FANCY PASSING
Final four QBs the best the league has to offer
There’s the legend, Tom Brady. There’s the hottest quarterback in the world, Aaron Rodgers. There’s the tough-as-nails Super Bowl champ, Ben Roethlisberger. And then there’s the likely MVP, Matt Ryan. It’s not often the league’s Most Valuable Player is the least heralded quarterback left in the playoffs, but that is the reality with championship weekend kicking off Sunday. “They have all got the smarts, and they are all naturally gifted,” said CBS analyst and former Giants quarterback Phil Simms, who will be calling the Steelers-Patriots game at Foxborough, Mass. “When you have a quarterback who is smart and can make all the throws, what you can do with gameplans and plays, there’s no limit. These four guys, they can make all the throws. There are no limitations in what they do. All four are great in the pocket. Of course Aaron Rodgers moves more than the rest of them.” And it brings a thankful end to the uneven portion of a postseason that lacked a memorable game until the Packers-Cowboys thriller on Sunday. No more Connor Cook or Brock Osweiler or Alex Smith. Rodgers, Brady and Roethlisberger are all Super Bowl winners, and used to being on this stage. Ryan is the outlier as his playoff record (1-4 heading into this postseason) has been questioned even with his gaudy 2016 numbers (4,944 yards, 38 touchdowns to seven interceptions). He swatted away his critics with a clinical domination of the Seahawks, slicing up Seattle’s oncevaunted secondary for 338 yards and three touchdowns in Atlanta’s 36-20 divisional round win.
Tony Gonzalez was Ryan’s tight end the last time he was in the postseason, the last time Ryan was this close to the Super Bowl. That was in 2012 when the Falcons lost a 28-24 heartbreaker to the 49ers in the NFC Championship game.
“The difference between this whole year and when I played with him, he has a different look, a different air of confidence,” the future Hall of Famer and CBS studio analyst said.
“You don’t know where the ball is going. We talked about Julio Jones, one of the top receivers in the league, but he’s throwing it to everybody. He drops back, he has the confidence, the skill and know-it-all to zing that ball to anybody. That’s what make him so dangerous, and why he’s probably going to win the MVP.”
So, the top quarterback this postseason is very much debatable. The top team seems less so — with the Patriots having been the Super Bowl favorite most of the season. The Patriots survived Brady’s Deflategate suspension, Rob Gronkowski’s seasonending injury and a defense that started so lackluster they traded one of their stars, Jamie Collins, to the Browns.
“It even confuses me sometimes,” Simms said. “They’ll score on two drives by doing this and this. Then they’ll come out for the third drive with a completely different thought process. And I just go, ‘Why?’.
“It’s because they don’t want you to adapt to what they are doing. Everything they are doing is to get you to react. And once they get you thinking that takes aggression away, and a huge advantage goes to an offense. They are going to do a little bit of everything, and you have to be able to adjust on the fly.”