Happy Birthday: Tom Brady Officially Turns 42 Years Old, Entering 2019 Season For Patriots
By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- The famed "cliff" has still not come for Tom Brady. But his 42nd birthday has.
The Patriots' quarterback woke up Saturday morning having officially turned 42 years old, as he enters uncharted territory in his quest to continue dominating the NFL through his early 40s. It's a journey few have ever even attempted, let alone conquered.
Nevertheless, undeterred, Brady is working as hard as ever for the Patriots this summer as they seek to defend their title for the sixth time since 2001.
At this point, after the six Super Bowl victories and the three MVP awards and the four Super Bowl MVP awards and every other possible accolade that could be bestowed upon him, some might wonder what exactly is driving Brady to continue playing at his current age. The simplest answer may be that, for one, he is a football player and thus loves playing football. The next explanation would be that he can still do it at a championship level.
Looking a bit beyond the obvious, though, there are still some accomplishments Brady may be seeking to achieve.
Brady needs 1,427 passing yards in order to pass Peyton Manning for second all time in career passing yards. (Drew Brees ranks first, roughly 4,000 yards ahead of Brady at the moment. That record figures to belong to Brees, unless Brady really does keep playing to age 45.)
Brady needs to throw 23 touchdowns in order to pass Manning for most all time. (Brees currently has 520 TD passes, compared to Brady's 517, so that's a race that could stay neck-and-neck for the remainder of their respective careers.)
While besting Manning in some statistical categories at this point may seem insignificant, we cannot forget the email Brady sent to a friend back in 2014: "I've got another 7 or 8 years. [Manning] has 2. That's the final chapter. Game on." For a hyper-competitive person like Brady, it seems as though getting past Manning at least means something to him.
Statistics aside, there may be one more reason that Brady is still toiling on the practice fields in extreme heat, trying to make things work with a receiving corps that isn't exactly full of All-Pros.
And it looks something like this:
MOST SUPER BOWL WINS BY A FRANCHISE
T-1. New England Patriots, 6
T-1. Pittsburgh Steelers, 6
T-3. Dallas Cowboys, 5
T-3. San Francisco 49ers, 5
There's also this:
MOST SUPER BOWL APPEARANCES BY A FRANCHISE
1. New England Patriots, 11
T-2. Pittsburgh Steelers, 8
T-2. Dallas Cowboys, 8
T-2. Denver Broncos, 8
So that's the history of franchises in the Super Bowl since 1967.
And here's how Brady would stack up against those other franchises, if he were indeed a franchise unto himself. (You could make the case that he kind of is.)
MOST SUPER BOWL WINS
T-1. Tom Brady, 6
T-1. Pittsburgh Steelers, 6
It may be possible that, impossibly unsatisfied with a record sixth Super Bowl victory last February, Brady wants more. It's certainly possible that Brady wants to leave the game having won more than any franchise has won. Ever.
It may be equally possible that such a goal is not exactly on his radar, but this is a fellow who celebrated his fourth Super Bowl by throwing on a T-shirt with a massive stenciled "5" on it when he climbed the Fenway mound to throw out a first pitch a couple of months later.
He is a quarterback who's always insisted that his favorite ring is "the next one."
It's possible that at some point, "the last one" becomes satisfying enough for the quarterback who's never been satisfied with anything.
All of that, of course, is merely speculation. Outside of playing for the sake of playing, and outside of proving to the world that his TB12 Method really does work, Brady has never really opened up fully about the why of his endeavor to conquer the football world forever.
That quest -- at least the age 42 portion of it -- begins in earnest on Sept. 8, when the Patriots open their season against the Pittsburgh Steelers. From the looks of everything, Brady's not planning for that to be the final banner-raising ceremony of his career.