When Tom Brady left the New England Patriots for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, everyone seemed to understand the respective roles of Brady and Bill Belichick in creating the greatest dynasty in the history of professional sports. But in the ensuing year and a half, everyone has decided to adhere to what philosophers around the world have called “The Law of We Can’t Have Nice Things,” and have decided to turn every event over the past 20 years into a referendum over Brady vs. Belichick, and in the process have attempted to historically alter the way we think about what the two accomplished over those 20 years.
Perhaps the most frustrating new topic that has arisen in the sports world is among those who demand that either Brady or Belichick be deemed more responsible for the Six Super Bowls that they won. Brady and Belichick are like John Lennon and Paul Mccartney, or Michael Jordan and Phil Jackson, or Elton John and Bernie Taupin. What they did has to be viewed in tandem, because in viewing their accomplishments it is impossible to separate the two. While they certainly would have won Super Bowls without each other (Brady has already proven that), each of them played such a big part in every run that it is simply impossible to say one was solely responsible. Even the argument that Belichick was more responsible for the first three and Brady was more responsible for the last three is lazy and simplistic. So to debunk all of that, we are going to go Super Bowl by Super Bowl and explain why it is impossible to say that one was more responsible. As someone who spent years being tormented by the Patriots, I take no pleasure in doing so- but as a lover of NFL History, I cannot stand for a distorted version of what occurred.
1st Super Bowl (2001): This is one where you could make a very good argument that Belichick played a bigger role. At this point Tom Brady was nothing more than a game manager, playing a smart, efficient game that allowed the Patriots to win through defense and field position. What’s more, the singular biggest reason the Patriots won this Super Bowl was because Bill Belichick put together perhaps the greatest defensive gameplan in Super Bowl History. Facing The "Greatest Show on Turf" Rams who had MVPs in Kurt Warner and Marshall Faulk and led the league in just about every significant statistical offensive category, Belichick spent the game chipping at Faulk, effectively taking him out of the game, and overwhelming Kurt Warner with blitzes coming up the middle. Holding the Rams to only 17 points is one of the greatest accomplishments of his career and an early indication that he was more than just a Super Bowl-winning coach. That being said, the game was still very much in the balance before Tom Brady took over. In a tie game with just over a minute left, Brady calmly led a game-winning drive with no timeouts to get in position for Adam Vinatieri to kick a game-winning field goal as time expired. It was a masterclass that caused John Madden to exclaim on the broadcast that “What Tom Brady just did gives me goosebumps,” and had only been bested up to that point in Super Bowl history by Joe Montana’s surgical touchdown drive to beat the Bengals in Super Bowl 23. That is a drive that very few first-year starters in NFL History could have pulled off, and was coupled with a masterful game plan that started the path for both Coach and Quarterback to become the greatest to ever do it.
2nd Super Bowl (2003): This was the year in which the Patriots became a well-oiled machine. Brady had complete command of the offense by this point, while Belichick was overseeing a dominant defense for a team that won a lot of close games and was also malleable, winning games by scores of 38-34 and 12-0 in back-to-back weeks. Come playoff time, both Brady and Belichick did their thing. Belichick’s defense overwhelmed MVP Peyton Manning in the AFC Championship game by causing four interceptions, before allowing Brady to take over in the second half of the most underrated Super Bowl in NFL History. After both teams were held scoreless through the first 26 minutes, the fourth quarter of Super Bowl 38 turned into a back and forth shootout, with five touchdowns being scored before Brady got the ball back once again in a tie game with a little over a minute left. And just like he did two years prior, Brady calmly led the Pats towards a game-winning Vinatieri kick which gave them their second Super Bowl in three years. While it is true that up to this point Belichick was more mastermind while Brady had not yet gotten to the level that we are used to from him, it is hard to give Belichick more credit when in his first three years as a starter Brady had as many fourth-quarter game-winning drives in the Super Bowl as anyone else in the history of the league (He now has as many in the Super Bowl as anyone else has for their career in the entire Postseason).
3rd Super Bowl (2004): This was simply a dominant team and the greatest of the Brady-Belichick Super Bowl winners. They went 14-2, backed by a dominant defense and a Quarterback who had now become one the best in the league, and stomped their way towards a title. They once again dominated Peyton Manning in the Divisional Round, before putting up 41 points against the 15-1 Steelers and their league-leading defense in the AFC Championship game. The Super Bowl was boring compared to the first two, with the Patriots beating the Eagles 24-21 in a game that they controlled from start to finish. Simply put this was the Patriots at their best, and no one was getting in the way of either Brady or Belichick.
4th Super Bowl (2014): This is where we get into the period in which Brady and Belichick became the respective GOATS of their professions. While their fingerprints were all over the first three Super Bowls, they were also supported by incredible rosters that were smartly built through homegrown talent. But by this point the Patriots had fallen prey to free agency and the salary cap and had also been drafting towards the bottom of the first round for over a decade, giving them fewer opportunities at true blue chips. 2014 began the stretch in which Brady and Belichick took their games up another level, winning another three Super Bowls despite having inferior rosters to the teams of a decade prior. In 2014, the two needed to pull out all the stops to win that Super Bowl. They nearly lost to the Ravens in the Divisional Round, but the Patriots came back from two 14 point-deficits to barely beat what had become by that point the biggest thorn in their side (this is not homerism it is simply a fact). Brady was at his best in that game, throwing three touchdowns in the comeback including an absolute dime to Brandon LaFell to win the game in the fourth quarter. What’s more, Belichick had to pull out all the stops. They scored a touchdown on a double pass which Belichick had just recently allowed into the playbook, but more importantly, Belichick came up with the formation utilizing an ineligible receiver and just four offensive linemen that broke John Harbaugh’s brain, one which still keeps me up at night. And all of that is before we get to Super Bowl 49, which I believe is the greatest game in Super Bowl history. Brady was incredible all game, but particularly in the fourth quarter when he led a comeback which has gotten completely overshadowed by later events but would be the signature career moment for any other Quarterback in the history of the league. Down 10 against Seattle’s vaunted Legion of Boom defense in the fourth quarter, Brady went 14/16 for 130 yards and 2 touchdowns over consecutive drives to take a 28-24 lead. All of that was just to set up what may be the greatest stretch of coaching in NFL History. When the Seahawks got the ball to the one-yard line, the typical move was to take a timeout, but Belichick instead saw the confusion in the Seahawks huddle and decided to let the situation play out. While I could attempt to sum up his thinking, I would instead direct you to 32:49 of this clip to hear an explanation of Belichick’s masterful 30 seconds prior to Malcolm Butler’s interception. While Super Bowl 51 gets all the attention for Brady’s masterful comeback, to me this is the highest level of greatness that the two collectively achieved. The only way the Patriots win this Super Bowl is if they had the greatest coach and the greatest quarterback of all time. Lucky for them, and unfortunately for Ravens and Seahawks fans everywhere, they did.
5th Super Bowl (2016): You don’t need me to tell you what happened here. This game saw the greatest half of football ever put together by a Quarterback. Seriously, go back and watch some of the throws Brady made over the course of the 28-3 comeback against the Falcons- they are simply stunning. But as brilliant as Brady was- this is not only the greatest game of his career and perhaps ever, but the moment where he inarguably became the GOAT- the Patriots do not win this Super Bowl without Belichick. For starters, the Patriots were without Brady for four games that year. No matter what you think of the deflategate scandal, the Patriots had to go four games that year with backup Quarterbacks, and Belichick made as much of it as he could. Not only were they perfectly fine with Jimmy G at the helm, but once he got hurt they developed a masterful game plan to beat the Texans 27-0 with a then-rookie Jacoby Brissett. When he came back, Brady stepped into a situation where the team went 3-1 without him, and then took the reins from there. What’s more, the Patriots do not come back in that Super Bowl without excellent coaching. For starters, Belichick’s focus on situational football paid off. Belichick spends more time than perhaps any other coach in football practicing specific situations, drilling his team on reacting to different time and score settings. Low and behold, the Patriots did not make a single mental or coaching error over the course of that comeback, while the Falcons failed to bleed the clock by snapping the ball with time on the clock, committed dumb penalties, and suffered from horrible play-calling. Belichick also reportedly went on intuition and requested during the week leading up to the game that the Patriots add a third two-point play to the playbook in case they needed it- and don’t you know, they wound up going for two three times over the course of the comeback. While that game was certainly Brady’s magnum opus just as 2001 was for Belichick, that game showed what happens when you have the greatest quarterback to ever play the game and the best-coached team in the league. Isn’t that sort of the Patriots dynasty in a nutshell?
6th Super Bowl (2018): While this Super Bowl featured another masterful game plan by Belichick, Brady’s contribution has started to become forgotten. While Brady was not the same guy physically that he had been in years prior, he brought it when he needed to in a way that only the greatest do. For starters, the AFC championship was a throwback Brady game. He went mano-a-mano with Patrick Mahomes, leading to a 37-31 OT victory that is one of the three greatest non-Super Bowl victories of the Brady Belichick era (along with the 2014 Ravens game and the 2001 tuck rule game). All of that led to a Super Bowl that was boring to the average fan but was a football nerd’s dream. The Patriots were once again facing a high-powered Rams offense in the Super Bowl, this time led by wunderkind Sean McVay (I’m mad at Nate from Ted Lasso so I’m gonna take away his nickname) and once again throttled them. The Patriots had played the most man and the least zone coverage in the league that year but completely changed their defensive identity for the Super Bowl. They played almost exclusively zone against the Rams, which helped take away the short and intermediate crossing routes that are McVay’s bread and butter. What’s more, they put six men on the line, which took away LA’s run game that more than doubled any other team in the league in DVOA, while the increased pressure took away their ability to run play-action. But as brilliant as Belichick was, the Pats still needed Brady to step up once more when it counted, and step up he did. In a tie game in the fourth quarter, Brady led the Patriots down the field for yet another fourth-quarter Super Bowl game-winning drive (giving him 6 for his career), headlined by a picture-perfect pass to Gronk to set up the touchdown. While this may not have been the prettiest Super Bowl, the Patriots got a Brady masterpiece to beat the Chiefs and a Belichick masterpiece to hold the Rams in check before Brady took over, once again doing something that was impossible individually, instead combining to create magic that capped off a run the likes of which we will never see again.
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Week 4 Picks
Last Week’s Record: 8-9 (0-1 locks)
Season Record: 27-25
*Lines as of Thursday afternoon
Bengals (-7.5) vs Jaguars
Falcons (+1.5) vs Washington Football Team
Texans (+17) @ Bills
Lions (+3) @ Bears
Cowboys (-4.5) vs Panther
Dolphins (-2, lock) vs Colts
Vikings (+2) vs Browns
Giants (+7) @ Saints
Titans (-6, lock) @ Jets
Chiefs (-7) @ Eagles
Rams (-4.5) vs Cardinals
49ers (-2.5) vs Seahawks
Ravens (even) @ Broncos
Packers (-6.5) vs Steelers
Patriots (+7) vs Buccaneers
Chargers (-3) vs Raiders
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