After all, defacto general manager Bill Belichick has discarded both of Brady's understudies, for a brief period this week leaving the team without a backup quarterback, trading second-year signal caller Jacoby Brissett to Indianapolis for wide receiver Phillip Dorsett before the start of the season and then exchanging walk-year phenom Jimmy Garoppolo to San Francisco, recouping New England's second-round investment in him with the 49ers' 2018 selection.
In the world of high-stakes poker, that's called going all-in, and it remains to be seen if Belichick shoving all of his chips to the middle of the table was a good bet or a margin call.
Belichick mitigated the margin somewhat by bringing back former-Brady backup Brian Hoyer - he of serviceable starter fame, who took more than his share of lumps on bad 49ers, Chicago Bears and Cleveland Browns teams since leaving Foxborough after being released by the team in final cuts before the 2012 season.
The gamble, of course, is that if Brady suffers an injury, the Patriots would be without the best quarterback in the the National Football League - even so at forty years old. The potential payoff is a trip to Minneapolis in early February for a chance at a big silver trophy.
The reality of it is, however, that even if Garoppolo or Brissett were still around, they were no Tom Brady. In fact, it wouldn't matter who was backing up the seventeen-year veteran, without Brady, the Patriots are screwed.
Or are they?
This particular situation brings up the chance to ponder the age-old "chicken or egg" question as to whether Brady makes New England's potent offense click or if it is the system that caters to Brady's skill set - and it also brings up the even more mystifying question why does it seem that the Patriots' offense can be so flat at times, yet when it comes to winning time, they are able to flip a switch and suddenly turn into a juggernaut?
There is a small sample of evidence that the system caters to the skill set of their signal callers, as last season Garoppolo looked almost Brady-esque in lighting up the Cardinals and then the Dolphins while subbing-in for Brady, and Brissett looked like a world-beater in filling in for both while Brady was suspended and Garoppolo was injured...
...not to mention that a decade ago, Matt Cassell filled in for an injured Brady and led the Patriots to eleven wins in 2008, winning four straight to end the season, but falling short of the division title on a tie-breaker.
But that question may be a few years from being posed and answered, as Brady is showing no discernible signs of decline.
Brady leads the National Football League in passing yards, attempts, completions, is second in the league in passer rating and touchdowns thrown and is in the top ten in just about every other statistic that one could conjure - and is probably in a dead heat with Kansas City's Alex Smith for the league's MVP award at midseason.
From a purely statistical perspective, Brady is having one of the finest seasons of his career. Current trends suggest that Brady would set career marks for passes completed, yards per attempt, yards gained per completion and will have thrown for the second most yards of his career, behind only his 2011 effort.
This despite throwing for his lowest projected touchdown percentage since '13, and is projected to be sacked the most times ever, topping even the 41 he suffered in his first year on the job.
The amazing thing - besides doing all of this at an age when most quarterbacks are pruning their gardens instead of throwing footballs - is that he is accomplishing these numbers without a true go-to receiver for the first time in a decade, as his favorite target, Julian Edelman is nursing a bum knee back to health and is lost for the season.
So what does Brady do? He spreads the ball around, pro rata.
All four of his in-line receivers - Brandon Cooks (33 catches), Chris Hogan (33), Rob Gronkowski (34) and Danny Amendola (31) - have seen the ball come their way a fairly equal number of times as Brady has been spreading the ball around when in the past the targets were heavily in favor of Edelman and, before him, Wes Welker...
...while passing back James White has more or less taken over the safety valve duties normally attributed to Edelman, leading the team in receptions (43) and in catch percentage (81.1%), putting him on pace for very Edelman-like numbers.
In addition, he doesn't have the benefit of a solid running game, which is more by flow and play calling, apparently, than it is by design - as the pass to run ratio for the season runs at 61% to 39%, which exposes Brady to more punishment than he would be in a truly balanced attack, and takes the play action - of which he is a master - out of the equation.
And that will have to be addressed if the Patriots are to improve upon their first half performance which sees them in their normal state, perched atop the AFC East with a 6-2 record - a record that on it's face doesn't tell of the trials and tribulations that team as a whole have had to endure, a record that when looked at from a deeper perspective shows a team that has the required intestinal fortitude to make yet another title run.
How long he will be able to sustain these numbers in light of the punishment he is taking and the fact that opponents are not respecting New England's ground game remains to be seen, but from what we've seen thus far in 2017, Brady is still the Top Cat among NFL quarterbacks.
"We probably had, in my opinion, the best quarterback situation in the league for the last - let's call it two-and-a-half years" Belichick was quoted as saying the day after dealing Garoppolo to San Francisco, speaking of having Jimmy Clipboard around - but now that he's gone, the Dark Master can still say the same thing...
...only he'll have to amend the time frame to include the last seventeen-and-a-half years, because when you have Tom Brady taking snaps for you, you still have the best quarterback situation in the league.
No comments:
Post a Comment