Tom Brady may have two children with one of the most beautiful supermodels to ever grace the runway, but the NFL icon was not always a heartthrob.
Since his high-profile divorce from Gisele Bundchen in 2022, the seven-time Super Bowl champ has been romantically linked to a glamorous roster of women, including model Irina Shayk, Kim Kardashian and influencer Alix Earle.
But when he was a mere first-year student athlete at the University of Michigan in 1995, there was no sign that the gangly, seventh-string quarterback was a ladies man.
Indeed, a bombshell new biography by bestselling author Lars Anderson reveals that Brady’s love life was so silent that some of his Michigan Wolverines teammates thought he might even have been gay.
‘For a brief period, a few of Brady’s teammates wondered about his sexuality,’ Anderson writes.
‘He was rarely seen with a girl – he chose the stadium lights over candlelight when Friday nights rolled around – but then, late one evening, a student who worked in the athletic department walked down a West Quad hallway.
A new Tom Brady biography details that his dating life was so silent while he was at the University of Michigan that some of his teammates thought he might have been gay
Brady, pictured with his father Tom Sr, was ‘rarely seen with a girl’ during his college days
‘Hearing muffled noises inside Brady’s room, he stopped and put his ear close to the door. There was no mistaking: Those were the breathless gasps of uninhibited desire emanating from a female voice. The sheets were shaking.
‘The next day, the student shared his findings with several Michigan players. “Guys” he said, “Tom Brady is definitely into girls.”‘
Brady’s early years at Michigan were difficult. Not just for him, but also the family he left behind at home in San Mateo, California.
His father Tom Sr felt the strain most. An insurance salesman, Tom Sr and his son were particularly close and Brady’s decision to uproot his life and leave for Michigan caused him severe emotional distress.
Brady had three older sisters – Maureen, Nancy and Julie – but Tom Sr had just one son and the pair were inseparable. The lure of an athletic scholarship, though, was too good to turn down.
According to Anderson, Brady moving out even caused a form of separation anxiety in Tom Sr that was ‘so painful he sought professional help, undergoing eight weeks of psychological counseling.’
Initially, Tom Jr showed few signs in Michigan that he was capable of becoming a quarterback that could start for the Wolverines, let alone compete at the highest level in the NFL.
Tom Sr would regularly fly across America in the hope of watching his son play, but he didn’t get a single chance in Brady’s freshman year in 1995.
The only glimpse Tom Sr got was of his son in action during the team’s warm-up. Brady failed to ever make the starting line up.
In his second year, he made it into two games. And after one of them, father and son sat in a car parked near Michigan’s Ann Arbor stadium and discussed Brady’s football future.
‘In his boy, Tom Sr saw a profound and gloomy sadness,’ Anderson writes. ‘It was there in the gentle, downcast face, a melancholy that flowed from his eyes. Slumped in his seat, Tommy finally spoke.
‘”Dad, I don’t know if I’m ever going to get a chance to play here,” he said. “I mean, I don’t think I’ll ever get my chance.”
Brady failed to make an initial impression on his Michigan coaches and teammates and came very close to walking away from the college football powerhouse
BRADY: AN AMERICAN STORY AND THE PRICE OF GREATNESS
Lars Anderson’s new Brady biography is out now. Buy it here
‘”You’re probably right,” Tom Sr replied. “You probably won’t.” At this moment, the father, a realist along the lines of a careful doctor who diagnoses problems according to symptoms not wishful thinking, was skeptical that his son would ever start for a national title-contending college program, much less become an NFL quarterback.
‘He simply hoped Tommy would have fun in college, do well in the classroom, and prepare for the nine-to-five life as a stockbroker or insurance salesman or whatever he wanted to do.’
One of Brady’s teammates admitted coaches ‘really thought nothing of Tom’ and after a particularly bruising loss on New Year’s Day in 1997, Brady asked to meet with Michigan head coach Lloyd Carr.
Brady told Carr he was thinking of transferring. ‘I don’t think I’m ever going to play here, and I don’t think I’m getting a fair chance,’ Brady said. ‘I don’t think that you’re realizing my potential. I don’t think that this is the best place for me.’
But, in a response that Brady has surely since reflected on more than once, Anderson writes how Carr warned the quarterback it would be ‘the biggest mistake you ever make.’
‘You know what, Tom? You expect everything to be perfect. You expect every player that you play with to run the right route. And you expect the blocking to be great, and the perfect play to be called. And when that happens, hey, you’re pretty good. But when anything else happens, you’re not very good.’
Brady returned to his off-campus apartment and contemplated the prospect of transferring to the University of California, Berkeley, a school that had heavily courted him before he decided to go to Michigan.
Brady kisses his father Tom Sr after winning the Super Bowl against the Falcons in 2017
Brady required immediate appendix removal but the setback – he lost 25 pounds – sent him into a physical and psychological spiral
Brady, displaying early signs of the tenacity that would lead him to become a seven-time Super Bowl champion, eventually became the starting quarterback. He was drafted by the Patriots in the sixth round of the 2000 NFL draft with the 199th pick.
The following morning, Brady returned to Carr’s office. ‘This time, he scooted his chair forward and leaned over the desk as he spoke,’ Anderson writes. ‘”Coach,” he said, “I’ve decided to stay at Michigan and I’m going to prove to you that I’m a great quarterback.”‘
Brady did not become the main man for Michigan at the start of the 1997 season, much to his frustration. And things got worse when, in terrifying fashion – and after only playing a back-up role in just four games – he was rushed to the emergency room in the October with intense abdominal pain.
Brady, then 20, required immediate appendix removal. While the surgery was successful, the medical setback left him in a spiral both physically and psychologically.
During his recovery, Brady lost 25 pounds and watched from the sideline as his rival for the starting job, Brian Griese, led Michigan to a 21-16 Rose Bowl victory over Washington State.
Brady beefed back up on eighteen inches of Subway meatball sandwiches each day – but still, mentally, he was starting to crack.
‘He’d been introduced to Greg Harden, a counselor in the athletic department, during his freshman year,’ Anderson writes. ‘It was a casual acquaintance, but after leaving the hospital, Brady was so aware of his own mental distress that he walked into the team facility and knocked on Harden’s office door.
‘When it swung open, the young man felt a sting behind his eyes – the tears were near – and his throat tightened. “I need help,” he said.
‘Sizing up Brady, Harden saw a walking ghost – a young, very skinny kid who’d had all the hope beaten out of him, a player who had been broken and traumatized.
‘After only a few minutes of talking, Harden ascertained that Brady was borderline depressed and in the throes of an existential crisis: He didn’t know who he was, he didn’t feel as if he fit in, and he didn’t understand why he had come to Michigan only to be utterly miserable.
‘”The coaches don’t believe in me,” Brady told Harden. “I’m never going to get my chance.”
‘”You’re right, they don’t believe in you,” Harden replied. He expected Brady to stand up and leave then and there – other players had when they realized Harden wasn’t a pep talker but a real talker – but Brady perked up and leaned forward.
‘”I’m sorry, Tom, I can’t help you become the starter at Michigan,” Harden said. “But I can help you believe you should be the starter at Michigan. If you believe in yourself, it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. You’ve got to believe, whether you are playing, starting, or sitting on the bench, that you are capable, you are qualified, and you are confident.
‘”I want you to do the best you can with the [chances] that they give you, Tom. If you do anything less, then shame on you.”
‘”Okay,” Brady said. “It’s time to see what I’m really made of.”‘
After Harden’s death at the age of 97 in 2024, Brady said: ‘He meant the world to me and I could never have had the success I had without the time, energy, love and support he had given me.’
Brady finally managed to win the starting job in Michigan in 1998. He ended his college career with 20 wins and 35 touchdowns in 25 games – good enough to catch the eye of the New England Patriots in the 2000 NFL Draft.
PART ONE: Every ugly detail of Tom and Gisele’s marriage… the secret letter stashed in a drawer… and her savage last three words
