Tom Brady returns to Tampa Bay and calls plays from the broadcast booth

TAMPA — They collided near midfield, the quarterback caught in the linebacker's inescapable embrace.

“Lavonte!” Tom Brady shouted. “Good job, baby! Good job. Incredible.”

Lavonte David hugged Brady as confetti fell after the Bucs' 31-9 victory over the Chiefs in Super Bowl 55.

“That’s good, baby!” said David.

A similar scene will unfold Sunday, 190 weeks after Brady hoisted his final Lombardi Trophy. He will emerge from the tunnel at Raymond James Stadium and be greeted by a hero, the prodigal son returning to his adopted home of three years.

He will greet former Bucs teammates and coaches as cameras focus on his face and fans chant his name. And like so many of Brady's 23 seasons in the NFL, this one will end with the Super Bowl.

“I just feel like he brought what we needed,” David said of Brady, who arrived in 2020 and led the Bucs to the championship in his first season. “At that time, our organization was trying to overcome the crisis. We tried to compete with the rest of the league even though we had all the talent in the world.

“… And then when you bring in a guy like Tom who has been there and knows how to do it, even though we had the talent, that raised the level of play from the talented guys we had.”

For Brady, Sunday's game against the Eagles will be the first Bucs game he has attended since they were defeated 31-14 by the Cowboys in an NFC Wild Card game on Jan. 16, 2023. About two weeks later, Brady announced that he would be retiring for the second and final time.

Another newbie

Now Brady is a rookie again, providing analysis for Fox's top broadcast team with play-by-play man Kevin Burkhardt and fulfilling the first season of a 10-year contract worth $375 million.

Despite being the greatest quarterback of all time, Brady is not above criticism as an inexperienced broadcaster.

He took a year off from football to reconnect with his family and begin training for his new career by playing mock games with his new partner.

But in Week 1, when Brady called Dallas in Cleveland, he sounded like a man learning on the job. His delivery was a little choppy and there were too many deadpan moments. The next week, Brady was more relaxed and showed improvement.

“In my experience watching, I thought he made a lot of progress from Week 1 to Week 2, just in terms of his well-being, his interaction with Kevin Burkhardt and the way he described things he did in the Field saw the broadcast,” said Richard Deitsch, The Athletic’s sports media reporter.

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Sunday should be Brady's best game, and not just because it's his next. Ten of his former teammates from the Bucs' Super Bowl team are still playing, including Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, Tristan Wirfs, Vita Vea, Antoine Winfield Jr., Jordan Whitehead and Jamel Dean.

Brady knows them all incredibly well, as does Bucs head coach Todd Bowles and his defense, which he faced every day in practice for three seasons.

However, due to his pending offer to become part owner of the Raiders, Brady will not be permitted to participate in in-person or online production sessions and may not have access to team facilities, players or coaches.

Of course, it's not like he can't just pick up the phone and call almost anyone in the NFL.

“I think it would have to influence you a little bit, but the reality is that Tom Brady has relationships all over the league,” Deitsch said. “If Tom Brady needs to talk to CJ Stroud, he will get CJ Stroud. He doesn't need to be in a hotel room with CJ Stroud on Saturday.

“But these meetings are important for the broadcast team because sometimes coaches give them insights that really help them. It's less about, “I'm going to tell you what they told me.” It's more of a foreshadowing of what's to come. They know this information and are definitely better prepared.”

Uniquely focused

No quarterback has ever been better prepared than Brady, and his arrival in Tampa Bay along with tight end Rob Gronkowski brought an increased attention to detail that helped the Bucs to three straight playoff appearances and two division titles.

“Men were more locked in just because you knew that with a guy like Tom you basically had to do your best when you went out,” David said. “You didn’t want to let a guy like him down.”

Expect Brady to also be focused on becoming the best NFL analyst in the business. He has seen the evolution of the game from the quarterback position like no other player. And because he played 23 seasons, many players at his position are retired.

“I think he has a morbid obsession with being great,” Deitsch said. “Whether you like his voice or think he's this or that, the one thing you couldn't tell after the first three weeks is that he's not prepared for this. Because he is prepared for everything.

“And that's a good sign because the best people in the industry approach their jobs like they have to be great this week to keep it, as opposed to, 'This company should be lucky to have me.' ”

The “Tom Brady Business”

In Brady's case, the company doesn't just pay for his commentary.

“The reason (Fox) did this was because they wanted to be in the Tom Brady business, and the Tom Brady business allows them to put Tom in front of advertisers in a stadium,” Deitsch said. “Tom will be taking on Fox’s upfront job of selling product to media buyers. It connects you with someone whose brand is truly positive. … I would look at it as them being more in the Tom Brady business than, “We hired Tom Brady as an analyst.”

What's interesting is that Brady is guaranteed to end the season at Super Bowl 59 in New Orleans since Fox owns the rights to the game this year. He played in 10 Super Bowls and won seven, but a game of this magnitude could make or break his broadcasting career.

“If Tom Brady had a very mediocre regular season and playoffs, but an incredible Super Bowl? This is what you would remember if the transmission was out of sight,” Deitsch said. “No one would care what happened in Game 3 or 4. It's a very big deal. … This is the game that these companies care about most.

“Given how much success he's had in Super Bowls, it'll be interesting to see how he approaches it as a host.”

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