Learn from the best: Tom Brady shares expert tip to throw the football like a pro quarterback in the wind

If you’re like me, you grew up wanting to be like Tom Brady, even though you were way too old to do so. No, of course it was not because you didn’t have the talent, you were just born in the wrong year.

Well, I’ve got good news at the start of 2026: you can be just like Tom Brady! The NFL legend has taken to social media to explain what I’m going to call Step 1 in The Tom Brady Guide: Throwing The Football.

For context’s sake, Brady himself is on Step 33,466, How to Improve Your Commentary Skills of the Post-retirement section of the book, and he’s doing well. The 48-year-old has developed into a genuinely insightful voice on our TV screens, something the NFL fanbase was crying out for him to be when he signed that mouthwatering 10-year, $375 million contract with Fox.

Brady was tasked with bringing life to the coverage of the NFC Wild Card game between the San Francisco 49ers and Philadelphia Eagles, a match that was marked by strong winds whipping around Lincoln Financial Field. Kicks and throws were constantly sent off-course by a particularly stubborn Mother Nature, who made her presence felt throughout.

Inside, away from the blowy conditions, Tom Brady stood in front of the camera and provided one of the most interesting peeks behind the curtain for fans as he explained how the mechanics of throwing can be affected by the conditions.

“What you see, and I talk about the point of the ball a lot, you see it from; I’ll show it to you from this angle,” Brady said, using the football in his hand as reference. “This is kind of like a neutral plane. This is when the plane is slightly down. When you’re throwing it into the wind, it has to be neutral. If the point of the ball is up, any wind friction is going to push that ball up over the top.” Bingo.

“So, as a quarterback, you don’t really like that ‘U’ throw underneath, because naturally that’s going to point the tip of the ball up,” he continued. “You like more of a ‘C’ or an inverse, a reverse ‘C’. That’s how you kind of control the point of the ball. And then you can kind of just snap it off as you throw it. But in these windy conditions, you can’t be underneath the ball. There’s too much wind surface of the ball to knock it off its path.”

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Tom, you can now move to the next chapter of the guidebook. You’ve completed the commentary position pages, trust us.

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