Tag: Tom Brady (Page 14 of 46)

Remember when some people thought the Pats should trade Brady? Ha! That was funny.

September 13, 2011 / Anthony Stalter

Hey, I’m guilty of it. We’re all guilty of it. We see a player get seriously injured and one of the first statements out of someone’s mouth is, “This may be career-threatening.”

The latest example of this is Peyton Manning. He recently had his second neck surgery in less than five months and at least one clown in the media wrote last week about how the Colts may wind up with Andrew Luck in next year’s draft. We live in a world where present news is old news and everyone has a blog nowadays so getting a jump on a story often takes precedence. But the media (and fans too, because they’re just as guilty even though the media provides a nice patsy for them) could learn a thing or two about Manning’s situation from Tom Brady.

As I watched Brady carve up the Dolphins for 517 yards and four touchdowns on Monday night, I had to laugh thinking about Matt Cassel’s 2008 season. He was so good that year that some wondered if the Pats should trade Brady and go with the younger Cassel at quarterback.

The idea wasn’t that far-fetched either. At the time, there was no timetable set for Brady’s return after he had season-ending knee surgery earlier in the year. Nobody knew when he would return in ’09, or if he would return at all. Cassel was also set to become a free agent, which further complicated the situation. If the Pats traded him or allowed him to leave via free agency, they risked not having an experienced quarterback for 2009 if Brady couldn’t recover.

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Tom Brady doesn’t miss a beat

September 12, 2011 / Gerardo Orlando

Aaron Rodgers still has to contend with Tom Brady before we anoint him as the best quarterback on the NFL. Tonight Brady put on a show in Miami:

Brady shook off a rare turnover to throw for a team-record 517 yards and four touchdowns, including a 99-yarder to Wes Welker, and the New England Patriots started with a victory for the eighth consecutive season Monday night by beating the Miami Dolphins 38-24.

Chad Henne threw for 416 yards in the shootout, but he missed on a critical fourth down play on the 1-yard line.

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Report: Tom Brady “froze out” Randy Moss

May 13, 2011 / Anthony Stalter

Tom E. Curran of CSNNE.com shared an interesting tidbit of information in his latest column about Tom Brady and Randy Moss. The crux of Curran’s piece is about how Moss isn’t an ideal fit for the Patriots any more, but he also mentions how Brady “froze” Moss out in the receiver’s final two games with New England last season.

Moss’ main concern isn’t playing football, it’s making money. And anyone who’s been listening for the last decade has heard Bill Belichick lob the praise “football is important to him” realizes how ill-fitting Randy Moss would be here.
Never mind the fact that, after the Jets game last year, quarterback Tom Brady basically froze Moss out for his final two games in New England. Brady was tired of throwing picks on balls intended for Moss (he threw two against the Jets; he had just two more the rest of the regular season).

This seems like one of those stories in which the player(s) later comes out and says that it didn’t happen. But I wouldn’t put it past Brady to do something like “freeze” anyone (not just Moss – Wes Welker, Deion Branch, Jerry Rice, etc.) out. His no nonsense attitude and leadership are just two qualities that endear him to football fans across the country.

Hey, you don’t want to work, Randy? No problem. But you’re not getting the ball. Good luck trying to get that contract extension you’ve been seeking. I’m not going to stand idle while you look out for No. 1 and the rest of us fight for the TEAM.

And what happened to Moss in the end? He turned out being the poster child for what not to do when you’re a player seeking a new contract. Now he’s practically begging for New England to take him back after he eroded in Tennessee last year. Had he just shut his mouth, continued to work hard and helped the Patriots win, he probably would have received a new contract (at least eventually, barring what happens with the lockout).

But because he put himself ahead of the team, Moss got the treatment he deserved in the end.

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Mallett: Brady and I “kind of the same”

May 3, 2011 / Anthony Stalter

After New England selected him in the third round of last weekend’s NFL draft, former Arkansas quarterback Ryan Mallett said that the Patriots are a “perfect fit,” and then made reference to how he and Tom Brady “are kind of the same.”

“I think it’s a perfect fit after watching film with the coaches when I was there,” Mallett told the Providence Journal. “And me and Tom are kind of the same. We’re not fleet of foot, obviously. We don’t run fast. We pick defenses apart and we know what’s going to happen before the snap or we react post snap and that’s why I think I’m like him a lot.”

There will be some who think Mallett is being arrogant with his comments. I get that, although I think he’s being genuine more than he’s actually (even literally) comparing himself to Brady. In other words, I don’t think he’s saying: I’m a multiple Super Bowl winner and a bona fide Hall of Famer. I think he’s just finding a way to relate to the person who will have a hand molding his future. And who better to model your pro career after than Tom Brady? If there’s ever a time to put the mistakes you’ve made in the past behind you and look towards the future, it’s after you’ve been drafted by the New England freaking Patriots and are about to be Tom Brady’s backup.

Mallett couldn’t have wound up in a better situation. Let’s not discount the fact that he’s only 22-years-old and by the time the Patriots ask him to take over the keys of their offense (if that day ever comes), he’ll be more mature than he is now. Plus, he won’t make anywhere close to the money he would have made had he been taken in the first round, and there’s zero pressure on him to succeed right away.

He will be coached up by one of the best staffs in the NFL and Brady won’t tolerate Mallett coming in acting like it’s his show. In 8-10 years, we could be looking back at this year’s quarterback class and saying how Mallett flourished more than those signal callers taken before him.

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