![](data:image/svg+xml;charset=utf-8,<svg height="439" width="780" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" version="1.1"/>)
Tom Brady delivered an epic, player-only pregame speech before the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat Kansas City 31-9 in Super Bowl LV, and parts of his grand locker room oration have surfaced since.
“Seize the opportunity! We win today, and we’re champs for life,” Brady exclaimed, addressing the whole team for the first time that season, according to Pro Football Talk’s Peter King.
Bucs players called Brady’s speech “the epic of epics” per Tampa Bay Times reporter Rick Stroud, who also noted that Brady prepped his team all week long. Brady sent a daily text of “we will win” to the players.
Most of Brady’s speech remains a mystery, but Bucs players sharing the main ideas they heard and NFL Films having Brady mic’d up for the Super Bowl after the speech, gives significant clues on what he said. No one made a recording of the speech available, if one exists, since the Super Bowl. Bucs linebacker Devin White alluded to not knowing if anyone recorded it, the Bucs organization didn’t per their Twitter exchange.
ALL the latest Bucs news straight to your inbox! Join the Heavy on Bucs newsletter here!
Brady on Honor
Bucs running back Leonard Fournette said Brady talked about honor in the pregame speech during an ESPN “First Take” interview.
“I ain’t going to go into details about it, but it was deep,” Fournette told ESPN. “I’ve never felt that deep — my feelings toward the word ‘honor’ until he put it in a sentence that made everybody open their eyes and realize that we’re going to win this game.”
Bucs defensive back Sean Murphy-Bunting said Brady touched on “honoring your family” in an interview on “The Pat McAfee Show.” Murphy-Bunting added it’s about, “really leaving your mark and leaving your legacy.”
“That definitely weighed a lot on me going into the game,” Murphy-Bunting told McAfee. “I loved every moment of it. He was locked in. He was intense.”
Bucs defensive end Ndamukong Suh concurred on ESPN’s “Get Up.”
“I know he got me really hyped up before the game in his pregame speech to us,” Suh said. “He doesn’t always speak, and I think he wanted to be reserved and choose the right time going into this game and just said to the entire group that, ‘you win this game, you’re going to be honored for your life and you’re family’s going to be honored for the rest of your life.'”
Head coach Bruce Arians isn’t the biggest fan of pregame pep talks per Pro Football Talk’s Michael David Smith, but the Bucs coach spoke highly of Brady’s on the “The Rich Eisen Show.”
Arians said Brady told the team, “the honor that comes with winning the Super Bowl, you guys have no clue. Let’s go out and play our best and win this thing because the rewards are unbelievable.”
Fire in Their Eyes
Arians told Eisen that Brady’s impact showed the minute the players left the locker room after the speech.
“They came out with a look in their eyes that I knew we were going to win,” Arians said.
Brady kept exhorting his team amid pregame warmups per NFL Films, which had him mic’d up. “Great day boys, lock in now,” he said. “You know what to do. Now we’re just playing ball. We already know what they’re going to do. We’ve got all the answers to the test. Now we’ve just got to go have some fun, go execute.”
The Bucs did just that in routing a Chiefs team that looked untouchable, 26-1 in their last 27 games going into Tampa.
READ NEXT: Tom Brady Finds Himself in Hot Water After Super Bowl
0 Comments