Jimmy Garoppolo: ‘Invaluable’ experience learning from Tom Brady

Jimmy Garoppolo, who spent just over three seasons with the Patriots, credits Tom Brady for teaching him ‘invaluable’ lessons about playing quarterback.

It’s probably a fair assessment to say that most New England fans reflect fondly on Jimmy Garoppolo. After all, the affable Eastern Illinois product played admirably during limited opportunities with the Patriots, most often in relief situations when Tom Brady was taken out of the game for safety reasons.

His most glorious work for the team, of course, came when Brady was suspended in 2016. Garoppolo vanquished a still-good Arizona Cardinals team on the road in Week 1 – making his first career start and throwing for 264 yards and a touchdown on primetime television. He followed that up by slicing and dicing the Miami Dolphins at home in Week 2 to the tune of 234 yards and three touchdowns in just two quarters of play, before a shoulder injury effectively ended his time in the limelight.

So it must have been with some bittersweet remorse that Pats fans had to bid “Jimmy G” adieu on Halloween of 2017, with Belichick shipping him off to the San Francisco 49ers for a second-round pick. Most fans understood why it had to happen – Garoppolo had earned his chance to start in the NFL, and Brady continued to show no signs of decline even as he won another Super Bowl ring earlier that year.

Now, almost two years after that trade, Garoppolo’s status in the NFL quarterback hierarchy is either unknown or up for debate. He’s looked sensational in some of his starts with the Niners, but he’s also missed plenty of action as he’s continued to battle injuries.

He sat down with The Ringer’s Kevin Clark recently to discuss a range of topics, and one of the questions Clark asked was what Garoppolo felt like he learned sitting behind and working with Tom Brady for a little more than three years in New England.

This is what he had to say:

"“(Brady’s) preparation as a whole was tremendous just to see… to be in the same room as it, to learn from it. To be a rookie and see that, it was invaluable. I can barely put it into words. What you learn is playing the game within the game, that’s a big part of Tom. I don’t even know if he told me that [directly], but he would always talk about the game within the game. He would talk about the snap count, and he’d say ‘you’re going to go on two on this play’ and he’d have a specific reason. That’s not the coaches telling you, that’s the player playing the game within the game. It’s the little things, the little details and how he ties them all together—that’s what separates you.”"

It’s not the first time Brady’s greatness has been defined more in terms of his mental gifts than his physical ones. Even at 41 years old (almost 42 now), Brady still has his throwing arm and his body overall in peak condition. And yet, he’s rarely wowed onlookers consistently with his innate athleticism or corporeal gifts – it’s more often his alertness, his decision-making, and his mental toughness that draw rave reviews from teammates and competitors alike.

As such, it should come as no surprise that Garoppolo calls Brady’s masterful ability to “play the game within the game” one of the most invaluable lessons he picked up from the future Hall of Famer.