about, how to study defense when I started playing, certainly, and we would have weekly meetings, sometimes one, sometimes two, and I couldn’t imagine a better teacher to say, ‘Hey, this is how we’re going to play quarterback in the NFL,” and these are the nuances of the game.

‘And not only that, but just because of his leadership, which is really one of his great, great qualities, he showed up every day with a purpose. When he always joked “No days off”, he meant it. There was the ability of him to sustain even what he’s still doing, you know, 23 years with the Patriots, beyond that, so many years in the NFL.

‘But he’s there working in the office right now. He is not playing golf. I’m sure he has his moments for those things, but it’s far less than he could be doing. No one has done it better than him, and I think he’s a blessing to me. There’s no way I’m going to be as successful as I’ve been personally without him and I’m very grateful for that.’

Despite the kind words between them, Brady has had more success than Belichick thanks to his Super Bowl win with the Bucs and subsequent playoff appearances, while the Patriots have only made the postseason once since his departure. .

However, Brady made it very clear that he doesn’t see things from this perspective.

“I think, for me, there’s nobody I’d rather be associated with and I think, from my point of view, I think it’s always such a stupid conversation to say ‘Brady vs. Belichick’ because, in my opinion, that’s not what it’s about. deal with associations”. .’ Brady said.

‘Coach couldn’t play quarterback and I couldn’t coach. The best part of football is, and the manager says it a lot, do your job. And he asked me to play quarterback. He didn’t ask me to be a coach. … From my point of view, they were just people who were always trying to tear us apart and I don’t think we ever felt that way with each other.

“We never tried to separate each other. In fact, we were always trying to go in the same direction and I think when we were in New England together for 20 years, you know, they got tired of writing the same story.

In addition to calling him “the greatest,” Belichick also gave Brady perhaps the second-highest compliment for a quarterback during the segment.

“So, you know, once they write down all the good stuff and the championships and this, they just start saying, ‘Okay, this works, let’s start trying to split them up,'” Belichick said.

‘I never really appreciated those ways that people would try to do that. Him and I always had a great relationship and we hung out all the time and did we always see everything in exactly the same way?’