Tom Brady: Fanatical Preparation

I RAN ACROSS THIS ARTICLE ON TOM BRADY. AS HE REHABS HIS KNEE, I HAVE A FEELING HE'LL BE BACK STRONG.

By Tom Pedulla, USA TODAY
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Tom Brady was not given one snap at quarterback on a winless freshman team at Junipero Serra High School in San Mateo, Calif.

He was seventh on the depth chart when he enrolled at Michigan and struggled so mightily for playing time that he hired a sports psychologist to help him cope with frustration and anxiety. He heard 198 other names called before the New England Patriots took a flier on him in the sixth round of the 2000 draft.
"Throughout my football career," Brady says, "it always has been looking up at other people."
Not anymore.
After an improbable climb, he is without equal among current NFL quarterbacks when it comes to winning championships, having surpassed boyhood idol Joe Montana by becoming the first to win three Super Bowl rings before his 28th birthday.
"There is no quarterback I would rather have," Patriots coach Bill Belichick says simply.
How can it be that the two-time Super Bowl MVP reigns supreme after being for so long a passer no one particularly wanted?
If there could be a glimpse into Brady's soul, it would almost surely reveal a raging fire, fueled by all of those coaches and all of those teams that did not think he was quick enough or strong enough or good enough. He will never forget the rejection he channeled so forcefully.
"I would say every day he feels that pain," says his sister, Nancy. "I think that people will never know how much being considered a backup by some of the people that he respected the most actually hurt him."
Says his father, Tom Brady Sr.: "His competitive nature kicks in every time somebody says he can't do something, and as a result he works harder. He's the guy who trains every single day."
Unwavering dedication
For Brady, 29, it was the only way to crack the lineup and complete an against-all-odds rise to stardom. He would go to the gym three times a day at Junipero Serra, playing basketball early in the morning for conditioning and sweating through speed drills at noon before lifting weights at night.
To this day, he leads by example. He remains the player to beat when it comes to winning the coveted parking spot given to the most devoted member of the Patriots' offseason program.
"If I'm not up at 6 a.m. or I'm not trying to win the parking spot here," Brady says, "then someone else is going to win it and I'm going to have to drive in every day and see their name up on the wall rather than mine.
"And if another team wins the Super Bowl, it's going to be painful to watch those guys celebrate. I'm not going to be happy for them."
Brady's greatest strength is his ability to all but will his team to victory:
•When New England was tied 17-17 with the heavily favored St. Louis Rams with 1:21 left in Super Bowl XXXVI to close the 2001 season, he hit five of eight passes for 53 yards in a final drive that led to a 20-17 triumph and his first MVP award.
•When the Patriots were tied 29-29 with the Carolina Panthers with 1:08 remaining in Super Bowl XXXVIII, he converted four of five throws for 47 yards to position Adam Vinatieri's game-winning field goal as part of a dazzling 32-for-48, 354-yard, three-touchdown MVP performance.
•With a 58-20 record and .744 winning percentage entering this season, he joined Roger Staubach (85-29, .746, from 1969-79) and Montana (117-47, .713, from 1979-94) as the only passers in the Super Bowl era (since 1966) to win at more than a 70% clip.
Brady has performed his late-game magic so often — he led the Patriots to victory on 21 occasions when they faced a fourth-quarter deficit or were tied through 2005 — that it is virtually expected. "If we have the ball in our hands," veteran offensive tackle Matt Light says, "we always feel we have a chance to win."
A matter of execution
A critical juncture in Brady's life came when he was a sophomore at Michigan. He was concerned about his seeming lack of opportunity and was considering transferring. He met with coach Lloyd Carr to discuss whether he had a future with the Wolverines. "I want to compete," Brady remembers telling him.
Carr responded: "Go out there and do everything you can to control what you can control and quit worrying about how many reps you get or the other quarterbacks, the skills they have and you don't. Worry about things that you do well."
Brady uses his intelligence and work ethic to master each week's game plan. His knowledge of defenses allows him to almost immediately recognize whatever look is presented and quickly make whatever adjustments are necessary.
He is fanatical about preparation, so much so that then-offensive coordinator Charlie Weis jokingly complained about the quarterback's late-night calls to his hotel room in the days leading to New England's 24-21 decision against the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl XXXIX.
"I don't want any unknowns. I don't want any guesswork. When I go out onto the field, I want to know exactly what we're going to do versus every defense we could face," he says. "And when I feel like I'm prepared like that in my mind, I feel like it's just execution from there, and if I can go out and execute and that's the stuff I work on, then we're going to do exactly what we set out to do."
There are never loose ends.
"I don't take the field if I'm not prepared," he says. "It's as simple as that."
He can be equally demanding of teammates. His father recalls a regular-season game several years ago that the Patriots won handily, yet his son was fuming afterward. He had suffered an interception because the receiver ran the wrong route. That receiver did not have another ball come his way the rest of the season, according to Brady Sr.
Brady's glittering 10-1 postseason record stems largely from his ability to limit turnovers when the stakes are highest. He has been picked off only five times in 11 postseason appearances, an interception percentage of 1.36 that is the best in playoff history.
As much as he has accomplished, Brady wants more. He is not content with either his lofty position in the game or his number of championships he has won.
"I think he just wants to be the best," his sister says. "If that means 10 more Super Bowls or 15 more Super Bowls, I think he wants to go down as one of the best quarterbacks to ever play the game."
As painful as the journey has been for Brady, as much as each snub gnawed at him, he would not change a thing:
"At the end of the day, you can hold that Super Bowl trophy up and you know you've done everything the right way and you've paid the price. When the situation came up and the pressure was at the highest, you performed your best."

Learning from TV: Lou Holtz Notes

Couple quick notes from Lou Holtz from his Dr. Lou segment during an October Saturday morning gameday broadcast.

"Your eyes are on the front of your head and not the back for a reason: so you can see where your going not where you been."

"Always have the 4 somethings in life:

something to do
something to hope for
someone to love
something to believe in"

"If u want great advice, ask your spouse."

Coach Bill Brown Perseveres at California University of Pennsylvania

Ray Mernagh does a fantastic job covering the mac and midwest hoops. His website hoopwise.com always provides some good insight. Ray did a nice piece for the Pittsburgh Sports Report on Coach Bill Brown at California University of Pennsylvania.

http://www.pghsports.com/2008-Issues/psr0812/08120103.html

Coach Brown has type 1 diabetes and an infected blood blister in his foot turned into a major physical setback.

Doing what they had to do meant amputating Brown's right leg just below the
knee. Life on life's terms was suddenly looking Brown in the eye.

He didn't flinch.

"As a coach I talk to players all the time about walking the walk and not just talking the talk," says Brown. "That served as my motivation during a long rehab that included some setbacks. I had to realize that I had to accept it, accept life on life's terms and move forward by focusing on the positives. I had to walk the walk."

Since the amputation, the Vulcans have had the two best years in the program's history.

Pretty inspirational perseverance by Coach Brown. A great reminder of how often we take our health for granted.

Letter of Intent Not Always the Best Fit

Jim Halley at USAToday.com writes about DeMarcus Cousins not signing his Letter of Intent without getting assurance that he'll be released if Coach Mike Davis is not there.

The national letter of intent cannot be altered or modified in any way," NCAA spokesman Chuck Wynne said.

Wynne said the LOI is an "agreement between the institution and the student-athlete, not the coach and the student-athlete." But, he added, that doesn't mean a school can't make an agreement to allow an athlete out of his or her scholarship.

Jim Haney makes a great point, one that i have told players before. If there is concern, then simply wait until spring. The mass hysteria of signing because everyone else is sweeps a lot of kids into less than ideal situations. With 1 of 8 coaches moving on each year it is cause for concern.

Another point that the article highlights is that kids, generally speaking, sign with coaches not schools. How would you feel if the all the people you have a relationship with, the system you want to play in, and the promises made to you were gone like the case of Jeff Withey at Arizona and the kids that had verballed to Arizona.

For the best of the best players, its a scenario where the athlete is the limited supply and the colleges are the overwhelming demand. I am fairly sure most colleges would take the verbal without the non-requisite LOI to get a player the caliber of DeMarcus Cousins.

The LOI does keep recruiting a little cleaner in that it gives an ending to the process. Once the doc is signed, the propaganda and innuendo seizes giving the athlete a breath of fresh air. It also clearly defines which side of the fence a prospect is on for recruiters. The key is for each athlete and their decision helpers to see what is right for them and their situation.

Jim Haney, executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches, said he is "not aware of any sort of side deals. … The bottom line is the letter of intent is the letter of intent. Historically, when there have been coaching changes, the prospects have asked for a waiver that would allow them to not be penalized. Some of them have been granted. Not all of those have been granted."

Another option for high school players who might be concerned the coach would leave, Haney says, "is to not sign until the spring, and then you know."