Has Tom Brady become his own worst enemy?
It’s often said that a man with nothing to lose should be feared. That was once true of the New England Patriots Tom Brady. Brady started his NFL postseason career with nine straight wins. He was 3-0 in Super Bowls and was named the game’s most valuable player twice; all by the age of 27. He was young, hungry and had nothing to lose — no legacy to protect, no hype to live up to. In fact, the more he succeeded, the more he wanted. But with three Super Bowl championships in his first five professional seasons and none in the last seven, the question has to be asked; what happened to Tom Brady? Have defenses figured him out? Has he lost his playoff swagger? The better answer can be found by placing Brady in front of a mirror. He’s competing against a prolific past. He’s competing against his own legacy. He’s competing against himself.
From 2001-2004 no quarterback was more unflappable than Brady; especially in the postseason. He beat the St. Louis Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI when no one gave him a chance. Two seasons later in the midst of back-to-back title runs he led the Patriots on a 21 game win streak. By the end of the 2004 season, New England had won three out of four Super Bowls in Brady’s first four seasons as an NFL starter. It was a level of success no NFL team had experienced since the Pittsburgh Steelers of the 1970’s. It was a level of success that no quarterback had experienced since Joe Montana in the 1980’s. Brady was well on his way to becoming the best of all-time. So what happened?
The problem with winning so much too soon is that a benchmark becomes established where fans, the media and even yourself come to expect it all the time. Everyone was spoiled and wanted to see more. With three Super Bowl rings at the youthful age of 27, surely Brady would win a fourth to tie Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw. Heck, the possibility even existed that Tom Terrific would get to five and become the winningest Super Bowl quarterback of all-time. But as fate would have it, what could have been…hasn’t been, and it’s not because the opportunity hasn’t presented itself. The problem has been that not only is Brady competing against opposing defenses, he’s now also competing against his reputation.
Aaron Moon is a syndicated writer and CEO of TPF. He can be contacted at AMoon@ThePenaltyFlagBlog.com
Meh. I think this is a bit of an overreaction. He is not only on his way to being the best ever. IMO, he IS the best ever.
Full of illogic!!
What the fuck are you talking about? Is anyone saying anything’s wrong with Brady? No. Here’s the first paragraph from his wikipedia page. Seems pretty fucking awesome to me.
“In Brady’s ten seasons as a starter, the Patriots have earned trips to the Super Bowl in five of them, winning three. He has also won two Super Bowl MVPawards, has been selected to eight Pro Bowls, and holds the NFL record for most touchdown passes in a single regular season. His career postseason record is 16–6. He also helped set the record for the longest consecutive win streak in NFL history with 21 straight wins over two seasons (2003–04), and in 2007 he led the Patriots to the first undefeated regular season since the institution of the 16-game schedule. Brady has the third highest career passer rating of all time (96.7) among quarterbacks with at least 1,500 career passing attempts. In 2012, Brady became the first quarterback in NFL history to lead his team to 10 division titles.”
I cannot agree with your take on Brady being his own worst enemy on the field. His statistics speak for themselves. I can say that his success gets him overlooked for MVP honors. He may hurt himself in that regards as it would take another record breaking year to earn him another MVP trophy. And lets be honest, there are no records left for Brady to beat.
It’s the old baseball cliche about winning 20 games. Once you do, everyone expects you to do it every year. Same thing with Brady. He may be a great QB, arguably one of the best of all time, but he’s only as good as the team around him. For the record, I’m a Giants fan, but I respect him and his accomplishments. Of course, I’m also happy the G-Men beat him and the Patriots 2 SB’s in a row.
That’s decent of you to say! I was SAD!!!!!- when we lost the 1st one by a MIRACLE escape and catch!!! And Assante Samuel NOT catching that INT (would have sealed it!!!). AND Moss not catching one (which would have sealed it!!!) But after a couple minutes, I thought it was destiny for you guys- just as it was for the PATRIOTS (the REAL red, white and blue team) right after 9/11!! And I was actually happy for you. But in the 2nd one…. I was just about puking when Brady was winning with a minute to go (again!!) and FIVE balls had been dropped (ANY of which would have sealed the freakin win!!!) hehe. Then I decided Defenses DO win championships after all. And the Pats were JUNK in the secondary!! And we only fixed that this last year by getting lucky to pick up Aqib Talib 1/2 way through the season… only to have him get wrecked in the AFCCG!!! Woe is me??? No. WAAAAGH is me!! hee.
None of what you said is true. On the first superbowl run Brady played well, but he didn’t win the games by himself. The Patriots could barely score more than 20 points against good defenses and the Patriots scoring defense was outstanding. Brady made the drive at the right time, but if the coin flip goes the other way, that was probably a loss. In 2003 Brady had a great run and played his best Super Bowl, but the defense won the AFC championship game almost on their own. In 2004 the team was all around fantastic. Dillon played great all year, and the Patriots again won as a team. Brady has since made it back to 2 Superbowls!!!! Yes, he didn’t win them, but they came down to the last drive just like the first 3. Only the Steelers have done better in the AFC and the NFC has gotten strong since 2004. Back then the AFC was winning if they showed up to the Super Bowl. You can’t win em all. Brady is still tied for the most playoff wins ever and in a position to get to the Super Bowl again. I don’t think your argument has any merrit. BTW… Montana didn’t win em all either. he might have won 4 Super Bowls in 4 appearances but he lost 3 championship games.
Brady isn’t tied for most playoff wins anymore. He took that title away from Joe a couple weeks ago!! hehe. (and I’m still a huge Joe Cool fan)
Brady didn’t lose the last two Super Bowl games the Pats played in, the defense or lack of on the last drives of the game did. Couple that with a miraculous once in a lifetime catch and an injured defensive back who needed surgery at the end of the season giving up the TD catch. Last year the game was in hand again; yet the defense once again dropped the ball. Don’t put the blame on the quarterback, he doesn’t play defense or call the defensive schemes.
Number four comes this year and all this crap talk will end….
The first wins by Brady,the Patriots were WireTapping their opponents, once caught wiretapping they lost their advantage of knowing exactly what play
the opposition was going to run. Anyone can look brilliant when they know every move the other team is going to make, dislike cheaters, and there are no bigger ones than the Patriots will definitely be rooting against them.
HAHA!! Pure hater. It was proved to have not had an OUNCE of affect on the games. But if that’s the excuse you’re going to go with for why you hate on the Patriots- instead of admitting you’re a jealous little child, so be it. SINCE the tapings (which were done by EVERY team, you moron), the Patriots have STILL been THE MOST successful franchise in all of football!! And Brady has been the most successful QB … wait for it… SINCE “spygate”!!! So your crybaby excuse is exposed as a non-starter. Sorry that your life sucks so badly that you have to hate on your sports foe.
Oakland player stated when they played the patriots in the Super Bowl , Oakland devised plays for the red zone that they never ran thay walked through the plays once the patriots filmed it . In the game on the 20 yard line they lined up for those plays and the patriots knew exactly what they were doing and had a counter play ready, Oakland was shocked until they found out that the patriots filmed and wire tapped . That win was stolen from Oakland . You say it made no difference . Why did the commissioner destroy the evidence. And how did the Patriots know Oaklands line up for the plays.
VERY good article. As a Pats fan I’m sad that a miracle beat them once and a hobbled Gronkowski and FIVE dropped balls; (any of which- NOT dropped would have sealed the WIN), are what’s kept them from giving Tom his due. But I think it’s a testament to how good he is; that he still led the league with the #1 offense again this last year. AND even w/ FOUR extremely crucial players out, STILL got them to the AFCCG. Being healthy at the end of the season is the most important thing. And it’s just plain lucky for those two teams to be all together at the end. And yes; when the Pats won SBs as well.