He won the Superbowl WITHOUT great receivers OR a great defense, and his OL wasn’t particularly distinguished that year either considering they let Bledsoe get broken when he was running for his life against the Jets. (The 2001 Patriots had the 24th ranked defense. Remember them? That was when Brady led a game-winning Superbowl drive against the heavily-favored Rams.)
Again, he had none of these things when he won his first Superbowl. If we are being generous, I suppose we could call the 2001 Patriots running game “servicable”, but when you have the 13th ranked rushing offense despite having the 8th most number of attempts, I’d call it sub-par.
I can’t, really. The passing game back in those days was quite primitive, so even though the disadvantage those guys have in this conversation is unfair, it’s still a handicap. Today’s passing game is far more sophisticated, and therefore today’s passers are better out of necessity. As a quick example, previous era standards of quality were 55% completion and interceptions didn’t really matter. In today’s game those standards would get you benched.
The older guys did call their own plays, so they get a (major) bump for that, plus they didn’t wear skirts hiding behind the ref’s apron, but even with that they were still great passers in a primitive passing game.
Brady’s first year doesn’t count because he was running under the Ewing Theory. That’s a statistical aberration that should be thrown out in any and all discourse on the topic.
That’s only “true” if they were a one-year wonder. They backed it up twice in the next three years, and while they had a better defense, running game and more experienced OL, they still didn’t have any real weapons for Brady to throw to.
It was during these same years that the Eagles also had a good defense, running game and OL, and they also had no receivers. Ask any Eagles fan why they didn’t win any Superbowls and they’ll immediately point to the lack of quality receivers. Didn’t seem to stop Brady, though.
Again I would point out that Brady didn’t look particularly good last week and I truly hope he makes me eat my words by stinking up the joint 11 days from now.
Nah. That first year is under the iron-fisted dominion of the Ewing Theory. After that, it’s all skill.
I hope the Patriots lose, and not because I dislike them. They’re playing such good football right now that if someone were to beat them, it could very well be one of the best games I’ve ever seen. So I want to see that.
Heh. Me, I’d rather see them almost lose in a hard-fought game but pull it out in a fourth-quarter thriller as they have in previous games this year. Now, that would be a great game.
Well, OK - I’m playing Devil’s Advocate here more than arguing my own position, because if you put a gun to my head and asked me, I’d say Brady’s the greatest QB of all time. But still…
Your argument seems to be based on the assumption that what constitutes a “great” quarterback is fixed and immutable. There’s absolutely no question that Brady is a better passer than Otto Graham was. If you dropped Otto Graham, exactly as he was then, into Brady’s spot on the Patriots, there’s no way Graham would be as successful.
But the definition of a quarterback’s role was so entirely different then. Calling your own plays. Far less elaborate passing games, and de-emphasized passing games. Getting hit way more often, and having to run more as a regular part of the offense. Drop Brady, exactly as he is now, onto the Cleveland Browns in 1951 and he’d be just as lost as Graham would be on the Patriots in 2007.
I think the greatness of a player is measured by judging how well that player performs in his role as it’s defined in his era. Is Tom Brady as good at doing what’s expected of a QB in 2007 as Otto Graham was at doing what was expected of a QB in 1951? I’m not sure there’s a particularly definitive way to tell.
I disagree with the second paragraph, because that leaves the door open for a game-manager to be better than Dan Marino, which would be pretty silly. (If he was the bestest game manager ever! hehheh.)
As for the first part, I don’t give “he would have…” arguments much weight. If I did, I’d have to put Ricky Williams into the greatest RB of all time conversation.
Could beautiful Tom play without a face mask, as Graham did for most of his career? (An injury to Graham caused Paul Brown to invent the first crude facemask, in fact.) Could he throw the slicker ball they used back then as well as Graham could? I don’t know, and nobody else does either.
