Tom Brady: ‘I’m retiring for good’

The GOAT is really hanging up his cleats this time.

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Tom Brady, a seven-time Super Bowl champion and a three-time NFL MVP, announced his retirement on Wednesday.

“I’m retiring for good,” he said in a video posted on social media. “I know the process was a pretty big deal last time so when I woke up this morning, I figured I’d just press record and let you guys know first.”

“I won’t be long-winded. You only get one super emotional retirement essay, and I used mine up last year so. Really, thank you guys so much to every single one of you for supporting me: my family, my friends, my teammates, my competitors — I could go on forever, there’s too many. Thank you guys for allowing me to live my absolute dream. I wouldn’t change a thing. Love you all.”

Brady, 45, appeared in a record 10 Super Bowls and won six titles with the New England Patriots and one with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during his 23-year career. He is also the only player to be named Super Bowl MVP five times.

He leaves the gridiron as a certain first-ballot Pro Football Hall of Famer when he becomes eligible for enshrinement in Canton, Ohio.

Brady originally announced his retirement in February 2022 but changed his mind 40 days later. That led to a season of frustration as the Bucs went 8-9 in the regular season — Brady’s first losing season as a starter at any level of football, USA Today reported.

That includes his years at Junipero Serra High School in California (1993-94), the University of Michigan (1998-99) and the NFL.

Tampa Bay ended its 2022 season with a 31-14 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in an NFC wild-card playoff game on Jan. 16. After a mediocre first half, which included his first red zone interception since 2019, Brady finished with two touchdowns and went 35-for-66 for 351 yards.

His final touchdown of the game was an 8-yard pass to Cameron Brate with 2:04 to play. Brady then completed a 2-point conversion pass to Mike Evans to end the scoring.

During his career, Brady threw for an NFL-record 89,214 yards and 649 touchdowns during the regular season. He spent his first 20 seasons with the Patriots, where he won Super Bowl titles after the 2001, 2003, 2004, 2014, 2016 and 2018 seasons. He added a seventh Super Bowl title with Tampa Bay after the 2020 season.

Including his postseason statistics, Brady is the only player in NFL history to pass for more than 100,000 yards in his career. He passed that mark this year on Nov. 6 against the Los Angeles Rams when he hit Leonard Fournette on a 16-yard completion.

Brady’s 13,400 postseason passing yards give him 102,614 for his career. He threw 88 touchdowns in the playoffs.

Brady led the Patriots to a perfect regular season in 2007, making the Patriots the second NFL team to finish a regular season with an unbeaten, untied record. But New England’s quest to join the 1972 Miami Dolphins as the only teams that went wire to wire without a loss was thwarted when Eli Manning and the New York Giants stunned the Patriots 17-14 in Super Bowl XLII. New England finished the season 18-1.

The Patriots would lose again to Manning and the Giants four years later in Super Bowl XLVI, falling 21-17.

New England used a last-second goal-line interception to beat Seattle in Super Bowl XLIX, but it was Brady’s performance in Super Bowl LI in February 2017 that was his most memorable performance.

The Patriots were trailing the Atlanta Falcons 28-3 in the third quarter, but a Brady-led comeback led to a tie game and the first overtime contest in Super Bowl history. New England won the game 34-28 in overtime.

Brady signed a two-year, $50 million contract with Tampa Bay in March 2020 as a free agent, the Tampa Bay Times reported. He led the Buccaneers to their first Super Bowl title since the 2002 season and the team’s first divisional crown since 2007.

Brady led the NFL in yards passing (5,316), touchdowns (43), completions (485) and attempts (719) during the 2021 season.

In 2022, he broke his completions record with 490. He also threw for 4,694 yards, marking the sixth consecutive season Brady passed for at least 4,000 yards. He has topped the 4,000 mark 14 times.

By topping the 5,000 mark in 2021, Brady became the oldest quarterback to top that plateau, NBC News reported.

Brady’s 251-82 regular season includes a 219-64 mark during his 20 years in New England and 32-18 showing in his three seasons in Tampa Bay, according to Pro-Football-Reference.com.

His 35 postseason victories are the most in NFL history. Brady has gone 35-13 in the playoffs -- 30-11 in New England and 5-2 in Tampa Bay.

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