FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady took part in the Milken Institute Global Conference on Monday, speaking for an hour alongside moderator Jim Gray. The headline news was Brady's confirmation that he plans to play in 2018 and still wants to play until his mid-40s, and that family considerations have kept him from participating in the team's voluntary offseason program.
Here are some other leftovers:
Is he over the Super Bowl loss? "Yeah. This is going to be my 19th season upcoming, and when you're young, you don't have the perspective on your career. I certainly didn't. We won three Super Bowls before I was 26 years old, so we had all this success. I was like, 'This is my life. It changed so much.' Then we went a long period of time without winning a Super Bowl, because it's hard to do. Then we won in 2014, and there was so much appreciation because I had experienced so many adversities in my career in different ways. Because I had that perspective, after this season, I finished the game, did the interviews after with the press, and then I was walking to the locker room. I had my wife there, and I had my three kids. My daughter, who's 5, and my middle son, who's 8, they were crying. Then I was like, 'I'm the one, I can't be crying.' I saw them, gave them a big hug and said, 'Guys, this is sports. Daddy doesn't always win. You try the best you can try, and sometimes it doesn't go the way you want it to, but that doesn't discourage you from trying again.' My oldest son said, 'Dad, you did your best.' I looked at him, and it was a good moment for a father. I think the point is those things have changed me in my life. I've evolved and grown so much since I started. Just based on the circumstances of my life, I can deal with them better than I have in the past, where it was really the only thing. It's not that it's not an important thing, but there are a lot of other important things in my life, especially my family and my kids and teaching them the lessons I hope they'll learn just from watching me do something I love to do."
Did he know why Malcolm Butler didn't play in the Super Bowl? "No, I haven't gone and discussed those things. ... I don't ask. ... I don't make the decisions. I wish he would have played, but the coach decided not to play him, and we still had a chance to win. ... For a team, this side of the room is the offense, and this side of the room is the defense. We don't interfere with them much. I didn't know. Malcolm kept coming over to me during the game and was like, 'Come on, TB, let's go!' And I was like, 'What defense are we in where Malcolm isn't on the field?' Then after the game, I asked Malcolm, and Malcolm said, 'I don't know. Coaches just decided something different.' I said, 'OK.' I don't know what was part of that decision-making. But I know we were trying to win the game. I don't think we were trying to do anything but win. It's unfortunate we lost, but give the Eagles a great deal of credit. They deserved it. And we'll be back next year trying to kick their butt."
Do fans deserve an explanation on Butler? "I don't know. That's probably a better question for the guy who owns our team. I think, for me, you don't make all the decisions. I can control what I can control. So much of what my performance has been over the years has been, 'How can I maximize what I can do?' ... I have to trust everyone else to do the same thing. Sometimes it works out. For our team, it's worked out better than every other team for a long time. So how do you nitpick one or two things? Everyone's trying, in my belief, to do the best thing. It just doesn't always work out. I love that particular player, Malcolm, I have a great relationship and history with him. He's moved on to his life. He's on a different team."
Why he doesn't like GOAT talk. "That's never really something I aspired to be. I don't have much of an attachment to that. In my belief system, I've always tried to be the best I can be. It's been a long process to get to this point, and I've never made comparisons. I've had idols that I looked up to, sports idols, when I was young. And I know kids are looking up to me the same way. So it's just pretty heavy for me to think about things like that. I still feel like I'm trying to do the best I can do. I have to show up, put the work in every day. It means so much to me. I want my teammates to feel the same way, that I'm as invested today as when I first started."
The greatest fulfillment for him. "Sports, certainly in my journey, I feel like I brought to the table to our team what we needed at the right time. I've been surrounded by so many great players, so many great coaches, a great organization, great ownership -- we're all trying to look for that in our life, to put you in a position where you can be surrounded by people that bring out the best in you. So how can you look at it as an individual when you have so many people that are there to support you and take more credit than whatever 1/70th of what you as an individual are in correlation to the team. I love team sports. I love being able to share it with so many people. That's the greatest fulfillment for me. After you win, you go hug all the guys you've done it with. You're climbing mountains. You're climbing mountains every week and every year, every season, and you're climbing them with different people. It's hard to get to the top. It's every bit of energy you have, every bit of determination you have. Two years ago, it ended the perfect way. Last year, it kind of sucked. But that's sports."