That's odd since every Sunday I see Brady ducking defenders coming from his blindside without even looking to see that they are coming. He is also very good at sidestepping or stepping up in the pocket.
If I remember correctly, the most troubled I see Brady is constant pressure straight up the middle. The edge rushers don't seem to phase him and if a corner blitzes he usually knows right away and throws into the spot they vacate.
How far back does your football knowledge go? Did you see Montana play? Did you see Roger Staubach play? How about Terry Bradshaw? I'm not trying to come across as a know it all or trying to downplay your knowledge of football because many here know more about the game than I do, that being said I can speak from experience because I saw these great players, not a highlight reel on the NFL network. You are right about Brady moving up in the pocket, but all QBs do that, but he showed his limitations when facing the Giants who were able to contain him and they were not even close in their skill level to some of the defenses that reigned in the NFC when Joe played.
response to displacedfan's last post: It is but Flacco has only played 2 good games in postseason and doesn't have SBs, Brady vs. Manning is a decade plus track record of one succeeding and one failing. Again, it's not just the postseason record, it's the play in critical situations and the fact that Manning has had more talent around him 75% of the time. 1) Brady was battered all game long but w/ the game on the line led an 80 yd TD drive then his D blew it in the final minute. Brady didn't have a great game but in the biggest moments he stepped up and his D failed. He didn't get 14 pts on STs, he didn't throw a pick 6, he didn't have a chance to run out the clock, he didn't get 2 possessions to win the game in OT. 2) Peyton was handed 14 pts, peyton threw a pick 6, Peyton couldn't run out the clock, peyton had 2 possessions in OT and set up the GW FG for Bal w/ an INT. Yes it was Peyton's fault. 3) Needed ONE 1st down to ensure AV's FG would be at the gun, ONE. Not only did he fail but he threw an incomplete pass which saved us a critical timeout. 4) mark Sanchez is not peyton Manning or Tom Brady and Mark did not need one 1st down to end the game in a REGULAR season game in his rookie yar- you think that's a good comparison to Peyton in postseason? 5) Mark was bad, he gave Denver life but we allowed Tim tebow to go 95 yds in the final minutes so yes it's on the D. your 2nd list: 1) led O to 7 pts in 2nd half and that was on a gift where no one covered reggie Wayne. He needed one first down to end it, he failed and took a sack to punt from the 1 setting up tying FG. 2) actually TB didn't need one 1st down to end the game, the Giants got the ball back w/ almost 4 minutes left. How could one first down have ended the game? Wes Welker DROPPED a 1st down reception which would have out NE in FG range and almost ensured they win but one 1st down does not end that game UNLIKE SD 2008. 3) Brady did fail, who said Brady has never failed? defense didn't win the game, Bal dropped a GW TD then missed a chip shot FG. They got lucky. 4) I think you are confused about what needing one 1st down to end a game means. SD had NO timeouts left, one 1st down and Indy can kneel on the ball. The jets had 2 TOs but one first down makes us use them on st and 2nd down then they could have run clock down on 3rd to give AV the kick at the gun. Brady failed in that spot to get a 1st down but even if they get it the Colts have another To AND the 2 min warning and Brady led an offense w/ reche Caldwell and Jabar gaffney as his manin weapons to 27 pts on the raod against a D that allowed a total of 27 pts in the 3 other playoff games combined. My examples are not misleading, I just explained it. awesome but 48-50 yd kicks are not chip shots especially w/ the game on the line. you push the blame to others, Peyton gets ALL the credit when they win and when they perform but none of the balme from some. He led his O to 3 pts in the last 3 qtrs at a choking Miami D and set up his K for a long Fg on grass. That's not on his K. Vs. Pitt had had 2nd and 3rd and 2 from the Pitt 28 and went deep each time, that's not on his Kicker. Again, Sanchez in a similar spot vs. Indy set up his K for a chip shot to win. I don't ignore anything, you can just post satst and excuses all you want. he had good #s vs. Pitt but cost them the game, he had good #s but SD but cost them the game. It's about digging deeper than just the #s. In our 2009 run Sanchez's best #s came at Indy but he had his worst game there. Peyton led his team to garbage time pts in 1999 and pretty much at NE 2003. I take away D/STs points for both. For peyton it is minus 21(7 in SB on INT return and 14 the other day) I agree, stats w/o context show you very little so why are you posting stats w/o context? The links made excuses and ignored the facts, they ignored the overturned INT vs. Pitt, they ignored the 3rd and 4th and 2 vs. Pitt, they ignored the 2 RZ INTs vs. SD, they ignored the failure to get a 1st down vs. us and at SD, they ignored the choking Miami D and only scoring 3 the last 3 qtrs of that game and they ignore the gift 14 pts Saturday along w/ his pick 6 and 2 failed possessions to win in OT.
Teams were better in Joe's day as there wasn't free agency but the skill level and athleticism of players today is far greater. Joe got eaten up by the Giants Ds in those days. All QBs have triouble vs. certain teams/D's. Joe was flawless in SBs against overmatched AFC teams but he did have troubles against other NFC teams and while you try to take away from Brady based on opponents Brady never had half the talent(O & D) that Joe regularly had. I still rank Joe higher but it's getting closer.
You said Brady couldn't buy time if his life depended on it. That is what I responded to because it was wrong. I don't know why you are ranting at me when what I said was a pretty obvious statement. Why would I need to see those other QBs play to take issue with your statement about Brady? Anyways now you are trying to minimize it by saying all QBs do that which is also wrong. Brady has elite pocket presence/awareness which makes up for his lack of mobility. Plenty of QBs like Sanchez/Tannehill/Fitz/Flacco are more mobile but still end up getting hit more because they don't have that type of awareness and can't escape pressure by knowing how to step away or duck. If your point is that Brady is less mobile than Montana for instance then fine, I don't think anybody would argue against that. I responded because you exaggerated and took it too far. If you don't like me pointing that out then post what you really mean next time.
I never tried taking away anything from Brady, I consider him a great QB and I would put him in the top 5 all time. I disagree Junc the athleticism of today's players is not better than those of Joe's day, if anything it's still the same. LT, Charles Haley, Reggie White, Jerome Brown, Marcus Allen, Steve Attwater, Ronnie Lott, Dexter Manley, Darrel Green....etc could play in any era and would still be dominant.
I can't wait for Brady to retire. Brady, Marino, Kelly, and maybe Bellicheck are like the mount rushmore of Jet killers.
You could find examples of players from the 50s and 60s too but athletes like those players that stood out back then are now the norm. Players are bigger, stronger, faster than ever before.
I've read most of the posts here and 1 factor that makes Brady better than Manning is the weather factor. Where did Manning play most of his career? In a dome that has no weather factor - rain/snow/sleet/temps in the 30s and below, often close to 0. Manning's losses to Brady in the playoffs (and some in the RS) occurred in Foxboro in the winter months, primarily January. His only victory (in his SB year) was in the dome in Indy. Manning couldn't be successful in cold/snowy weather (on a regular basis over his career) if he wanted to. Saturday's defeat by Baltimore in Denver - was I surprised? Not a bit. It better stay warm in Denver for whatever years Manning has left or he won't win the important games. Brady, on the other hand, has a great record when the temperature falls below 30 and even near 0. In the early Patriots SB years, look at Manning's great list of pro bowlers year in and year out. I bet most to most NFL fans, the Patriots in the SB years were constantly asking themselves - Who are these guys? Yes, Brady was a major factor in making great players from journeymen Offensive players. No one can deny that. But that is also what makes him greater tha Manning. Again, Manning had the pro bowlers and couldn't produce playoff success on a regular basis. Brady was able to take journeymen players and make them great, and winners.
The stats I post from the links have context. They list the stats for many other QBs so you can compare them and see how they stack up in the league. It shows how people think Peyton throws RZ INTs more often than other QBs in the playoffs but then compared to Brady, he has thrown the same amount. It shows that people think Peyton throws picks late in close games, that he has thrown the same amount of INTs as Brady in the those situations. It also shows the totals of other QBs to see how it stacks up overall. Stats in context with other players. Also for example, how is 2nd worst average starting field position an excuse? It's a reason. An excuse is "Peyton Manning didn't have the right tape on his fingers so he lost". TO CLARIFY BEFORE YOU TAKE THAT AND RUN, I AM NOT SAYING THAT IS A REASON PEYTON LOST, IT'S AN EXAMPLE OF AN EXCUSE. Junc also, how can you write this "Wes Welker DROPPED a 1st down reception which would have out NE " after writing this "I don't want to hear about drops and all that, all QBs have drops." You are using the drop excuse for Brady but said the article couldn't use it with the quote above. Why is 7 taken out from Peyton in the SB loss? They scored 17 and all from the offense. I think you confused the pick 6 from the SB win against the Bears and thought it was from the SB loss against the Saints. Hayden picked it off against CHI, Brees had 0 INTs in the other SB I believe. Actually in IND in Sanchez' first run, our defense had it's worst game IND which makes sense and Sanchez had his best game. He contributed much more than either the SD game or the CIN game and helped put us in a position to stay close. THe D had their worst playoff game there while Sanchez had his best there from the numbers and his play. He didn't have to be hidden in the IND game which was a big step for him and his career. You want to guess the distance of AV's GW winning kick against STL? Yep, 48 yards the same amount Vandy had. This is what I mean. Two very similar scenarios, both kickers lined up from 48 yards to win the game, both QBs on the sideline watching their kickers, and the kick gave Brady the W and Peyton the L. We assign the W to Brady and the L to Peyton but the W/L for both games came down to the kicker and at this point the QB had nothing to do with the game. Yet we assign the W to Brady because his kicker made it and assign the loss to Manning because his kicker missed it? This is why W/L is tough to judge as a QB stat. Both QBs but their kicker in the same situation and the kicker's leg decided the Win or Loss. Nobody likes the IF game because it can go on forever, but here's how it much affects playoff W/L without the QB ever stepping on the field: -IF AV misses against OAK, Brady's W/L drops from 17-6 to 14-7. Such a dramatic drop on a play Brady had no control over. Did Brady play great that game, of course. But the difference between the loss and win didn't rest on his hands or a play he was on the field for. -If Doug Brien makes that field goal, Chad Pennington gets another W. He had no control over either kick, but it affects his W/L. -If Kyle Williams holds onto the ball, Eli Manning doesn't win another SB and Brady probably gets ring #4 against SF changing all those records, or Alex Smith becomes a SB winning QB. - If Mike Vanderjagt makes his FG against MIA Peyton's record jumps to 10-10 with 1 potential loss or 3 more potential wins. -The craziest one is what if Larry Fitz didn't trip over his teammate on the sideline chasing Harrison? -What if Hank Baskett recovers that onside kick in the NO/IND SB? These what IFs are a lot different that what IF QB A made a better throw because that is QB play. This is something that clearly affected W/L record of a QB in the playoffs that they had no control over. These are all plays the QB was not on the field for that change W/L. Some of them are even game ending plays too. And since the playoffs are just a part of a season, usually things don't even themselves out statistically like over the long run of a 10 year career or so. This is why it's hard for me to use playoff W/L as a deciding factor in any argument. It comes down to so many plays the QB has no part of. You haven't really addressed this part of the argument from me, just focused on the Peyton Manning part. He is a lightning rod in sports so I understand that, but my first post ended with me asking how playoff W/L is a QB stat? We haven't addressed that except that I use Peyton as an example of this. I can use Brady too, or Sanchez, or Flacco, but Peyton just had a perfect game for it this past weekend and has much more of career than Rodgers or Ryan. We haven't a discussed a single Peyton win except when discussing the IND/NE AFC championship game in 2006. Besides that, I haven't even talked about Peyton's wins so I don't know how I am giving him all the credit for something I haven't talked about. If you want we can discuss how when Peyton got late defensive stops from defense/ST, he won a SB and the same holds true for Brady and most QBs of this generation. When his defense made the late stops, he won SBs and posted an impressive 9-0 playoff record, when they stopped getting those stops (NYG twice, IND, etc) he stopped winning SBs even though he played at a higher level than he did in his 9-0 start. It's funny how that works. And when he has played his worst, he actually won games.* Oh and yeah, if you want to discuss Peyton's wins and credit he does or does not deserve, we can do that, but I haven't done that or assigned credit for wins. I only have been looking at losses from Peyton Manning. You are misreading what I am writing about him. In fact I don't think I linked to anything talking about his wins, so again, not sure what you are reading? I don't think I even mentioned credit, in fact when searching for "credit" on this page, besides this post from me, this was the other time I said it "Do we really give Flacco credit for his 4/10 win against NE and then discredit him for a great game last year played against NE?" Not even in relation to Peyton Manning. If you could find where I was giving Peyton all the credit, please go ahead and point it out and I'll see what I was talking about. In fact I said this in one of my long post "Also to clarify, Peyton deserves blame just as every QB deserves blame" so you definitely took the credit argument from someone else and mistakenly applied it to me. But yeah, if you want to discuss how playoff W/L is a QB stat and not a team stat, I am all for it. But most things point to it's much more than a QB stat which makes it hard to use. Like Sanchez has a better playoff record than Matt Ryan or Aaron Rodgers, yet both those QBs are clearly better. This is an extreme example obviously, but it's a quick way to show how misleading playoff records can be.
This is one of things I'm curious about. How did Brady take subpar talent his first 4 years and then when he got better offensive talent like Moss, Hernandez, Welker, etc he hasn't won a SB yet. That's what makes it so interesting. As Brady's offensive talent has gotten better and he has gotten better as a QB, he hasn't added on to the hot start of his career. It's really interesting to see why. I credit it to the fact the Patriots teams became too QB centric recently and you see Bill noticing and tying to fix it by establishing the run and spending multiple picks and trading for defense. I wonder if this is the case or some confirmation bias I have. It's strange though that the addition of his ability and offensive talent has led to 0 more Super bowls. It adds in my mind to the fact that W/L is very misleading in the playoffs. Tom Brady is clearly a better QB now than he was 10 years ago, his SBs came when he wasn't close to the level he is now.
I think the problem here is that you are abusing drugs. In what universe is it even remotely possible to state with a straight face that Brady has somehow regressed over the last several years, each of which has shown him to win 10 to 14 regular season games each? Lunacy. Here's the fact. Every SB he's played in has been a one score game. In this parity laden age, the Patriots are just a couple of lucky plays away from being anywhere between 0-5 and 5-0 in the big game with Brady. As a Jets fan, I could only wish my team would deteriorate like that.
I never said Brady regressed. I stated " As Brady's offensive talent has gotten better and he has gotten better as a QB". But his first 3 years he started 9-0, obviously undefeated can't last forever, but it has become a 8-6 record since then with no Super Bowls. That's the interesting part, he has gotten really really good since his 3/4 year run, but something around him failed that didn;t fail in the first 3/4 year run. I also said "Tom Brady is clearly a better QB now than he was 10 " So I think you just misread me. I meant the playoff record has dropped and it's not due to Brady's play because he grown immensely as QB.
Totally diagree ... Brady made BB. Not the other way around. BB was a decent coach who hit the luckiest jackpot in history with Brady. Not only did he pass on him for 5 rounds, he was sitting behind Bledsoe before Mo Lewis did them a huge favor and fucked everyone else in the league. You think BB is getting to all those SBs and winning those rings with Drew Bledsoe? No chance. BB would have no effect whatsoever on Manning, who basically runs the entire offense himself. BB is supposed to be a defensive genius ... but his defenses have been surprisingly mediocre lately. No Brady ... no rings. EDIT: BTW ... just take a look at the five players BB drafted before Brady. Complete disasters. And since he drafted Brady the only big time offensive weapon they've drafted in 12 years is Gronk.
responding to displaced fan: He hasn't thrown the same amount, peyton makes critical mistakes as I have shown. comparing their stats means nothing, show me all the late game flubs by Brady? of course he has a few but Peyton has been the consistent reason for so many of his teams playoff failures. avg starting FP is an excuse. He couldn't have started w/ better FP in the Pitt '05 game and still failed. It's not like he is always starting in poor FP. Let's look at the game he scored ZERO points in: starting FP: Ind 26 Ind 29 Ind 35 Ind 9 Ind 31 Ind 31 Ind 41 Ind 33 Ind 30 What is the excuse for this game? Did I take out 7 for the NO loss from the O? If I did it was a mistake b/c that comes out fromt he D total. Sanchez didn't have his best game in the 2009 title game, he had his best #s from that postseason but his worst game of the 3. One on grass, one on turf. One a clutch kicker, one the peyton of kickers. Peyton had AV for as long as Brady had him, if it is as easy as setting up AV why couldn't he do it? We can play the if game all day. Like what IF Peyton didn't didn't choke all the time? what if he got his K into chip shot range vs. Pitt? what if he only threw ONE RZ INT instead of 2 vs. SD, what if he he didn't throw 4 INTs at NE, what if he got one 1st down against us and SD, what if he didn't throw a SB ending INT, what if he didn't turn it over 3 times leading to 17 pts for Baltimore.
You can't really blame Peyton for the loss against the Ravens can you? His team put up, what, 35 points? The loss against the Ravens is solely on the defense. You usually don't lose when you put 35 points up on the board.
He and his O only put up 21, he threw an INT for a TD, he fumbled setting up another TD, he threw a 2nd pick that set up the GE FG for Baltimore. YES we can blame Peyton, he deserves the most blame.
I saw both Montana and Staubach play. Staubach (My favorite player growing up, and still one my favorites) was a raw scrambling QB when he was young that made himself into a great QB and leader (He's a top 10 in my book). Bradshaw was a great thrower on a team with elite speed receivers and a great running game, to go along with a defense for the ages. Before they loaded that Steelers team most thought he was a buffoon with a great arm. Neither Staubach nor Bradshaw belongs in a comparison with Montana and Brady IMO. As far as Montana buying time... he never had to. He had a stud OL, a top notch running game and elite talent at WR and TE. I did see the Giants crush him in the playoffs one year, when he couldn't buy any time... Neither Stauback nor
