Goat

[TemplarCane]

The only truly "elite" defense that either of them ever played with was the defense that carried a broken, awful Manning to a SB in Denver. Brady played with some good defenses in his early years but none were like that Denver defense. Only Dilfer benefited from a defense as much as Manning that year. That SB counts on Manning's all time record, but they won it in spite of him not because of him.

The Bucs defense was more responsible for their championship than Brad Johnson. Although, Johnson was much better than Dilfer.

 

[FrancisSawyer]

It will definetly be a mark on their record, but if they got lucky and landed on a stacked team they too could have been 5x SB champs.

I get your point but at some point you have to start to acknowledge all of the clutch plays, drives, and performances. Yes the system and all of that but there is a special quality to Brady that I feel must not be overlooked. Brady is clutch and as mentally tough as they come. He is a winner. A champion.

 

[OriginalGatorHater]

I get your point but at some point you have to start to acknowledge all of the clutch plays, drives, and performances. Yes the system and all of that but there is a special quality to Brady that I feel must not be overlooked. Brady is clutch and as mentally tough as they come. He is a winner. A champion.

I agree. That is basically my point. That is what needs to be looked at when discussing the Goat. Not, "well he has more rings"

 

[252cane]

I get your point but at some point you have to start to acknowledge all of the clutch plays, drives, and performances. Yes the system and all of that but there is a special quality to Brady that I feel must not be overlooked. Brady is clutch and as mentally tough as they come. He is a winner. A champion.

So is manning. He holds the record for most 4th quarter comebacks. Brady is 2nd and about 8 or 9 behind peyton.

 

[TemplarCane]

It will definetly be a mark on their record, but if they got lucky and landed on a stacked team they too could have been 5x SB champs.

I don’t think Brady’s teams were all that ‘stacked’. Moss is a HOF player but only had a few seasons in NE. The Pats lost the SB their undefeated season. Gronk is a HOF caliber player. What the Pats excel at is finding excellent coaches and very good players to fill roles for what they do. Anyone on the Pats’ defenses going to the HOF? OL-men? Skill players other than Gronk?

Marino I feel bad for. All Shula had to do was put together a solid running game and assemble a good defense. He didn’t need the Bears 85 defense. Just hold teams to less than 21 points. Like Denver did for Elway.

Fouts should have a ring. Had the Chargers not had to play at Cincinnati in -50 degree temperatures he might have one. Bill Walsh wrote he wasn’t sure his first SB team could have kept up with Air Coryell.

 

[Insanecane]

Exactly. People act like you could drop Brady onto the Browns an the past 15 years they would have had 9 SB visits.

Name me one quarterback better than Brady that you could drop onto the Browns and have 9 Super Bowl visits and I'll hang up and listen (and have a good laugh).

 

[TemplarCane]

So is manning. He holds the record for most 4th quarter comebacks. Brady is 2nd and about 8 or 9 behind peyton.

Ask Peyton if he’d trade places in the record books with Brady. 4th quarter comebacks versus Super Bowl championships.

 

[Hardcore Cane]

Arguing this topic is always crazy.

Every players circumstances are different.

Every time frame is different.

Nobody would ever touch Marino’s records if he played today.

Marino played in a time when football was still football and not some over glorified flag football league.

You old timers know what I mean

 

[calinative umstudent]

I'm rooting for Goff like I have been his whole Career. Bay Area kid. Brady is a fake Bay Area guy. Went to Michigan. Goff went to Cal.

 

[TemplarCane]

Arguing this topic is always crazy.

Every players circumstances are different.
Every time frame is different.
Nobody would ever touch Marino’s records if he played today.
Marino played in a time when football was still football and not some over glorified flag football league.
You old timers know what I mean

Agreed. Except for the flag football reference. I remember football before the 5-yard contact rule. When the NFL still played real bump-and-run. Marino and every other big time QB benefitted from that 1978 rule change. The West Coast offense thrived based on the rule change.

I still rank Unitas as a GOAT. If you looked at a historical timeline of QB play, he’s a big dot on the chart. Pre-Unitas and Post-Unitas.

At any position I define a GOAT as someone so good they’re isn’t anyone better. There are may be other players as good, but they aren’t better. Whose better...Walter Payton, Barry Sanders, Earl Campbell, or Eric ****erson?

 

[OriginalGatorHater]

I don’t think Brady’s teams were all that ‘stacked’. Moss is a HOF player but only had a few seasons in NE. The Pats lost the SB their undefeated season. Gronk is a HOF caliber player. What the Pats excel at is finding excellent coaches and very good players to fill roles for what they do. Anyone on the Pats’ defenses going to the HOF? OL-men? Skill players other than Gronk?

Marino I feel bad for. All Shula had to do was put together a solid running game and assemble a good defense. He didn’t need the Bears 85 defense. Just hold teams to less than 21 points. Like Denver did for Elway.

Fouts should have a ring. Had the Chargers not had to play at Cincinnati in -50 degree temperatures he might have one. Bill Walsh wrote he wasn’t sure his first SB team could have kept up with Air Coryell.

They had a few HOFers like you named, but the main thing is they had a bunch of really good players. More than any other team I can think of and like you said with an elite coach they were able to fill positions of need with more really great players.

 

[OriginalGatorHater]

Name me one quarterback better than Brady that you could drop onto the Browns and have 9 Super Bowl visits and I'll hang up and listen (and have a good laugh).

That is the point. The team matters. Had Tom Brady ended up on the Browns in 2000(and stayed until now) then he would be finishing up his career with no rings and no one would consider him the GOAT even though he was just as good.

 

[JTKoval]

Key word is Team. Because brady had better coaches and teams dont make him better.

You think the Manning, Edge, Harrison Colts were the lesser team talent wise to the corresponding Patriots cast? The Colt teams that threatened to go undefeated were the inferior talent? You are in a severe minority in that belief. Dungy was a great coach too, btw.

 

[Insanecane]

That is the point. The team matters. Had Tom Brady (or Montana, Manning, Farve, Elway, Rapistburger etc) ended up on the Browns in 2000(and stayed until now) then he would be finishing up his career with no rings and no one would consider him the GOAT even though he was just as good.

Fixed above.
Seriously though, this line of thinking really undermines greatness. Would Jordan be great without Pippen? Or Phil Jackson? The Bulls went to the playoffs when Jordan left for baseball. So they were a pretty good team without him.
Does Elway win a Super Bowl without T. Davis carrying the team on his back? Montana without Rice and the great 49ers defense's of the 80's?

 

[OriginalGatorHater]

Fixed above.
Seriously though, this line of thinking really undermines greatness. Would Jordan be great without Pippen? Or Phil Jackson? The Bulls went to the playoffs when Jordan left for baseball. So they were a pretty good team without him.
Does Elway win a Super Bowl without T. Davis carrying the team on his back? Montana without Rice and the great 49ers defense's of the 80's?

Basketball is a totally different sport. The ring debate holds more weight in basketball because you only have 5 players on the team and the player is on the field on both offense and defense.

The greatest QB of all time debate needs to be seen in a vacuum. If you were able to take every QB of all time and stick them on identical teams and have them play identitical teams. Which QB would have the best record. That is how you decide who is the best. Not "but he gotz 5 rangs!!!"

I don't know enough about Montana or Elway to really be able to say if they are the true GOATS.

 

[TemplarCane]

Fixed above.
Seriously though, this line of thinking really undermines greatness. Would Jordan be great without Pippen? Or Phil Jackson? The Bulls went to the playoffs when Jordan left for baseball. So they were a pretty good team without him.
Does Elway win a Super Bowl without T. Davis carrying the team on his back? Montana without Rice and the great 49ers defense's of the 80's?

Does Denver get to three Super Bowls in the 80s without Elway carrying the team on HIS back?

BTW...Montana won two Super Bowls with the 49ers before they drafted Jerry Rice. And those ‘great 49ers defenses’ had ONE great player, HOF and GOAT safety Ronnie Lott. In fact, there were only three (3) players to start for all four SF Super Bowl teams from the 80s: Montana, Lott, LB Kenna Turner.

Montana and Elway were the constant and the catalyst for the success of their teams. Yes, they had good players around them, but there is a reason why the quarterback position is the most important in football. In the modern era, starting in 1978 with the 16-game schedule and rules eliminating bump-and-run pass coverage, teams winning Super Bowls without excellent-to-elite QB play are outliers.

 

[Insanecane]

Basketball is a totally different sport. The ring debate holds more weight in basketball because you only have 5 players on the team and the player is on the field on both offense and defense.

The greatest QB of all time debate needs to be seen in a vacuum. If you were able to take every QB of all time and stick them on identical teams and have them play identitical teams. Which QB would have the best record. That is how you decide who is the best. Not "but he gotz 5 rangs!!!"

I don't know enough about Montana or Elway to really be able to say if they are the true GOATS.

So.....based on your argument, which quarterback Is better that Brady?
You must be young not to know about Montana or Elway.
And I disagree about your basketball analysis. Because there are only 5 players playing having good players on your team affects the outcome of a team much more than football. The Warriors V's Cleveland last year clearly showed that. As great as Lebron is he could not compete against Golden state.

 

[Insanecane]

Does Denver get to three Super Bowls in the 80s without Elway carrying the team on HIS back?

BTW...Montana won two Super Bowls with the 49ers before they drafted Jerry Rice. And those ‘great 49ers defenses’ had ONE great player, HOF and GOAT safety Ronnie Lott. In fact, there were only three (3) players to start for all four SF Super Bowl teams from the 80s: Montana, Lott, LB Kenna Turner.

Montana and Elway were the constant and the catalyst for the success of their teams. Yes, they had good players around them, but there is a reason why the quarterback position is the most important in football. In the modern era, starting in 1978 with the 16-game schedule and rules eliminating bump-and-run pass coverage, teams winning Super Bowls without excellent-to-elite QB play are outliers.

You can say the same thing about Brady. His cast has completely changed in 19 years yet he is the constant.

 

[Canedude08]

Fixed above.
Seriously though, this line of thinking really undermines greatness. Would Jordan be great without Pippen? Or Phil Jackson? The Bulls went to the playoffs when Jordan left for baseball. So they were a pretty good team without him.
Does Elway win a Super Bowl without T. Davis carrying the team on his back? Montana without Rice and the great 49ers defense's of the 80's?

Montana won 2 Super Bowls WITHOUT Rice. People forget that. Montana won titles with solid, but hardly spectacular guys like Dwight Clark.

People forget that the "QBs are graded mostly on titles" argument is going to be used to justify Eli Manning being in the HOF. Ironically enough, Eli Manning is basically a glorified version of Jim Plunkett, the only difference is that Plunkett wasn't allowed to stink it up for the latter half of his career and rack up garbage numbers. Titles should matter, but it's a team game, and titles can be extremely random. If a team gets hot, they can win, while a team can be the victim of awful timing. Look at the early 90s Bills. They faced 4 **** good teams in the Super Bowl. Compare that to someone like Brad Johnson or Trent Dilfer, who faced straight trash in their Super Bowls.

 

[Ethnicsands]

Brady is the goat QB. If you do not understand that, you should quit watching football.