Yeah, Eagles fans love to bring up the Westbrook and Desean kick returns, because they don’t have any memories of winning an actual championship.
Somebody’s bitter, haha! Maybe that was you I heard in the streets.
Nah, but you did probably hear me celebrating the two super bowl victories I’ve had the pleasure of experiencing in my lifetime… two more than the Eagles have in franchise history.
That’s… helpful. Then again in sports, anyone can write anything to get attention. This topic is a good example of that. I don’t see him getting cut unless something goes terribly wrong with this surgery. He’s signed to a team friendly deal through 2019. The Patriots aren’t stupid. They knew what they were getting when they drafted him way below where he was meant to be, and they knew what they were doing when they extended him early. This was the risk. They know it’s worth it. The Patriots have played in an AFC Championship game every year since 2011. It seems to be working out OK.
FT said that about Gronk? Really? Greenman, please understand that even to this point not a single person has agreed with you. As discussed ad nauseam, Gronk is an unprecedented talent in terms of size and speed. I don’t know what else you need to see to deem him great. A lot of people already have him in the HOF at 27 years old. Anything you say is pure speculation based on literally zero cogent arguments. Why would Gronk not succeed (injuries aside) on another team? Would he suddenly get smaller and slower if he signed with the Cardinals?
People need to chill with this blanket statement. Belichick does seem to get more out of his players than other coaches, but a lot of times that player’s drop in performance after they leave New England is because they’ve gotten older, or suffered one too many injuries, or have just plain run out of gas. Bill is better than anyone at leading indicators and cuts bait while he can still get value. So yes it’s true that a lot of guys leave New England and go on to underperform on other teams but that’s because they’ve hit their peak and have already been shown the door in Foxboro.
I agree with everything else you said, and also this statement to a certain extent, but how do you explain the Matt Cassel phenomenon then?
Cassel had a better QB rating in 2010 with the Chiefs than he did in 2008 with the Patriots! 27 touchdowns, only 7 picks.
^ True, but he was pretty horrific every other year. The only other data points we have for the qb position was when Brady was out earlier this year, and you guys went 3-1 with two different qbs. Clearly, there’s something to be said for the system here.
Yeah, Cassel sucks. The 2007 Patriots won 16 games with Brady. The 2008 team with a similar cast won 11 games. A five game dip in the NFL is severe. In this comparison, Brady effectively gets punished for having a lights out year in '07. People only see 11-5 and don’t realize the Patriots played the fourth easiest schedule in the league that year. I remember that season quite well, seeing as how they didn’t make the playoffs, and honestly I wasn’t even that bent out of shape about it because Cassel sucked and they weren’t going anywhere anyway.
3-1 looks nice, it does. But Arizona and Houston are trash, we both know that. They got Miami in their abysmal September and nearly gagged that game away anyway. And Buffalo! Zero points at home. Brady comes back and they drop 41 on the road just a few weeks later. Why does that never get brought up?
You could say the same with this year’s Cardinals and Panthers, and they didn’t lose their quarterback.
Sometimes teams just lose steam because…they just lost steam. There’s no real explanation for it.
So to pin that on Cassel is, in my opinion, unfair. I’m no Matt Cassel fan, and I definitely think he’s a step down from Tom Brady, but to say that Matt Cassel is the difference in five games just ain’t right.
^Brady is clearly better than those guys, no question. However, all of those other guys (Cassel, Brissett, Garoppolo) would be/have been significantly worse on other teams. Obviously, there’s a ton of other variables there, but it’s hard to dispute that there’s a ton of value being added by the coaching staff.
By the way, to say that part of Brady’s success is the system in which he plays is not a derogatory statement whatsoever. On the contrary, it’s really remarkable how Belichick has managed to stay so far ahead of the curve over the course of so many years.
Indeed.
And please don’t ever bring him up again.
It’s kind of funny that the Eagles have pretty much owned the Giants over the last 15 years or so, but I’ll take the SB wins instead.
Wooo! We’ve come full circle! “Cassel won 11 games with the Patriots!” “You can’t blame Cassel for only winning 11 games with the Patriots!”
Yessssss.
I hear ya. I’m not disputing it. But there are plenty of people who use the 2008 season (and now the four games this year) as THE proof that Brady is a “system QB”, and they do mean that in a derogatory way. Believe me I’ve been reading it for 8+ years now. Obviously as a fan of the most vile, cheating scum in professional sports, nay, the history of Earth, I’ve learned to ignore a lot of the trolling but sometimes I can’t help myself when I have downtime. Also, I have to laugh when I point out Cassel did have arguably a better year with the Chiefs, a direct counter to him only being successful for the Patriots and the response is “Yeah, but still.”
To your second point I would agree. Guys like Drew Brees or Peyton Manning have operated in the same schemes their entire careers. Brady has seen his offense change drastically throughout the last 16 seasons and has been successful in every phase. I’m not sure how it was before my time but having a QB who is so malleable you can alter the entire dynamic of an offense without skipping a beat is rare and seems like a strength, not a weakness.
Totally agreed, but that 2010 Eagles offense was super fun to watch before the wheels came off.
I’m not saying Brady isn’t great, but it’s amazing how much championships skew the GOAT conversation when it comes to QB’s. Brees and Brady have essentially been in the league the same amount of time (Brady has 4 more games played than Brees), but Brees basically has an extra season’s worth of yards and TD’s. In fairness, he also has a couple of season’s more INT’s. Except for the INT’s and rings, Brees’ numbers are superior to Brady’s pretty much across the board but he’s never even mentioned in the GOAT conversation.
Oh, totally. I mean not seconds after Malcolm Butler had intercepted Wilson were people proclaiming “now it’s cemented, Brady is the GOAT”. To be fair he played incredible in the second half, but had the Seahawks run or Butler not made one of the best players in SB history, then it’d still be a debate? Doesn’t add up.
The NFL is built on its stars but it’s obviously a team game. It can’t matchup with basketball which is completely dominated by a few greats, or baseball where a lot of the game is about 1 on 1 matchups. Still tries to, and that’s why we’re left with these inane arguments.
Ultimately we’re all losers.
On Mike and Mike this morning they were discussing the HOF prospects for Big Ben, Eli, and Phillip Rivers. Ben and Eli were considered locks because of their rings, but Rivers was a weak maybe despite the fact that his career passing numbers are much better than either Ben’s or Eli’s.
Eli is not a HOFer. He was built for one thing and one thing only - to beat the Patriots. That alone does not make him a HOFer.
Ben…I lean towards yes.
And, as much as I don’t like him, Rivers is/was the best QB of the three.
I agree, but Eli will get in because of the rings. Despite the two rings, I still believe the Giants made a mistake trading for Eli. I think they would have done just fine with Rivers and the draft picks they gave up.