The first throw to Pringle was incredible, but he should have been whistled down long before that was thrown. The way the refs seem to use the “forward progress” rule to sometimes stop the play to give an advantageous spot and then sometimes not stop the play and allow a scrum to push the ball carrier forward is stupid. Mahomes was clearly stopped and in the grasp on that play and it should have been blown dead. Doesn’t take away from the physical feat that was though. The throw after that was simply one of the most incredible football plays I have ever seen.
Brady is an enigma. He did all the right things. Like you said, when he has time and open targets he will execute and he will not miss opportunities or beat himself. But, lots of QBs probably would have been just a good with that much time and that talent around him. He’s the GOAT, but it’s so hard to explain why. He’s not making incredible plays or bailing his team out with incomparable talent. If Mahomes were starting for the Bucs he probably scores 50…but of course, football doesn’t work that way.
And he was the number one draft pick back in – oh, wait, that was Manning, and also Manning – Brady was picked 199th, well after the last regular pick in round six. He was an overtime pick.
I cannot remember the last time one team in a Super Bowl was so totally dominant at the line of scrimmage. Brady almost always had time to line up, and Mahomes was under constant attack. A football team will NEVER win while losing the line of scrimmage that badly. It’s impossible.
A couple of things Brady has going for him are first, he just makes fewer throwing mistakes than other QBs, and second, he can read defenses extraordinarily quickly. He also has high expectations of his receivers to make those same reads, and I suspect that’s why his release has been so fast most of his career…fewer checkdowns/progressions to go through.
The Patriots became my number two football team after I moved to MA, and I’ve been here for his whole career. I have to say, he’s a bit about as fun a quarterback as I’ve ever watched.
This isn’t true anymore, he actually missies a lot of throws. He’s had issues connecting on deep balls over the last 4-5 seasons and he misses open pass catchers fairly regularly, he even had a few clear whiffs tonight. Now, it’s usually not catastrophic and he almost always makes the right read, but he’s not nearly as accurate as some of the other elite QBs. His TD-INT ratio is good but not extraordinary and I’d say his offenses were tailored to help him in that respect for most of his career. His completion percentage is fairly pedestrian compared to his peers in spite of him throwing short to guys like Edelman, Gronk, Welker and Brown most of the time.
I know, right? I don’t even watch football anymore, and I’m still amazed that he’s still playing and winning.
To put it in perspective, there are a whole bunch of kids in their freshman year at college right now who were in utero when Brady won his first Super Bowl.
Seeing this makes me think that Father Time has somewhat caught up with him. Only it’s not his arm strength or stamina that went first, but rather his eyesight. It’s probably only diminished a little, but that’s enough to explain things like the three picks he had on his deep balls against Green Bay.
If I’m Brady, I retire right now. Why not go out on top?
If this wasn’t the Super Bowl, we all turn off the television in the middle of the 3rd quarter. Not a lot of drama or suspense. KC had some critical penalties that could have made it closer without them, but I still think they were just a bit overmatched.
Aside from all the stats, I have to imagine there are some intangibles involved, in terms of leadership, work ethic, and the fact that he is cool as a cucumber under pressure.
He’s 1,154 yards behind Drew Brees for most career passing yards. Assuming Brees retires, as seems likely, Brady is likely to pass him around game 5 or 6 next year. That’s probably the biggest reason.
I wouldn’t say quite that; I think they complemented each other. Let’s also give credit to Bob Kraft as an owner while we’re at it. There are so many things that can go wrong when you put a team of players together. It takes great players, but leadership - from owners to coaches - create culture and stability within the organization.
There are so many quarterbacks who might have been great if only they’d played in the right organization, been surrounded with the right players, received the right mentoring, and so forth. No question, Belichick doesn’t win 6 SBs as New England’s coach with just any QB.
Tom Brady is a winner. That’s simply what he is. When Tampa lost game one of the season, they looked like a team that might have a shot at the expanded playoff format, but might very well not. By yesterday, they looked like a great team that could very well turn into a team like New England, good every year and a playoff team every year.
Yes, they have a number of very talented players besides him, but the fact is that it is the intangibles he brings to a team that puts them over the top. He knows how to win, what to do to get to that point, and the confidence and leadership to convince his teammates that it is exactly what they are going to do. It is an attitude and an aura coupled with a deep understanding of the game. His coach, who is a pretty darned good one, said in his statement, “Sometimes I just step back and let him coach.”
I try to avoid absolutes, so I pretty much avoid declaring a GOAT in any sport. In this case, however, he has convinced me. Retire? Heck, he’s already thinking about #8 next year.
stratospheric ability to read defenses: All the greats have it. He has the ability to read the field and knowing what opposing defenses are trying to do. I thought Peyton Manning was just as good in this regard, FWIW.
off-the-charts spatial awareness: It’s almost like he has a sixth sense of knowing where every single player is on the field. He rarely misses wide open receivers for this reason. He is also really, really good at evading the sack, despite being older and having always been a relatively slower runner than other QBs. He knows where each player is, on offense and defense. He’s almost unparalleled in this respect.
an exceptional EQ and ability to communicate: He garners respect among his teammates because of his ability to communicate in ways that make people want to listen. He knows when to be a hard-ass and when to soften up and be encouraging. He reads people well and knows how to push buttons.
situational awareness (killer instinct): remember how he murdered both Green Bay and Kansas City at the end of the first half? Remember how in the SB against the Rams a few years ago, he went deep to Gronkowski, who had been pretty quiet all game? I don’t think it’s necessarily that Brady sensed the defenses were ‘asleep’; I think he sensed apprehension and confusion, which also explains how he came back against Atlanta. He knows when defenses are uncomfortable, when they’re confused, when they’re not communicating or reacting quite as quickly as they were a few plays ago. He senses weakness, and he jumps all over it. And worse, he senses when defenses have gone into a full-blown panic at having realized that he senses that they’re weak.
Brady will rank in the bottom half of all QBs in recent years in terms of raw athleticism, but he’s athletic enough, and he has the intangibles to compensate for his lack of athleticism. The one area where he is ‘athletic’ is in terms of strength; Brady is deceptively strong. He has a great arm, and he has great accuracy to go with that arm.
I grew up watching Joe Montana and for years believed he was the unparalleled best I’d ever seen, with Dan Marino, Steve Young, and John Elway coming fairly close behind. Then Favre and Manning came along. Brady, IMO, has eclipsed them all. Manning won a title with another team, too, but Manning’s passing game clearly wasn’t as strong in his final year as Brady’s was. At times, Brady has played like he’s 23 or 33, not 43.
I’ve never really understood this “throwing mostly short passes” claim. Just looking back over his career, there were many years where he was in the top 10 in yards/catch (or top 11 - there are two years he was 11th). Given how shitty his receivers have sometimes been, that’s remarkable.
