Tom who? UCLA star Maya Brady establishes herself in a well-known household

CLEARWATER, Fla. — There’s a photograph that UCLA coach Kelly Inouye-Perez nonetheless has, one that is still extremely sentimental, as a result of it helps clarify how the Bruins landed certainly one of their future superstars.

A celebrity who occurs to have a well-known celebrity uncle or two.

Within the photograph, 9-year-old Maya Brady stands entrance and middle in UCLA gear, smiling massive. All the workforce, wearing uniform, smiles throughout her. Inouye-Perez is off to 1 facet of the photograph. Maya’s “Uncle Tommy” Brady is within the photograph too, off to the left.

Maya Brady fell in love with UCLA softball after watching the Bruins win the Girls’s Faculty World Collection in 2010. Already a proficient softball participant in her personal proper, Brady zeroed in a single participant particularly: freshman outfielder B.B. Bates, a participant who seemed like her, inspiring her to imagine it was attainable that she, too, might play at UCLA someday.

She attended a summer time softball camp at UCLA, after which her journey ball coach, Mike Stith, organized to take younger Brady to a sport and a meet-and-greet with the workforce. Her mother, Maureen, sister and uncle (sure that Tom Brady) got here on the go to together with her, and he or she lastly had the prospect to satisfy her position mannequin.

“I keep in mind being so nervous as a result of it was my first UCLA sport that I had ever gone to,” Brady says now. “I used to be that shy little 9-year-old child that the coaches would ask inquiries to, and I’d simply smile and take a look at my mother as a result of I couldn’t even converse.

“My uncle Tommy was with me as a result of he had moved to L.A. on the time and UCLA was proper subsequent to his home, so we wished him to go together with us to make it much more particular for me.”

Brady had already made an impression on the UCLA coaches with out even understanding it. Inouye-Perez remembers a play Brady made throughout a summer time camp that she nonetheless talks about in the present day.

“She was a extremely skinny little factor, they usually have been taking floor balls and there was a excessive chopper,” Inouye-Perez stated. “She got here in and he or she charged it, turned it into a brief hop and threw it on the run to first and I went, ‘Oh, take a look at that lady. Simply pure athleticism.’ I informed her when she got here up afterwards to go to, ‘I keep in mind you. You turned that prime chopper into a brief hop,’ and he or she acquired the most important smile on her face.”

The go to left Brady extra sure than ever that UCLA was the place she wished to be. Now, right here she is, 12 years later, main the Bruins within the St. Pete/Clearwater Elite Invitational. UCLA takes on Florida State tonight (7 p.m. ET, ESPN/ESPN App) in a extremely anticipated matchup between two of the nation’s finest softball applications.

“Having a lot admiration for them after the World Collection win, after which going there and being in that ambiance across the workforce and coaches actually made me a die-hard UCLA fan,” Brady stated. “B.B. Bates was such an enormous idol for me, as a result of I merely felt like I might relate to her. She not solely gave me the arrogance that somebody like me might play at UCLA, however I might go and play school softball normally.”

Attending to UCLA, after all, was not so simple as saying, “I need to play at UCLA.” Brady was born with athletic presents, as her final identify suggests. Along with Tom Brady, who not too long ago retired from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, her mother and aunt Nancy each performed collegiate softball. Her aunt Julie performed collegiate soccer and is married to former Crimson Sox infielder Kevin Youkilis. Sister Hannah is a volleyball participant.

The load of expectation comes with being in her household. Brady embraced all that, and her Uncle Tommy has not been shy about lavishing her with reward — most particularly on social media — the place he has known as her “probably the most dominant athlete within the Brady household … by far!”

Maya Brady, probably the most dominant athlete within the Brady household…by far! https://t.co/BUstHqAyjD

— Tom Brady (@TomBrady) March 7, 2021

What stood out to Inouye-Perez from the very starting — along with Brady’s athletic capacity — is not only the best way your entire Brady household embraced UCLA, however the best way Maya Brady realized the identical work ethic and competitiveness that has grow to be a trademark of the Brady household.

Inouye-Perez performed in opposition to Maureen Brady, a celebrity pitcher at Fresno State within the Nineteen Nineties who led the Bulldogs to 2 WCWS appearances and had 80 profession wins. So the 2 have a protracted historical past collectively, and all the time shared a mutual respect.

Brady credit her mother for serving to her push her limits. Maureen Brady labored as a touring nurse whereas elevating her two daughters as a single mother. However she made it her mission to verify each Maya and her youthful sister, Hannah, had the identical alternatives in sports activities, and did no matter she wanted to do to make {that a} actuality.

“Seeing how my mother operates in life is on one other stage, and I genuinely don’t know if anybody works more durable than her,” Brady stated. “She always jogs my memory of how nothing is handed to you and the way arduous and unforgiving life may be, so I take what she tells me and I attempt to apply it in my very own life, whether or not that be within the classroom or on the sector.”

Brady began out enjoying each softball and soccer. Actually, she wished to pitch identical to her mother. However coaches by no means put her within the circle, as a substitute telling her she ought to play shortstop. Alongside the best way, she developed right into a terrific hitter — one thing her mother helps her with as properly.

“I developed as a hitter undoubtedly with the assistance of my mother guiding me to assume like a pitcher, and her telling me what she would throw me,” Brady stated.

By the point UCLA coaches noticed her play for the primary time outdoors certainly one of their camps, Brady was in seventh grade and confirmed extra of the athletic capacity and velocity that make her so particular. When it got here time for her recruitment, Brady dedicated to UCLA as a freshman in highschool. However over her softball profession, as she developed her energy, Brady went from being a slapper on the plate to a much more dominant energy hitter.

That was on full show when she was a real freshman in 2020, when she was chosen the Softball America Freshman Participant of the 12 months after main the Bruins with seven house runs and tying for first with 28 RBIs in a COVID-19-shortened season.

Final yr, she made first-team All-Pac-12 after hitting .333 and tying for the workforce lead with 14 house runs. Already one of many strongest gamers on the workforce, her subsequent step is discovering extra consistency together with her swing.

Brady stated she centered this previous offseason on “going again to the fundamentals and what I used to be comfy doing, and centered on what had acquired me to UCLA within the first place. Generally you overthink what that you must work on, so the assistance of my outdated journey ball coach actually helped me rather a lot.”

Inouye-Perez stated, “Being a first-team All-American as a freshman now creates expectations, and expectations can result in urgent or desirous to do extra. And he or she desires that, she desires to be acknowledged as the most effective participant in Division I softball, and with it, she is aware of comes execution. So I really like seeing her develop and develop. She’s a fierce competitor and desires to be often called any person who can do injury at any time.

“The lucky factor for her is, she’s in a program the place she’s going to get some massive video games like this Sunday. Persons are going to pitch their aces in opposition to us. So she’s going to get extra expertise, and hopefully, if all goes as deliberate, deeper right into a season to permit her to get extra massive moments. That, by nature, makes athletes higher since you discover ways to embrace it. You discover ways to method it. You discover ways to achieve success in these moments.”

Veteran teammate Aaliyah Jordan, among the finest hitters for the Bruins, instantly took Brady beneath her wing when she arrived at UCLA. She noticed Brady develop from a shy participant who didn’t say a lot into somebody who now takes the lead in cracking jokes and goofing off. However the place Jordan has tried to assist probably the most is in giving recommendation a giant hitter wants to listen to.

The 2 are hitting companions and have grown shut over the previous three years. When Jordan leaves after this season, she is aware of will probably be Brady who carries ahead as a workforce chief, one who has realized the best way to not solely assist her teammates however assist herself.

“She has an incredible swing, so I don’t really want to show her a lot there, however I’d say serving to with the psychological sport of not using the curler coaster of feelings and having confidence in your self,” Jordan stated. “And understanding that you simply’ve put within the work to achieve success in any given state of affairs.

“Each pitcher goes to offer her their finest pitch. Generally she would possibly get a bit bit in her head about that, however she has the flexibility to remain true to herself and say, ‘I’m Maya Brady.’ She will be able to hit actually any pitch, it may very well be 5 ft over her head. It may very well be two inches off the bottom. She’ll nonetheless hit it out.”

Certainly, making a reputation for herself as Maya Brady is necessary, too. Already, she is engaged on NIL alternatives that shall be introduced over the following month, however the aim stays to get UCLA again to Oklahoma Metropolis.

There is perhaps a bit lady someplace watching her, being impressed the best way she was when she noticed Bates play for UCLA within the WCWS 12 years in the past. What Brady won’t know is that Bates had her personal supply of inspiration as a younger lady. Watching future Olympian Natasha Watley play for UCLA made Bates need to be a Bruin, too.

The connection actually isn’t misplaced on Bates, who remembers assembly shy, 9-year-old Maya Brady all these years in the past.

“For Maya to level me out, as a result of we had numerous athletes come via which are African American, was fairly superior,” Bates stated. “I acquired to take a seat within the bleachers and watch Natasha Watley, and that impressed me, and I used to be in a position to manifest and visualize my dream faculty. So I can solely think about what it did for her.”

From Watley within the early 2000s to Bates within the 2010s to Brady within the 2020s, there would possibly simply be a UCLA softball participant 10 years from now who has the same story … and the same photograph to share.

“I need to give little women the identical imaginative and prescient and identical objectives that B.B. gave me,” Brady stated. “Once I see little women on the sport I simply consider myself in that clubhouse with the 2010 workforce, and the way a lot we have an effect on these women and make their day by doing the smallest acts.”