Didier Drogba Inspired Tom Brady to Aim for Seven Titles, Pass Michael Jordan as GOAT

Tom Brady now has more championship rings than Michael Jordan. Who helped the Bucs QB dream of passing the GOAT? Didier Drogba.

After winning his seventh championship and fifth Super Bowl MVP award, it is hard not to think of Tom Brady as the GOAT.

The only other player who still rivals Brady's status? Michael Jordan.

Given their penchant for winning titles and dominating their respective sports, it makes sense that Brady admires the former Bulls star and six-time NBA champion. But a chance encounter with former Chelsea soccer star and Ivory Coast national team captain Didier Drogba at the Canadian Grand Prix several years ago helped shape the Buccaneers quarterback's mindest in his quest for GOAT status.

Drogba and Brady bumped into each other at the race a little over a year after the quarterback won his fourth Super Bowl when he beat the Seahawks in February 2015. In an interview with Sports Illustrated's Greg Bishop and Jenny Vrentas, Brady detailed what he and Drogba talked about in that crucial conversation.

The two athletes "compared notes on stretching, elasticity, recovery and fun-free diets. They tuned their bodies the same way mechanics prepped the eight-figure race cars flying past. Drogba asked Brady how long he wanted to play.

'I don't know,' Brady responded. 'I just want to keep going. I just want to win.'"

Celebrate the Bucs' Super Bowl win with SI's special commemorative issue

Drogba pressed Brady for details on how many more championships he wanted to win, getting the quarterback to reveal that he admired Jordan and saw the shooting guard's six NBA titles as the mark to match.

"If you really want to be the GOAT, you gotta try for seven," Drogba said. "If not, you're 'only' as good as MJ." 

"They laughed. In that moment, Brady says he thought, only, 'Man, you f----- crazy.' But then he won a fifth Lombardi trophy, then a sixth, and then he went to Tampa ...Then he lined up three of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history–Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers, Patrick Mahomes–and eliminated them in the span of four weeks [in the playoffs]," wrote Bishop and Vrentas.

"I never could have envisioned this," Brady told Sports Illustrated.

With his seventh Super Bowl title secured, Brady's impact and legacy have deepened, even by his own impossible standards. 

But we all know the quarterback's favorite ring is "the next one." Next season he'll be trying for No. 8.