Though it was relatively hush-hush, Tom Brady was in his fair share of discomfort at this time a year ago due to a knee injury that required surgery.
Having since healed up, played the 2021 season, retired and unretired, Brady feels refreshed and much of that is due to the absence of having to recover from MCL reconstruction.
"Last year was pretty tough, just from basically having the MCL reconstruction, and I basically tore it in my last season in New England and I went the whole offseason with a torn MCL," Brady said Wednesday, via the Tampa Bay Times' Rick Stroud. "I didn't get a reconstruction, because I thought it would just heal back. So I didn't do anything. The following year, I just taped it, basically, every day. And then finally getting it reconstructed last year, it felt for the first time this offseason, it's been really good."
Initially tabbed as nothing more than a clean-up procedure in February of 2021, Brady's knee injury was of the more serious variety as he needed an MCL reconstruction. Brady deemed himself ready to go in June of last year and went on to lead the NFL with a career-high 5,316 yards passing and also led the league with 43 touchdowns passes.
So, he certainly played like he was good to go, but by his account is now "really good."
Brady has long defied age and conventional wisdom when it comes to the body breaking down, so getting the thumbs up that his knee troubles are behind him should at the least be a good sign of what's ahead.
"It's been fun just to kind of, you know, run around a little bit," said Brady, who was speaking at a news conference ahead of The Match golf event on June 1 in which he'll team up with Aaron Rodgers against Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes on the greens. "Work on some sprinting stuff. I know Aaron has probably rushed for more yards in a game than I have my whole career. But for me, it's been kind of interesting to be able to train in certain ways. Like, a single leg jump. I haven't done a single leg jump in I don't know how many years, because I couldn't do it because I never wanted my knee to be unweighted, because it was just kind of wiggling around. It's been good this year to do it."
Forty-four years young, headed to the greens with his fellow QB elite and then headed for his 23rd season with a repaired knee that apparently feels better than it has in sometime, Brady is back in the swing of things.
