“I’m going to beat out Drew Bledsoe” When a rookie Tom Brady challenged his Patriots teammate, showing his insane competitiveness and work ethic

Before the 7 Glorious Super Bowls, Tom Brady was just another 6th round QB. But despite being a rookie and playing behind franchise QB Drew Bledsoe, Brady’s confidence was high as ever.

Tom Brady is a little bit crazy. There’s no way around it. He is so dedicated to football and quarterbacking that it borders upon madness.  There’s nothing else to say about it and his continued NFL career at the age of 44-years-old is a testament to it.

Tom Brady is known for not only outworking players on the field but also outworking them in the film room, the training centers and even his diet. He doesn’t eat dairy, tomatoes, pepper, mushrooms, or most fruits—“I have no desire to do that”.

And all of this has led to his unbeatable legacy. 7 Super Bowl rings. All-Time leader in Passing Yards with 79,204 yards. All-Time leader with 581 touchdowns. 3 MVP’s and many more.

Tom Brady was confident that he would be the future in New England.

In the 2001 NFL season, Drew Bledsoe was still the Patriots’ starting QB. The former 1st overall pick had some success in New England and the team was comfortable with him under center.

However, in the 2nd game of the season against the Jets, Bledsoe went down with a scary injury that caused internal bleeding in the chest area. The scarcely-known, lanky, 6th round pick out of Michigan had big shoes to fill. And that’s exactly what he did. After starting the season 0-2 with Bledsoe, the Pats finished 11-5 with Brady leading the way.

And the rest is history.

But people don’t know that Brady was confident that he would beat Drew Bledsoe before even playing in an NFL game. Lonie Paxton had an interesting story to tell.

Lonie Paxton was an undrafted long snapper from Sacramento State in 2000, thrilled to simply score an invitation to an NFL rookie camp, when he first met Brady on their shared connecting flight to New England. “I got a T-shirt and a plane ticket, so I was going to prove myself,” Paxton says. “I was not really expecting too much.” He quickly learned that his new traveling companion, the 199th pick that year, had similar plans. “He’s always had that chip on his shoulder,” Paxton says of Brady.

Eitzmann realized this soon after workouts started at Rhode Island’s Bryant University, by which point he and Brady had begun a tradition of staying late after practice to throw and run routes. “We’d go until I was completely gassed and couldn’t anymore,” Eitzmann says. One day, “We were walking off, and he was like, ‘Know what Eitz, I’m gonna beat out Bledsoe.’ Which at the time just sounded like the most preposterous thing ever. Bledsoe was a god in New England, and here’s this skinny kid.”

Also Read: “You just have to be faster in the QB room” When Tom Brady put Jacoby Brisset on notice about his unreal competitiveness