Alabama’s newest quarterback wears the same number as one of, if not the greatest, quarterbacks of all time.

Freshman Keelon Russell picked No. 12 to wear for Alabama, the same number Tom Brady wore in his Hall of Fame career. That’s probably not an accident.

Russell, it seems, tries to learn from how Brady did things. Russell is on the cover of Men’s Health magazine, and in an interview, he shared how he looks to shape his mental game like Brady.

“We all know he was a sixth-round pick, didn’t nobody believe in him—now he’s one of the greatest of all time,“ Russell told Men’s Health. ”It gives me that drive—it touches my heart.

“A coach told me Tom would study film all night, sleep in the film room. That’s one of the things that I take away from him.”

There’s at least one person in the Alabama building who saw Brady’s rise himself. That’s general manager Courtney Morgan. He and Brady both played for Michigan at the same time.

“I saw Tom Brady when he was on his come up,” Morgan told AL.com in December. “I didn’t see the Tom Brady everyone knows. I saw the Tom Brady that was building the foundation to be who he was.”

Russell is entering his freshman season with the Crimson Tide. The 247Sports Composite ranked him the No. 2 overall prospect in the entire 2025 recruiting class. He is in competition with Ty Simpson and Austin Mack to be the starting quarterback, but Simpson has been labeled the frontrunner by the coaching staff.

Nick Kelly is an Alabama beat writer for AL.com and the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on X and Instagram.