New Tampa Bay Buccaneers WR Russell Gage thought call from QB Tom Brady was a prank

TAMPA, Fla. — Tampa Bay Buccaneers new wide receiver Russell Gage said Friday that when quarterback Tom Brady personally called him Monday night on the first day of the NFL's legal tampering period, he thought it was a prank. Gage had just talked to his agent and was weighing his options on where to sign next.

«For a minute, I thought it was a prank, somebody was trying to pull one on me,» Gage said. «He just told me about what they have here in Tampa Bay and that he wanted me to be a part of it, that they something really special going on. Honestly, he didn't have to say much. He definitely had me hooked on it after that.… It was definitely special.»

Gage said he got the call when he was taking out the trash. The two had no prior relationship, other than facing each other twice a year over the last two seasons. In Gage's last game against the Bucs, he hauled in a career-best 130 receiving yards in Week 13.

«I had just seen some fake news on social media so my mind was kind of on fake news so then when I got the call, it was kind of like, 'Alright.' I'm in a state of shock and I'm stuck between, 'OK, this is unreal' and 'this is not funny!'» Gage said. «Just trying to navigate my way through that, and then as we got going, I realized, 'OK, this is something serious.'

»I had conversations with teams and offers and whatnot, but this was just completely different. This was like no other. It was a huge blessing. I was three years old when Tom Brady got into the NFL, so to hear from somebody like that, just seeing the other day that he unretired and now he's reaching out to me? It was unreal."

At what point did he know that it was no prank?

«Probably midway through,» Gage said. «I could kind of tell in the delivery that, 'OK,