As the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Kansas City Chiefs gear up for Super Bowl LV this weekend, Tara Sullivan of the Boston Globe joined us to look ahead.
Brady has made the showpiece event in the National Football League in his first attempt, having joined the Bucs from the Patriots in March of last year.
Sullivan, whose beat involved regular conversations with Brady, believes that the respect he has for Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is one of the more respectful rivalries in the NFL.
Tom Brady v Patrick Mahomes
"Mahomes is one of the opponents that Brady will gush over with no hesitation whatsoever," Sullivan said of the Bucs star.
"To have them doing it in [a joint press conference] in that setting is a really cool thing and not something you see that often; one of the weird upsides to the pandemic and Zoom call realm that we're in."
Brady's respect for opponents is not just reserved for Mahomes, but it is certainly more pronounced - in some cases, there is outright disdain.
"He is hugely respectful, it is not an issue in that way at all.
"We tend to track Brady's actions at the end of a game, because of the tradition of handshakes here in American football.
"That can be interesting if it's Bellichick and a former assistant; you do it with the opposing quarterbacks.
"For instance, Nick Foles, the Eagles quarterback who beat him shockingly at the Super Bowl a couple of years back - Brady has never had a comfortable exchange with him. I'm not even sure if shaken hands with Foles over the years.
"I think it is probably that he is probably so annoyed that he has lost that game. But Mahomes seems to have brought out... I'm not sure if Tom sees a younger version of himself in some ways, or he is just the best young quarterback of them all.
"Because Brady got the best of him in an AFC championship game on the way to their last Super Bowl - it just seems to be a very easy mutual respect between them."
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