Listen, i’m not saying his time isn’t coming to an end at the elite level. But one poor season in 23 years does not call for some of the revisionism occurring here lately. Arguably, the defences he’s still producing (2022, 2021, 2020) have kept the Patriots from rebuilding properly. It isn’t easy in this league to escape from 8-8 hell without a franchise QB.
“Brady made him”. You can use whatever stat you want here, but let’s use the most basic one. Points allowed per game. Of course there are influences here. Time of possession, special teams, ability to generate turnovers. But at its most basic level this is what determines the result of a game.
Brady had 20 seasons as a Patriot. He had a top 10 defence in 17 of them. In 3 super bowl victories, the Patriots played 3 of the top 15 offences in NFL history. 01 Rams, 16 Falcons and 18 Rams. 17 points, 22 points(pick six), 3 points. Even throw the record breaking 04 Colts in there, 3 pts. If we change to PTS per drive, he still has 15 top 10 defences!
Manning had 4, Rodgers had 3, Brees had 2. All three had great ball security and time of possession.
Is Brady the GOAT, yes. His consistency in clutch moments puts him ahead of the likes of Peyton and Rodgers. Did he make Bill the greatest defensive mind in history, no!
Brady record when scoring 20+in the playoffs: 32-4. Rodgers is 12-9 in this statistic for a direct comparison.
Average finish in points per drive among notable QBs
Brady: 9th
Rivers: 15th
Peyton: 18th
Rodgers: 18th
Brees: 20th
Mahomes: 20th
And we are trying to pretend Bill didn’t give Brady a significant advantage over his peers? Another 2 super bowls as a DC.
This happens anytime anyone who had a ton of success starts going downhill. There’s a lot of “he never had it, was carried by _____”. Unless you’re a Barry Sanders who retires in prime, it’s going to happen eventually.
The Patriots dynasty couldn’t possibly ever be just one player. Hell, Peyton Manning has displayed about the level of skill Brady has, but could never pull off the postseason results, and you can’t chalk that up to one being a winner and the other not.
It’s easy to forget BB’s genius when he’s struggling now but he’s done a hell of a lot of genius things that helped lead that team to the success they had. Would people still be saying all this if Brady hadn’t won a SB somewhere else? Probably not. But that shouldn’t affect anything, because that team was also well-coached and had a lot of things going well for it. It’s silly to let something after the fact erase all of what people saw in that team and BB’s role in their success.