How Buccaneers' Tom Brady finds ways to connect come playoff time

TAMPA, Fla. — In 2020, on a rain-dampened field, a practice squad receiver named Cyril Grayson — who hadn't played a down of college football and had one NFL catch for three yards to his name prior — now had arguably the greatest quarterback of all time running the show.

On the first route Grayson ran, he slipped.

«I was making excuses, and I was like, 'Man, the ground.' He was like, 'It's a perfectly laid ground.' Just being hard on me,» Grayson said. «And then he throws me the ball that's in the sun, and he goes, 'Hey, I don't need any excuses. You're an NFL receiver.'»

For a moment, Grayson, who had been on five other practice squads prior to Tampa Bay, put his head down. He felt defeated.

He thought to himself, «Man, he's being too hard on me,» Grayson said.

And then Tom Brady came over.

He told him, «The reason I'm so hard on you is because you have this talent — I just want to pull that out of you,» Grayson recalled. «I see that in you, and I just want you to see that in yourself.»

«From that moment, I knew he felt something in me,» Grayson said.

Neither knew a year later, after the unexpected departure of Antonio Brown, in the Bucs' Week 17 game at the New York Jets, that Brady would hit Grayson with the winning 33-yard pass late in the fourth quarter.

Getting the most out of virtually every teammate is one of many reasons Brady has been so good down the stretch in nearly every one of his 22 seasons, with the exception of his first season as a starter (2000) and 2008, when he suffered a torn ACL in Week 1.

Brady owns a staggering 112-31 (.783) record after Thanksgiving, and 43-14 (.754) in January and February. When other teams fade, as rosters are whittled down because of injuries, Brady's teams ascend. He finds