Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady's 700th career touchdown pass came at a special moment. On Sunday, it gave them a 33-27 overtime victory over the Buffalo Bills at Raymond James Stadium.
After forcing the Bills to punt in their first possession in overtime, the 44-year-old Brady led the Buccaneers to a six-play, 94-yard drive that he capped with a 58-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Breshad Perriman for his 700th career touchdown pass, the first NFL player to reach the plateau.
Brady now has 617 touchdown passes in the regular season and 83 in the postseason.
When Brady reached the 600 regular season touchdown plateau, wide receiver Mike Evans gave the ball to a fan in the stands, and the team had to recover it in exchange for some goodies.
To ensure that it won't happen again, the team assigned an equipment manager to recover the ball in case Brady reaches the milestone, per Clutch Points. As expected, when Perriman spun the ball after reaching the end zone, the equipment manager came rushing and quickly recovered the historic ball.
When asked who will get the touchdown ball, Perriman said, "he does," referring to Brady. "He definitely gets that," said Perriman. "No, thank God. I spin it, and I don't know where it went," said Perriman, adding that he went around looking for it, but they found it, referring to the team's equipment manager.
In addition, Brady also broke Drew Brees' all-time record for completions after throwing 31 against the Bills.
Perriman thankful for the triumphant return
This is Perriman's second stint with the Buccaneers, the first being in 2019 when Bruce Arians took over as head coach. That year, Perriman finished the season with career-highs in catches (36), receiving yards (645), and touchdowns (6) after Evans and Chris Godwin went down with injuries.
After that year, he signed a lucrative deal with the New York Jets. He spent training camp with the Detroit Lions this season, but he started the season with the Chicago Bears before he was cut. Perriman said his return to Tampa Bay is a blessing, and he's thankful to God for another chance. "I'm just thankful to God, and my teammates make me feel like I'm on top of the world.
It's a great feeling," said Perriman, who helped the Buccaneers extend their winning streak to four games and improve to 10-3 on the season.
Arians happy with a good team win
Arians, for his part, said he's very happy with the excellent team win despite a disastrous second half where they were limited to just three points after leading 24-3 at the half. "But it showed a lot of toughness, and we got the stop in overtime, and BP made a big play to win the game," said Arians, referring to Perriman.
The Buccaneers have a chance to clinch the NFC South with a win over the New Orleans Saints on Sunday at Raymond James. If the Buccaneers win, it will be their first division title since 2007.
