National Post (National Edition)
Brady's winning pedigree goes beyond absurd.
AT 43, BUCS QB POSTING PLAYOFF NUMBERS THAT MAY NEVER BE MATCHED
Tom Brady's playoff career has been so utterly ridiculous that it is possible to build a lengthy resumé out of only the games in which he wasn't particularly great.
He won his first Super Bowl by throwing for just 145 yards in a game in which the New England offence scored 13 points. He won his third with a 236-yard performance in the title game, which was the most yardage in any of his three wins that post-season. He won his sixth by outduelling Jared Goff in a game in which he threw zero touchdowns, one interception, and guided the Patriots offence to 13 points. Goff has since been traded for Matthew Stafford, who is about to turn 33 and has a career playoff record of 0-3.
Over a four-year stretch beginning in 2013, Brady's Pats were knocked out of the playoffs in games in which they scored 13, 16 and 18 points. They also won a Super Bowl in there, the one in which the Seattle Seahawks inexplicably didn't hand the ball to Marshawn Lynch at the goal line in the dying seconds.
Brady lost Super Bowls to Nick Foles and Eli Manning (twice). He lost playoff games to Joe Flacco and Mark Sanchez (!) and Jake Plummer (!!) and, most recently, Ryan Tannehill. It's a whole career's worth of playoff mediocrity that still dwarfs the post-season records of the vast majority of people who have played quarterback in the NFL.
A sharp-eyed reader might be wondering at this point: Wait, is this guy actually trying to make the case against Tom Brady's greatness as he is about to play in his 10th Super Bowl? I assure you, reader, I am not. Although I did get a mild thrill rehashing his playoff disappointments.
No, the crazy thing is Brady also has this entire other playoff career, the one that also dwarfs the accomplishments of any of his modern peers or historical rivals. He long ago smashed the records for appearances and wins and conference titles and pretty much every total you might care to imagine. He has 17 300-yard passing games in the playoffs, almost twice as many as Peyton Manning, who is in second place on the list with nine. Drew Brees has eight. Joe Montana had six. Brett Favre, Dan Marino and John Elway: four apiece. Patrick Mahomes, as much of a video-game stat-crazy quarterback as there has ever been, has topped the 300-yard mark twice in seven playoff games. If he does it twice a year for the next seven-consecutive seasons, he would still be short of Brady's mark. (He could also do it on Sunday, but so could Brady.)
There were 35 Super Bowls contested before Brady ever played in one. As of Sunday, he will have played in almost 20 per cent of the 55 that will have been held.
The thing that has allowed Brady to destroy the record books, the thing that kept him going from good to great to absurd is the thing that is most perplexing about all this: his longevity. The stories about his health and fitness regimen are legion, from his commitment to pliability to the zero-sugar diet to his early bedtime to his line of sleepwear that “returns infrared energy to your body” to “restore muscles faster.” He infamously has a fitness guru whose presence may have hastened the end of the Patriots dynasty and, at 43 years old, he continues to insist that he has at least a couple more seasons left.
Whatever the source of Brady's competitive agelessness, it cannot be overstated how bizarre it is when compared with historical precedent.
Even those few quarterbacks who were excellent past their mid-30s were either finished by the time they hit 40 years old, or very close to finished. Favre had a 33-touchdown season at 40 with the Minnesota Vikings, and won a playoff game, but threw a last-minute interception the following week. His age 41 season was a disaster. Vinny Testaverde played a full season for Dallas at age 41, throwing 17 touchdown passes — and 20 interceptions. Warren Moon was still slinging it for Seattle at 42, but he averaged 163 passing yards per game that season. The only example of someone playing anywhere close to Brady's level past the age of 40 has been the last couple of years of Brees, but he's more of a cautionary tale of what is likely to happen when men of that age play quarterback in the NFL. Brees was hurt for chunks of each season, didn't crack 3,000 passing yards in either one, and quite plainly could not throw the ball downfield. (There is no shame in that. These guys are being hit by 350-pound linemen. Most 40-year-olds are sore after playing golf.)
Brady has now had four full seasons past 40, during which he has averaged 4,400 passing yards, 31 touchdown passes and just under 10 interceptions. Those averages compare favourably to an average season for Peyton Manning (4,200 yards, 31 TDs, 14 INTs), who retired at 39. It is nuts. Maybe we should all go to bed at 8:30 in our infrared jammies.
One more stat. The number of playoff wins for all NFL quarterbacks age 40 or older, non-Brady division: three, one each for Brees, Favre, and Testaverde. Number of playoff wins for Brady, post-40: eight.
And amazingly, still counting.