By Jimmy Cunningham, howiGit New York Writer, Manhattan, NY
Tom Brady began his NFL career winning 9 straight play off games, throwing 3.6 touchdowns for every interception, completing 62.5% of his passes for an average of 216 yards per game, and an had average quarterback rating of 91.5. He did all of this before his 30th birthday. HE IS JUST A WINNER!
The success the Patriots have had is something that is very rarely seen on the NFL level; you could argue the 1970’s Steelers and 1990’s Cowboys are the only teams to have similar success. However that success was done with quarterbacks towards the end of their careers, both Terry Bradshaw and Troy Aikman only played 4 more years after their last Super Bowl. Brady has 8 playoff appearances since 2005. Since his last Super bowl Brady has an 8-7 record – that sounds almost Peyton Manningish – and has thrown 1.63 touchdowns for every interception, completed 55% of his passes, and has a respectable 88 QB rating per game which is inflated by his performances against the David Garrad led Jaguars and Tim Tebow led Broncos. He’s also averaged 266 yards a game during this stretch – the only area in which Brady has not declined. Maybe his 19 picks in 15 games are why he had to throw for so many yards in those games.
This is a trajectory that I can not ever remember seeing. Most football players, especially quarterbacks, tend to get better with age. How come Tom Brady in his prime has been significantly worse in the playoffs in almost every statistical category? What could stop Tom Brady from continuing this historic pace? Injury? No, he has only been hurt one season. Then it has to be his team must have fell apart; well no – he has won his division 7 times since then. What could it possibly be for this guy who was on pace to be the most successful quarterback of all time?
Oh I know, SPYGATE! I win more on partycasino.com than Tom Brady has since he stopped cheating. In 2007 the Patriots were caught of illegally filming the opposing teams’ defenses signals. Something that would allow a quarterback to identify coverages and blitzes prior to breaking the huddle. The narrative out of New England is “oh it really didn’t help that much, and look at his regular season numbers!” Well Brady and the Pats look a lot like the Colts and Peyton Manning since they had to stop filming signals. If a baseball player put up numbers rarely seen before, got caught for steroids and then could not replicate the same success, our very own lead writer would be first in line to give him the death penalty. But what do you Ugg boot loving homers have to say to the facts that Tom Terrific has become significantly worse in the playoffs? Please don’t give me look at the regular season.
All you cared about in the beginning of this century was winning championships – trust me I know because you would point to it every chance you got. It is no longer Tom is the best when it matters most, but instead wow look at how many TD’s he put up against the Jets, Bills, and Dolphins. Whether it be his clock management at the end of the 1st half yesterday or his no-point, two-pick 2nd half , overthrowing Wes Welker in the Super Bowl last year, losing to the Jets as a 9.5 point favorite in 2010, a 4-turnover loss to Baltimore in ’09, or scoring 22 points less then his season average in the first Super Bowl against the Giants, you have to wonder what Tom Brady’s legacy would be if his team was not involved in the biggest cheating scandal ever seen in the NFL.
Terrible article, and clearly just a response to my recent article on Eli. The NFL handed down what they thought to be an incredibly severe and appropriate punishment for Spygate. They could have stripped the titles and never even considered it.
You want to know about Brady’s legacy? Ask his peers. He’s done it all. There’s no doubt the Pats haven’t been as good in the playoffs as of late – they haven’t been a good defensive team, and in general they haven’t executed (see the Welker drops, the Asante Samuel drop, etc.) Tom’s put them in position each and every year, which is something your boy Eli has not done. And give the Ravens some credit – they tipped both balls in his “2 pick second half” way up into the air and made the plays they needed to.
It would be nice to response to the stats that clearly show he has been worse in the playoffs since spy gate, not only in win and loss but Tom Brady’s stats, can’t put that on his defense.
If you can give me the phone number of the peers that I should ask I will do so.
And maybe you couldn’t see his last pick through your tears but there was no tip just a shit pass
The hypocracy of your stance of cheating is baffling. The MLB didn’t take any stats away but that doesn’t stop you from throwing * next to people’s names. Sooner or later you Boston folks need to take you head out of the sand and see that when you cheated you won, when you didn’t you don’t. It’s that simple.
And again you take Tom Brady criticism and some how bring up Eli. Eli wasn’t mentione once here. Stats were but you chose to ignor those an add Eli, because you have no argument against the stats.
Tom Brady’s post spygate post season completion percentage is the same as mark Sanchez’ regular season completion percentage for reference.
That’s relevant. Well done.
It is much more relevant then comparing teams winning percentages and relating it to how good a quarterback is
Hahaha. This is hilarious. Such a hater article with such a homer response. Perfect for the two of you.
Another fun stat pre spy gate the patriots were 3-0 in the playoffs in games where the defense gave up 21 or more points. Post spy gate they are 2-6. Not so easy to win a shoot out when you don’t know the plays pre snap I guess
Credit finoodler for some of that stat
Aaand some more fun facts. Did you know Tom Brady is know for his come backs and game winning drives? Well in the 6 years with the defensive signals he has 25 game winning drives and 15 4th quarter comebacks, in the six years he didn’t have the defensive signals he has 12 game winning drives and 11 4th quarter comebacks. Interesting.
So now Tom Brady has defensive signals for six years? What else can you make up? Keep trying.
Tom Brady began his career in 2001, spygate was in 2007. So yes six years. If I am making anything up show me. You may want to start trying period, since you’ve done nothing to refute any stats.
That’d be like assuming because you murdered someone in 2007, you murdered someone every year prior as well. Silly.
That literally makes no sense. The pats admitted to cheating up until the 2007 season. You don’t have to assume anything because the people who did it admitted it.
Isn’t it common practice for teams to spy on opposing teams defensive signals? I understand videotaping took it to another level, but from what i recall spying and trying to learn other teams signals is nothing new. No chance that every team doesnt have some dude analyzing plays every week to pick up on the playcalling. I dunno how much advantage it could have given the pats… although based on their performance your argument is sound.
It is common to watch film on other teams from previous games. It is not, however, allowed by NFL rules to tape another teams private practices. This is what they were caught doing.
i don’t think they filmed private practices. Atleast that wasnt what they got punished for. They had people filming the calls in game. I dont know if they showed the films at half time or what but the time frame was so short I dont know what they could have really done with it that they couldnt have done with just a person watching and relaying the info without a camera.
You cannot ignore the fact that since they were caught filming other teams practices they have not had the same post season success. There are a number of factors that play into this, mainly that no one player, or team, can keep a pace like the early 2000 Pats teams had, but there is no disputing that they have not been able to win a title since they were caught. Its fun to provoke Pats fans who do tend to ignore the relevance of this in terms of the teams success. At the same time they still have had some great seasons since then, including going 18-1 (we all remember that 1 GIANT loss) and so you cannot attribute their lack of a title since then solely to Spygate.
What the patriots actually got in trouble was for having a guy on the sideline filming the other teams defensive signals, they would then log the coverages and blitzes off those signals. So during the second half they would have a better idea of what the defense was running pre snap. This can be seen above as 67% of Brady’s game winging drives and 57% of his 4th quarter comebacks came pre spygate. Also pre spygate Brady threw a 1.07 ratio of his touchdowns in the first half as opposed to a 1.22 ratio of 1st half touchdowns post spygate. So Brady was noticeably better in second halls, with defensive signals pre spygate
They also got caught for illegally filming the rams walk through before the Super Bowl, just another example of illegal things they did when they were winning Super Bowls that they have no been able to replicate since they stopped
Thats what I was referring to. Filming the walkthrough. Basically the same thing as filming practice.
Ridiculous. Prood positive that statistics can be used to prove anything you want. Every team in the league has vaults full of tape of everything the other teams do. Games and practices are scouted and analyzed. You could probably chart the same statistics to Dan Koppen playing center. Maybe he was the key to the success and his demise brought the Patriots downfall.
Every team has vaults of illegally taped signals? That’s interesting, I didn’t see any other team get fined or lose draft picks.
If you see Geoff while you both have your head in the sand tell him I say hello.
Patriots were found guilty of videotaping games from the sideline. Everybody else does it from the press box. That’s the significant advantage? The only reason they were punished at all was because they ignored a league memo. They went 16-0 the next season. Everyone except you acknowledges that refuted any perceived advantage the Pats may have had. You’ll have better luck tracking Brady’s title drought to Giselle.
you guys make this easy for me, Geoff basically said the same exact thing in the next post so I really just have to cut and paste
http://www.usatoday.com/story/gameon/2013/01/13/ravens-brendon-ayanbadejo-patriots-tweets/1831133/
http://www.behindthesteelcurtain.com/2012/8/6/3218255/spygate-the-untold-story
book came out a few months ago
“That’s funny, ever since Spygate they haven’t been able to win.” — Terrell Suggs
http://www.tulsaworld.com/blogs/sportspost.aspx?SpyGate_Defines_New_England_Belichick/14-18644
http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2013/01/20/why-bill-belichick-really-needs-win-this-super-bowl/1cwfPVe2NfAh0xLbSxPbWM/story.html
Bob Ryan, in the Boston Globe
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-shutdown-corner/marshall-faulk-brings-spygate-ll-never-over-being-182812366–nfl.html
Players that played against it acknowledge it and have a problem with it, reporters still write about it, including in Boston papers,and a book was written last year on it. But the Patriot humpers say it really didnt help so nothing to see here move along.
Read that book, step up your education.
..They went 18-1 the following year..
There’s no doubt that Tom Brady hasn’t been as clutch lately, but I disagree that spy gate was the reason that he was so good or that the Patriots won 3 Super Bowls. If that were the case then they wouldn’t have had any success after they got caught. They went 18-1 in 2007 and win that Super Bowl if Assante Samuel makes a very simple interception or if David Tyree doesn’t make one of the greatest catches of all time. Every single year the Patriots are in the final 8 playoff teams, if not the AFC title game. They could not achieve this sort of success if their previous wins were a fluke (due to spy gate). http://aidanfromworcester.com/2013/01/21/bernard-pollard-shows-us-how-they-dance-in-fort-wayne-pats-lose-pastor-ray-preaches-kill-me-now/
I am not saying that spy gate is what made them good, the patriots have been a top 8 team for over ten years. What spy gate did was give them an edge against the other top 8 teams to win Super Bowls. It is not like they would have been drafting first every year with out cheating.
The patriots success post spy gate is a 79% winning percentage in the regular season and a 50% winning percentage in the playoffs, two Super Bowl appearances and no wins. When the Colts had Peyton Manning they had a 77% regular season winning percentage and a 47% winning percentage, two Super Bowl appearances and one win. It’s not like the patriots succes post spy gate is unprecedented and can not be achieved, it’s actually very similar to the Colts and Peyton Manning, minus a championship.