There's been plenty of speculation about when Tom Brady might eventually retire, but don't look for it to happen anytime soon.
The Patriots quarterback released a surprise episode of his Facebook documentary on Wednesday, and in the five minute video, Brady made it clear that he wants to play until he's 45. However, he did admit that playing five more seasons won't be easy.
"I would love to play five more years -- 41, 42, 43, 44, 45 -- it will be a challenge for me, I don't think it's going to be easy," Brady said. "It's f------ going to be hard to do. I think it's going to be very hard to do, but I think I can do it."
Although Brady has five Super Bowl wins and three MVP awards under his belt, the 41-year-old says he still has a lot more to accomplish in football.
"Once you stop, you're done and I think that I'm not ready to say I'm done, because I don't feel like I am. I feel that there's still things to accomplish," Brady said. "It'd be like getting close to the mountain and being like, 'It's good, I'm good.' It's like 'No, you worked really hard to get to this point, you have to finish it off.'"
Brady also believes that the second half of his career has been more impressive than the first half.
"I think the last eight years of my career have been better than the first 10, so I should just prolong it and that's what I'm trying to do," Brady said.
The surprise episode of Brady's documentary was only five minutes and 14 seconds long, much shorter than the other six episodes of "Tom vs. Time," which were released earlier this year and ranged in time for 14 to 21 minutes.
Although Brady has consistently said he wants to play until he's 45, there has been some speculation that he might call it quits before that. During Episode 5 of his documentary, Brady told Gisele that he would retire if he made it two more Super Bowls.
"Two more Super Bowls. Two more," Brady said. "That could be shorter than five or six [more years]."
That interview with Brady took place in August 2017, which means Brady has already knocked one of those Super Bowls off his list. If Brady sticks to his plan of two more Super Bowls, that means he could end up retiring as soon the 2018 season ends if the Patriots make it to the Super Bowl.
One of Brady's close friends, Willie McGinest, believes that's exactly what will happen, but only if the Patriots win it all. Over the summer, McGinest predicted that Brady would retire if New England were to win Super Bowl LIII.
Of course, if Brady is going to keep playing, he's likely only going to do it if he's having fun, and it seems that he is. In the documentary, Brady admitted that the past few years haven't been that fun, but it seems that things are getting better.
"The last couple of years, a lot of parts about football weren't enjoyable when they should've been," Brady said. "Some of it was my approach, and you know, I think anytime you're together with people for a long period of time, relationships ebb and flow and I think people are just looking for something to write and talk about. They wanted to talk about a lot of drama and I'm sure a lot teams have things like that, but ours is just to the 10th degree. I'm learning to deal with it better."
You can see the epilogue episode of "Tom vs. Time" below.