Tom Brady Had Bucs Locker Open for Players to Leave Items for Him to Sign for People

The 2023 campaign will be the first season since 2000 without Tom Brady on an NFL roster. Still, his impact on the league is in the minds of many.

He was honored at halftime of the New England Patriots season opener, allowing him to have a proper send-off with the team that he led to six Super Bowl titles. Still, his impact on his final team, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, cannot be understated and recently retired tight end Kyle Rudolph spoke about how great of a teammate Brady was.

Rudolph said, per Peter King of NBC Sports:

"But my experience with Tom was incredible. First, the way he treated people. The way he treated the Glazer family [Bucs owners] is exactly the way he treated the janitor at 6:30 at night when he and maybe one or two other guys were the last players in the building. Second, the way he treated his teammates. Tom had an empty locker next to him. I would look over there and every day, guys would put helmets, jerseys, pictures, footballs, all the stuff they wanted Tom to sign for them. There'd be notes on the stuff, a post-it note on a football—'Sign this for Jimmy, it's his birthday.' At the end of the day, almost every day, he'd sit there and sign everything."

Rudolph's only season in Tampa Bay came in 2022 and he said he signed there with the intention of playing with Brady. While the tight end's playing time was disappointing (he only made three catches for 28 yards and a touchdown), Rudolph said that the way Brady carried himself and acted toward his teammates was something that really impressed him.

"The most amazing thing to me was, with all the negativity swirling around his life outside of football, he never carried it into the building," Rudolph said, per King. "Always positive. I didn't think it'd be possible when I walked into the team to be more impressed with Tom. But I was."

Brady will now have an opportunity to enjoy retirement for the next year before he steps into his broadcasting deal with Fox in 2024.