Five years ago this Saturday, Tom Brady became the first quarterback to reach 600 career touchdown passes, and the man who caught No. 600 promptly gave the ball away. On Sunday, October 24, 2021, Brady hit Mike Evans for a 9-yard score as the opening quarter ticked down to its final six seconds, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers went on to crush the Chicago Bears 38-3 at Raymond James Stadium.
The win lifted the defending champions to 6-1. For Brady, then 44, it was another entry in a record book he had spent that fall rewriting: earlier in the season he had already overtaken Drew Brees for the most passing yards in league history.
Three scores in one quarter
Brady arrived in Week 7 two touchdown passes short of the milestone, and Tampa Bay got there before the first quarter was over. Leonard Fournette opened the scoring with a 2-yard run. Brady’s 599th touchdown pass went to Chris Godwin. Then, as the clock wound down in the opening period, he found Evans in the end zone to make it 21-0.
Evans was not finished. He caught two more touchdown passes in the second quarter, and the Buccaneers took a 35-3 lead into halftime. The only Chicago points of the afternoon came on a second-quarter field goal. The second half was a formality: neither side reached the end zone, Blaine Gabbert replaced Brady in the fourth quarter, and a late Tampa Bay field goal closed the scoring.
Brady finished 20 of 36 for 211 yards, four touchdowns and no interceptions. Evans had six catches for 76 yards and three scores, Godwin caught eight passes for 111 yards, and Fournette ran 15 times for 81 yards. Tampa Bay did it without two of Brady’s favorite targets, Antonio Brown and Rob Gronkowski, who were both sidelined by injuries. Afterward Brady called football “the ultimate team sport.”
For Chicago, the day belonged to the defense across the field. Rookie Justin Fields completed 22 of 32 passes for 184 yards but threw three interceptions, lost two fumbles and was sacked four times. Khalil Herbert’s 100 rushing yards on 18 carries were the Bears’ lone bright spot, and defensive lineman Bilal Nichols was ejected for throwing a punch.
The ball that went into the crowd
Evans, unaware that the pass was the milestone, handed the ball to a fan in the front row behind the end zone, a 29-year-old named Byron Kennedy. The Buccaneers had to negotiate to get it back. Kennedy agreed to return it, and the club’s thank-you grew into a package that included two signed Brady jerseys, a signed Brady helmet, a signed Evans jersey and his game cleats, a $1,000 credit at the team store and season tickets for the rest of 2021 and all of 2022.
Two nights later, during a Monday night broadcast appearance alongside Peyton and Eli Manning, Brady added his own gift: one Bitcoin, worth just under $63,000 at the time. He joked that the fan had “lost all his leverage” by handing the ball over so quickly. Collectors at the time estimated the ball could have fetched around $500,000 on the open market.
Where 600 stood
The touchdown put Brady 29 ahead of Brees, who had retired with 571. Peyton Manning (539) and Brett Favre (508) were the only other passers ever to reach 500. Brady kept adding to the total: he led the league with 43 touchdown passes that season and retired after the 2022 campaign with 649 in the regular season, still the most in NFL history.
The record that afternoon in Tampa was never in doubt. The only real drama was the ball, and it ended with the ball back in Brady’s hands and a fan going home with a Bitcoin.
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