NFL '13 SEASON THREAD

[infrared41]

I want Denver to win it all, because I really like Peyton Manning. I haven't even seen him play much, but I like his commercials, his SNL appearance, and just think he has a good personality. On the other hand, I HATE Eli Manning, and don't want him to have more rings then peyton.

On the other hand (even though I already used my other hand above, so let's pretend I have three hands), I want to be able to say to my yet-to-be-conceived kids (even though I'm undecided about even having kids) that I saw the QB that won the most, appeared in the most SBs, and the team that was the closest thing to a dynasty we'll ever see in the salary cap era. Brady has to win for this to be the case.

Therefore, I'm "rooting" for the Patriots (even though I won't be able to even see the games.)

That's pretty much where I'm at. I'd like to see Peyton get a second ring for the some of reasons you mentioned - and partly because people might finally shut up about his "inability to win the big one." That said, if New England wins today then I'd like to see Brady get his 4th ring for essentially the same reasons you brought up. Brady is the closest thing to Joe Montana that we're going to see and the Patriots are this era's '80's-90's 49ers. Love them, hate them, don't give a flying about them, it's hard to argue against the Patriots success over the years.

In any case, we are seeing two of the best QBs to ever play the game and, for my money anyway, the best head coach in NFL history. Enjoy it while it lasts.

[FiddySicks]

Uggh, puke. Brady couldn't hold Montana's jock strap. The very last thing I wanna see is Brady win another one. I've NEVER seen an athlete let fame and fortune consume every fiber of their being like Brady. He went from being a pretty normal dude to Derrick Zoolander in a football helmet. There is absolutely nothing endearing about Brady, and Montana has more pizzaz in his toe nail clippings than Brady had in his whole body. He's a Bay Area kid and I don't know a single person from the Bay Area who likes him at all. It would really be a shame if people started to pass the torch from a guy like Montana to Tom freaking Brady.

[Kevin W.]

Please, Brady's got nothing on Zoolander. I've never seen him pull off Ferrari, Le Tigre or Blue Steel.

But seriously though, :censored: Brady. The guy's got rings because his team cheated. Plain and simple.

[Kramerica Industries]

Admittedly, I'm always negatively skewed on Brady just because of where he plays; I've never been able to be truly fair in my assessments of Brady. But even in spite of that, I've always been Peyton-tilted anyway. The comparison isn't perfect, but when Brady missed a season, the Patriots still won 11 games. When Peyton missed a season, the Colts won TWO games. The vast majority of the 2001-2011 Patriots teams were better than their 2001-2011 Colts counterparts. The Patriots teams that won those Super Bowls all came before Tom Brady turned into the machine he is today, really. Both are excellent, first ballot HoF QB's. I give a slight edge to Peyton; always have. Because, really, does anyone really think those '03 or '04 Patriots teams would have been worse off with Peyton instead of Brady? It's a team sport that we always have a ridiculous tendency to reduce to analyzing from an individual player's legacy (I'm just as guilty). Brady has three Super Bowl to Peyton's one in large part because Brady played on better teams than Peyton did. That's fine, Brady played his part excellently. But, nonetheless, he had better personnel around him, especially on defense. I really don't see how this can be argued. Those early-'00s Patriots defenses were lights out.

--

All that said, I just attached a pretty large wagon to the Broncos today, because Denver is certainly the better team in this matchup.

[BBTV]

Uggh, puke. Brady couldn't hold Montana's jock strap. The very last thing I wanna see is Brady win another one. I've NEVER seen an athlete let fame and fortune consume every fiber of their being like Brady. He went from being a pretty normal dude to Derrick Zoolander in a football helmet. There is absolutely nothing endearing about Brady, and Montana has more pizzaz in his toe nail clippings than Brady had in his whole body. He's a Bay Area kid and I don't know a single person from the Bay Area who likes him at all. It would really be a shame if people started to pass the torch from a guy like Montana to Tom freaking Brady.

I don't get that at all. Granted I'm not a sports nut so I'm not watching Sports Center or all of those other shows as much as many do (I do watch them, just not religiously) but as far as I can tell he's very low key, doesn't have his face all over TV with endorsements, doesn't give as many interviews as most, and just generally seems pretty reserved for a player of his level of fame. Actually, I think that his lack of exposure actually adds to his legend since he's not overexposed.

Again just an opinion from someone who is relatively out of the loop when it comes to some of these things.

[4_tattoos]

I'd like to see the Patriots win another Super Bowl under the Belichek/Brady regime. I've grown beyond annoyed with people bitching about Spygate. The only thing that would really shut those people up would be for New England to prove they can win a title post spygate.

Keep in mind, I'm a Redskins fan. The Redskins caught perhaps the worse beatdown of the season from that 18-1 Patriots team the year spygate broke. I literally cared about that whole thing for all of two days. Seriously people, get over it. Every team cheats in some way, they just got caught.

[infrared41]

Uggh, puke. Brady couldn't hold Montana's jock strap. The very last thing I wanna see is Brady win another one. I've NEVER seen an athlete let fame and fortune consume every fiber of their being like Brady. He went from being a pretty normal dude to Derrick Zoolander in a football helmet. There is absolutely nothing endearing about Brady, and Montana has more pizzaz in his toe nail clippings than Brady had in his whole body. He's a Bay Area kid and I don't know a single person from the Bay Area who likes him at all. It would really be a shame if people started to pass the torch from a guy like Montana to Tom freaking Brady.

Joe Montana is a.) my all-time favorite football player b.) the greatest QB of all-time - I won't even entertain an argument to the contrary c.) nowhere near the "celebrity" Brady is. I'm judging Brady solely on his on-field performance. Having had the pleasure of watching both Brady and Montana for their entire careers, I believe that Brady is about as close to Montana as it gets. Not saying Brady is as good or better, or that any symbolic torch will be passed, blah blah blah...

If Peyton Manning can't get his second SB ring, I'd like to see Brady get his fourth. Much like the team he plays for, love him, hate him, don't give a flying about him, it's difficult to argue against his greatness.

[FiddySicks]

Uggh, puke. Brady couldn't hold Montana's jock strap. The very last thing I wanna see is Brady win another one. I've NEVER seen an athlete let fame and fortune consume every fiber of their being like Brady. He went from being a pretty normal dude to Derrick Zoolander in a football helmet. There is absolutely nothing endearing about Brady, and Montana has more pizzaz in his toe nail clippings than Brady had in his whole body. He's a Bay Area kid and I don't know a single person from the Bay Area who likes him at all. It would really be a shame if people started to pass the torch from a guy like Montana to Tom freaking Brady.

Joe Montana is a.) my all-time favorite football player b.) the greatest QB of all-time - I won't even entertain an argument to the contrary c.) nowhere near the "celebrity" Brady is. I'm judging Brady solely on his on-field performance. Having had the pleasure of watching both Brady and Montana for their entire careers, I believe that Brady is about as close to Montana as it gets. Not saying Brady is as good or better, or that any symbolic torch will be passed, blah blah blah...

If Peyton Manning can't get his second SB ring, I'd like to see Brady get his fourth. Much like the team he plays for, love him, hate him, don't give a flying about him, it's difficult to argue against his greatness.

And that's a perfectly reasonable point. I'm certainly not arguing his merits as an athlete. He's a tremendous talent. You're absolutely right, you can't argue that. But that still doesn't make him any more endearing.

BBTV is totally right. Brady is low key, but I think that's the reason so many people dislike him. He represents the soulless disconnect of pro athletes to everyone else. It's like he got famous, and instead of sharing that with his fans, he basically became one of "them" (the uppr eschelons of society) and left everyone else behind.

Is it unfair to put that on Brady's shoulders? Yeah, I'll admit it is. Is it even a bit unreasonable to expect that from a guy who hucks a football down the field for a living? Probably. But does it explain, at least in part, why Brady is seen as an unlikeable charicter? Absolutely.

Joe Montana had ALWAYS been seen as a guy who's approachable. Even somewhat relatable. Brady could've just as easily been that guy too, but he let that fall by the wayside much too easily. He's an aristocrat, a noble, and because of where he came from, kind of a sellout.

For a guy as good as he is, I find it difficult to root for a guy like that.

[infrared41]

Admittedly, I'm always negatively skewed on Brady just because of where he plays; I've never been able to be truly fair in my assessments of Brady. But even in spite of that, I've always been Peyton-tilted anyway. The comparison isn't perfect, but when Brady missed a season, the Patriots still won 11 games. When Peyton missed a season, the Colts won TWO games. The vast majority of the 2001-2011 Patriots teams were better than their 2001-2011 Colts counterparts. The Patriots teams that won those Super Bowls all came before Tom Brady turned into the machine he is today, really. Both are excellent, first ballot HoF QB's. I give a slight edge to Peyton; always have. Because, really, does anyone really think those '03 or '04 Patriots teams would have been worse off with Peyton instead of Brady? It's a team sport that we always have a ridiculous tendency to reduce to analyzing from an individual player's legacy (I'm just as guilty). Brady has three Super Bowl to Peyton's one in large part because Brady played on better teams than Peyton did. That's fine, Brady played his part excellently. But, nonetheless, he had better personnel around him, especially on defense. I really don't see how this can be argued. Those early-'00s Patriots defenses were lights out.

--

All that said, I just attached a pretty large wagon to the Broncos today, because Denver is certainly the better team in this matchup.

This argument has been going on since 1983 - the only thing that has changed is the players involved. "Marino's teams weren't as good as Montana's." "Elway has to do it all by himself." "The 49ers always had the better teams." "The 49ers defense was better..." and so on. To paraphrase the great philosopher Madden: at some point we have to decide that someone is the best. In my book, Brady is the best QB of his era. Here's why - if your team is up 5 with two minutes to go and the opposing team has the ball, who is the QB playing today that you'd least like to see leading the opposing team on the final drive? For me, it's Brady. Your mileage may vary.

[Kramerica Industries]

My mileage says "if you've got either, you've got a damn good chance", but that's me being, eh, a bit of a party pooper to the whole concept.

Really, the gist of my argument was just to highlight the not-always-noticed part of football being a team sport. It's absolutely ridiculous to try and denigrate Tom Brady or Joe Montana (not that you were saying I was); my point is only to say that Peyton Manning (or Dan Marino/Jon Elway/etc.) would've almost certainly (IMO, of course) done just as well in the same situation. (well, scratch that one part; I didn't see those guys or those teams in my lifetime, so I can't speak with certainty.)

In any case, they are the two best QB's of this generation and unquestioned top-10 QB's in the history of the sport. We've seen them matchup at least 15 times by the end of today. We are all fortunate to have seen these games in the last 14 seasons.

[infrared41]

My mileage says "if you've got either, you've got a damn good chance", but that's me being, eh, a bit of a party pooper to the whole concept.

Really, the gist of my argument was just to highlight the not-always-noticed part of football being a team sport. It's absolutely ridiculous to try and denigrate Tom Brady or Joe Montana (not that you were saying I was); my point is only to say that Peyton Manning (or Dan Marino/Jon Elway/etc.) would've almost certainly (IMO, of course) done just as well in the same situation. (well, scratch that one part; I didn't see those guys or those teams in my lifetime, so I can't speak with certainty.)

In any case, they are the two best QB's of this generation and unquestioned top-10 QB's in the history of the sport. We've seen them matchup at least 15 times by the end of today. We are all fortunate to have seen these games in the last 14 seasons.

Exactly.

Hard to say with Marino and Elway because they stayed with the same team. Montana went to KC and did pretty well. During the last couple years of his career (I can't remember the exact season) there was talk that Marino might be traded to Pittsburgh. I wish it would have happened. Anyway...

In terms of pure ability, Elway was the best I've ever seen. He could do it all. Still the best arm I've ever seen. The guy was a freaking magician. Those Denver Super Bowl teams of the 80's probably don't even make the playoffs without Elway. Hell, I doubt they go 8-8. The 80's Broncos basically boiled down to 3 quarters of Dan Reeves trying to execute a lousy game plan followed by turning Elway loose in the 4th so the Broncos could get the win. If Elway had played for a different coach, I think the passing record book would have looked a lot different than it does today.

Marino was a lot like Manning. Probably not as much of a "coach on the field" as Manning is, but their styles are similar. Marino had the better arm but he lacked the "vision" Peyton has.

The best way I can describe Montana is like this: if he had a minute on the clock and the ball, he could lead a drive from the parking lot of the stadium to beat you. He is the greatest QB of all-time.

[dbadefense1990]

It's so freaking awkward knowing that these are the conference championship games, yet the logo painted on the grass says, "NFL Championship."

What; is the league hellbent on having co-champions?

[Brass]

Wow. The Patriots defense looks absolutely horrendous. McCourtey is beyond lost out there. If they don't sack up, they're gonna be watching the Super Bowl in the comfort of their own homes next week.

[infrared41]

Still a lot of game left.

[Still MIGHTY]

It's so freaking awkward knowing that these are the conference championship games, yet the logo painted on the grass says, "NFL Championship."

What; is the league hellbent on having co-champions?

What in the hell are you babbling about?

Those same logos said "Divisional" last week and "Wild Card" before that. It's the NFL playoffs Championship week.

[Brass]

A defense that's already lost Vince Wilfork, Jerod Mayo and Brandon Spikes may have just lost Aqib Talib, too.

Fantastic.

[dbadefense1990]

It's so freaking awkward knowing that these are the conference championship games, yet the logo painted on the grass says, "NFL Championship."

What; is the league hellbent on having co-champions?

What in the hell are you babbling about?

Those same logos said "Divisional" last week and "Wild Card" before that. It's the NFL playoffs Championship week.

It's one of those things where two separate things are juxtapositioned together to look awkward. Yes it is the championship round, but having that wording and the NFL shield together make it a little itchy to see live.

[Brass]

Patriots better start picking it up, starting with this drive. Hopefully the Patriots defense realizes that just having Tom Brady do things can only get you so far.

[DS729]

There we go! Huge stop for Denver right there, they can put this thing on ice with a touchdown right here...

[ninersdd]

Devastating play there for the Patriots. A field goal could've cut it to 2 scores(though New England probably knows that they can't stop Denver right now).