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The dust has barely settled on Tom Brady’s retirement, but his former teammate doesn’t think the book on the legendary quarterback’s football career is closed.
Julian Edelman, who played with Brady for a decade in New England, spoke with Tom Curran on NBC Sports Boston’s “Patriots Talk” podcast.
“My answer for, ‘Were you surprised (that) he retired?’ was, ‘No, I’m not.’ And that’s the same answer if he comes back,” Edelman said. “You wouldn’t be surprised. I don’t know how he’s going to feel in six months when he’s sitting there.”
Edelman hung up his cleats and shoulder pads for good in Apr. 2021, citing a body banged up by 11 NFL seasons.
“The first offseason when you retire, it’s different,” he said. “You have a routine, you have a body clock that you’re so used to. I did it for 12 (years), he did it for 22. So like, it’ll hit him in some form or another. But it wouldn’t surprise me… I mean, it’d make for a hell of a documentary that I’m sure he would make.”
Brady himself has given the “never say never” answer when asked if he could possibly un-retire.
“You know, I’m just gonna take things as they come,” Brady told Jim Gray last week on their SiriusXM “Let’s Go!” podcast. “I think that’s the best way to put it and I don’t think anything, you know, you never say never. At the same time I know that I feel very good about my decision. I don’t know how I’ll feel six months from now, [if it will] change, it most likely won’t. But I try to make the best possible decision I can in the moment, which I did this last week.”
While Edelman would not be surprised if Brady is back to playmaking, he also wasn’t stunned about the retirement itself, citing Brady’s relationship with his wife, Gisele Bündchen, plus a desire to go out on top.
“It didn’t surprise me. It was gonna come sooner or later,” Edelman said. “He’s still good, but that’s what he likes, probably. He wants to be able to say, ‘I can still do it, and I went out on my terms.’
“Personally, it gets tough on an athlete, especially someone who’s played for (22) years. When you’re a kid, when you’re 22 years old, it’s easy. But then life happens. Now you have responsibilities. You have kids. He has a wife.”
While Edelman is not married, he could see how marriage is a factor to stop playing for the NFL.
“[Marriage is] a completely different thing that I don’t even know about,” he said. “I have a kid but I don’t have a wife that’s over here telling me, ‘Hey, what are we doing here?’ So, it didn’t surprise me. And I’m not saying it’s just his wife, but I’m just saying, there’s other things that you have pulling you from the game.”
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