For a brief moment just before spring, it looked as though Tom Brady’s march against the tides of time had come to a close. But after briefly retiring and reversing course soon afterwards, the incomparable NFL quarterback is celebrating his 45th birthday at yet another NFL training camp, with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
With each passing year, Brady’s birthday on August 3 has taken on much greater meaning as he continues to play at an elite level well into his mid-forties. And to commemorate the occasion, Buccaneers running back Leonard Fournette decided to make the extra effort so that Brady could have a cake and eat it too.
Fournette got Brady a special custom-made cake modeled after the head of a goat from The Cake Girl bakery in Tampa. Since Brady’s strict diet excludes sugar, the cake was made from a mixture of fondant and buttercream — And it also wishes the Bucs quarterback a happy “100th” birthday.
“It’s always fun to work with our Tampa Bay Bucs,” Kristina Lavallee of The Cake Girl said. “It was such an honor to make a cake for Brady’s 45th birthday.”
Now entering his third season in Tampa Bay, Brady is effectively playing with house money in continuing his career. After winning Super Bowl LV in his first season with the Bucs — his seventh championship, Brady led Tampa Bay to another playoff win in 2021 before losing a shootout with the Los Angeles Rams in the Divisional Round. Brady announced his retirement shortly afterwards, but went back on retirement after just over a month and announced he would return for the 2022 season.
When the 2022 regular season begins, Brady will become just the second player in NFL history to attempt a pass at age 45 or older. Brady will join George Blanda, who played quarterback as-needed for the then-Oakland Raiders in his late forties while also playing placekicker.
