OLD-SCHOOL LESSON

Exiting Brees gets humbling sendoff from Brady, Bucs

Drew Brees handed Tom Brady an NFC Championship Game berth in the Saints quarterback’s final NFL game Sunday night, a 30-20 Buccaneers victory in New Orleans. Brady incredibly advanced to a 14th conference championship game in his first season with the Bucs. It will be Brady going headto-head with the Packers’ Aaron Rodgers at Lambeau Field in the first-ever playoff meeting between two of the best quarterbacks of all time.

But Brady is going to Green Bay primarily thanks to a complete collapse by Brees.

The NFL’s all-time passing leader threw three interceptions, and Saints tight end Jared Cook also lost a crucial fumble, to hand Tampa Bay the game.

Brady’s Buccaneers offense scored all three of its touchdowns, and 21 of its 30 points, on short fields off Saints turnovers. The starting field position on the TD drives were the New Orleans 3, 40 and 20-yard lines.

Drew Brees talks with Tom Brady after Brady’s Bucs top Saints to move on to NFC Championship Game in Green Bay. yards

The Bucs scored off a Sean Murphy-Bunting interception return in the second quarter, a Devin White fumble return off Antoine Winfield Jr.’s forced fumble of Cook in the third, and White’s interception of Brees in the fourth.

Brady could have had more. Bucs wideout Chris Godwin dropped what should have been a beautiful touchdown pass over the top in the second quarter.

But Brady got lucky, too, though. He threw a second-quarter interception downfield that came back because Saints safety Marcus Williams didn’t get a second foot down inbounds.

And Brady threw a dangerous fourth-quarter pass outside the right hash that Saints corner Marshon Lattimore jumped and nearly picked, just prior to Ryan Succop’s go-ahead field goal for a 23-20 Bucs lead with 10 minutes to play.

Brady, 43, who is chasing his seventh Super Bowl ring, always took heat for playing in the easy AFC East while winning championships with the Patriots.

But now he is in the NFC Championship Game in his first season playing in the NFC South, where he voluntarily signed to go toe-to-toe with Brees and New Orleans, one of the NFL’s best teams in 2020.

Brady and the Bucs sold out for this opportunity, of course, signing persona non grata wide receiver Antonio Brown to go all-in. But they’re here riding the back of an opportunistic defense coordinated by former Jets head coach Todd Bowles.

The Bucs’ three pivotal turnovers all were forced by players in their first or second years in the NFL, as well. Murphy-Bunting was a 2019 second-round pick out of Central Michigan. White was the fifth overall pick of that draft, just before the Giants took Daniel Jones at six.

And Winfield Jr. was the 45th overall pick in last April’s second round, nine spots behind the Giants’ Xavier McKinney selection.

Former Giant Super Bowl champ Jason Pierre-Paul also flustered Brees often and is going back to the NFC Championship Game for the first time since he won a ring with Big Blue in 2011.

Brees, meanwhile, was expected to hang them up after the season but now is definitely doing so, as first reported by

FOX’s Jay Glazer prior to Sunday’s game.

Brees, 42, was the Chargers’ second-round pick in 2001 out of Purdue, and all the 6-foot quarterback did was become the NFL’s all-time leader in passing yards (80,358).

His 571 career touchdown passes are second to only the ageless Brady’s 581.

Sunday’s game set a new NFL record for the oldest combined age of two starting quarterbacks ever at 85, and often the game felt like it, with both offenses struggling and Brees ending his career on a sour note.

All in all, Brees’ final 2020 year in the NFL was a stain on his resume, including his controversial and insensitive insistence last summer that kneeling players were “disrespecting” the American flag, even in the face of George Floyd’s death and rampant injustice forcing the country to confront racial injustice head on.

On the field, Brees always will be respected for his play and ability, but he still won only one Super Bowl season and never was named NFL MVP. rady will gladly step right over Brees’ sorry farewell into an opportunity for a seventh Lombardi Trophy, though, toward a star-studded matchup with Rodgers on hallowed NFL grounds.

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