DUNEDIN, Fla. – Walking quietly through the Toronto Blue Jays clubhouse one morning this spring, Troy Tulowitzki drew a few quizzical looks because of the hoodie he was wearing.

The New England Patriots?

“I don’t like the team,” he says. “I like the guy.”

The guy is Tom Brady, whose No. 12 was emblazoned in small silver numbers on the hoodie’s right side. And it’s only because of Tulowitzki’s respect and admiration for the winningest quarterback in Super Bowl history that he’d don the colours of a divisional rival to his favourite team, the Miami Dolphins.

“I like watching the best in any sport and seeing how they got to be the best,” explains Tulowitzki. “In the NFL, Tom Brady is the perfect example. You see Aaron Rodgers and how he’s that much smarter than any other player in the NFL. In the NBA right now you look at LeBron (James), you look at Russell Westbrook, you look at (James) Harden – those guys work differently, with a purpose. They look at the long haul.

“In baseball, guys like Adrian Beltre that have been doing it for a long time at a high, high level, they’re all just a little bit different.”

Tulowitzki is a little bit different too – the shortstop also among the elite’s elite in his sport – and his following of other top athletes extends well beyond simple fandom. A relentless worker who finds comfort in exhausting sessions of batting and fielding practice, he’s fascinated by the approach and mentality of other superstars.

At 32, he’s not looking to model himself after anyone as his usually stoic intensity is already a trademark. But he’s always looking for little bits of knowledge he can glean from others that he might be able to integrate into his own game.

“You just continue to learn,” he says. “I’ve been around great guys in my career. Todd Helton was a professional. I learned from Matt Holliday, who was kind of my mentor when I first got called up. And I watch guys. I watched Derek Jeter work, how he went about his business. He was my favourite player. I’ve talked to Nomar (Garciaparra), I’ve talked to Cal (Ripken Jr.), seeing how these guys do it at the same position, and I learned from those guys.

“I pick their brain all the time and they’ve gotten me better.”

Similarly, Tulowitzki loves sharing his knowledge with the new class of gifted shortstops emerging in the game today, headlined by Francisco Lindor and Carlos Correa. Same deal with his fellow Blue Jays, both those at the big-league level and in the minors working their way up.

He and Josh Donaldson have forged a particularly strong bond, even though the all-star third baseman’s obvious fire and passion on the field stands in stark contrast to his steady calmness.

“I pass my knowledge on to certain guys who are able to handle it,” says Tulowitzki. “You don’t go up to everybody in this locker room and talk to them about this stuff, because they’re not at that level, they’re not ready for that in their career. That’s no disrespect to them. We’re all at certain stages in our career. Me and JD can talk at the same level. To Devon (Travis), who’s going to be a heck of a player, it’s going to be a process for him. So you pick and choose guys and try to help them in any way, but you can’t be on the same level with everybody.”

Few are on the same level as Tulowitzki, and manager John Gibbons has often pointed to how his addition, along with those of Donaldson and Russell Martin, complemented Jose Bautista’s competitiveness and helped transform the Blue Jays’ collective mindset.

While the trio’s talent is very obviously the most significant gain, their will to win can’t be overlooked.

“It revs up the intensity a notch,” says Gibbons. “Baseball is a different game, you need to be able to slow things down and relax probably a lot more than other sports. But you still need that good mental toughness and intensity from that angle. You’re at it every day and you’ve got to push yourself because it’s not easy day after day after day to keep that intensity.

“You watch all post-season baseball games, there’s like a different energy, right? But some teams have more of that during the season, whether that’s focus or just the personality of the guys,” he continues. “When your key guys and top guys are that type of personality, it’s got to rub off on everyone that way, because most of the team are looking to those guys. We have so many of them that everybody gets caught up in it.”

Tulowitzki comes by his intensity honestly, in part a by-product of not being drafted out of Fremont High School in Sunnyvale, Calif. At California State University, Long Beach, he blossomed into a rising star, prompting the Colorado Rockies to draft him seventh overall in 2005.

“Playing with that chip on your shoulder,” he says of his style. “I didn’t just wake up and be this guy that I am right now. I got it through work, man. I went to college, didn’t get a scholarship, and made myself into a first-rounder. How I made myself into a first-rounder is I brought intensity every day and a steadiness that someone can count on. Professional organizations saw it and it made me bypass a lot of people because of what they saw.

“I knew that was my ticket to success, so I need to be that way every time I stepped on a ball field.”