After the New England Patriots defeated the Los Angeles Rams by the final score of 13-3 in Super Bowl LIII last night, as it was quarterback Tom Brady's 6th title, equalling Michael Jordan, the comparisons started pouring in faster than creepy robot commercials by TurboTax. "Is Tom Brady as dominant as Michael Jordan?" "Is Tom Brady the Michael Jordan of the NFL?" "Is Tom Brady the greatest athlete in history?"
I've always despised GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) debates for many reasons. Most importantly, games evolve over the course of time, so it's virtually impossible to compare a player from the 1960s to a player from today. It's impossible to say with any certainty, "X player from the '60s would have put up Y number's in today's game while Z player from today would have put up XX numbers in the '60s." So how can we then ultimately decide who the better player was? Is it simply based on how they dominated the league, regardless of what era it took place in? Do we just simply go by numbers? It's like the MVP-debate. Should the award be given to the best player or the player most valuable to his or her team's success? There isn't an objective answer here, which makes the debate all the more frustrating, hence why I despise it.
The debate is even more ridiculous when we attempt to cross sports lines. While it's ridiculous to compare Michael Jordan to LeBron James, at least they both played NBA basketball. It's beyond ludicrous to compare an NBA star like Michael Jordan to a player from the NFL such as Tom Brady. I guess the only way we could do that would be if we were to compare their level of domination in their respective sports, but even if we were to attempt that, too many variables would leave our conclusion to be incredibly flawed, at best.
Football and basketball are entirely different sports. Basketball is technically a team game (5-on-5), but all participants play both offense and defense and it's entirely possible for a single player to dominate the entirety of a game. Look at Michael Jordan for instance. The guy was one of the most dominant forces on the offensive side of the ball in NBA history. He was also named to 9 NBA All-Defensive First Teams. So the guy was a beast on both sides of the ball. He literally took over games by himself time and time again. Football is a team sport as well, but with more than twice the number of participants than basketball, and with that, an extended number of rules. So a team can't just give the ball to Michael Jordan, like they do in basketball, let him hold it until 10 seconds are left on the shot clock, and then just stand by while he creates some magic. It's also incredibly rare for an NFL player to play on both sides of the ball. So no matter how good an NFL player is, he's not going to be able to dominate on both sides of the ball like an NBA player could. It's also highly unlikely he'll be able to even dominate on just the offensive side of the ball like Michael Jordan did. There are ten other players on offense. In order for a play to be successful, the five linemen have to block effectively enough to open a hole for the tailback or give the quarterback ample time to complete a pass. That's not the case in basketball. There are only ten players on the court at a time, which creates more space, and allows more freedom and flexibility to individual players. Often times basketball is more about individual players and football is more about coaching.
That brings us to the comparison I mentioned at the outset. Is Tom Brady the Michael Jordan of the NFL? No. No football player could ever be the Michael Jordan of the NFL for the reasons I outlined above. Even if we're just going by the category of "greatest of all-time in their respective sports," how can we say that one player on a team with 24+ starters in a sport where there are 22 players on the field at all times, is the greatest player in the history of his sport? Simple, we can't. Now, if we condense that category to "greatest quarterback of all-time," then there may be room for debate. We'd then have to condense Jordan's domination to a single position, however, and that would then defeat the purpose of the larger debate, making it moot.
Going another direction, I wrote a while back that while Michael Jordan is the greatest player in NBA history, LeBron James is the most valuable. Just look at the Cleveland Cavaliers without James this year for further proof... Can we go that route with Tom Brady and contend that he's the most valuable player in NFL history? No again. Since becoming the starting quarterback for the New England Patriots, Tom Brady only missed more than four regular season starts once, back in the 2008 season. He only started one game that year, which the Pats won. In the other 15 games, the team went 10-5, right in line with the Brady-led Patriots' teams. Matt Cassel. Here's a guy who has a career 26-40 record outside of Patriot-country. He's combined to throw 81 touchdowns and 69 interceptions away from Belichick, with a quarterback rating of 75.9.
Cassel with Belichick: 10-5 record (.667); 62.9% completion percentage; 7.1 yards per attempt; 1.77:1 TD:INT ratio; 88.2 rating
Cassel away from Belichick: 26-40 (.394); 57.8% completion percentage; 6.4 yards per attempt; 1.17:1 TD:INT ratio; 75.9 rating
Under Belichick's leadership, Cassel saw his win percentage increase almost two-fold. His completion percentage increased over 5%. The quarterback's yards per attempt moved up about 3/4 of a yard. His touchdown to interception ratio improved by nearly 2/3. His quarterback rating went up 12.5 points from a mediocre 75.9 to a very respectable 88.2 (especially in 2008, prior to all of the recent quarterback-friendly moves/rules).
So not only is Tom Brady not the Michael Jordan of the NFL; he's not the LeBron James of it. Now, if you wanted to say Bill Belichick is the LeBron James of the NFL (MVP), I'd probably agree. Tom Brady is a great quarterback, one of the best of all-time, but he's likely needed Bill Belichick for his success much more than Belichick needed him for his.
I've always despised GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) debates for many reasons. Most importantly, games evolve over the course of time, so it's virtually impossible to compare a player from the 1960s to a player from today. It's impossible to say with any certainty, "X player from the '60s would have put up Y number's in today's game while Z player from today would have put up XX numbers in the '60s." So how can we then ultimately decide who the better player was? Is it simply based on how they dominated the league, regardless of what era it took place in? Do we just simply go by numbers? It's like the MVP-debate. Should the award be given to the best player or the player most valuable to his or her team's success? There isn't an objective answer here, which makes the debate all the more frustrating, hence why I despise it.
The debate is even more ridiculous when we attempt to cross sports lines. While it's ridiculous to compare Michael Jordan to LeBron James, at least they both played NBA basketball. It's beyond ludicrous to compare an NBA star like Michael Jordan to a player from the NFL such as Tom Brady. I guess the only way we could do that would be if we were to compare their level of domination in their respective sports, but even if we were to attempt that, too many variables would leave our conclusion to be incredibly flawed, at best.
Football and basketball are entirely different sports. Basketball is technically a team game (5-on-5), but all participants play both offense and defense and it's entirely possible for a single player to dominate the entirety of a game. Look at Michael Jordan for instance. The guy was one of the most dominant forces on the offensive side of the ball in NBA history. He was also named to 9 NBA All-Defensive First Teams. So the guy was a beast on both sides of the ball. He literally took over games by himself time and time again. Football is a team sport as well, but with more than twice the number of participants than basketball, and with that, an extended number of rules. So a team can't just give the ball to Michael Jordan, like they do in basketball, let him hold it until 10 seconds are left on the shot clock, and then just stand by while he creates some magic. It's also incredibly rare for an NFL player to play on both sides of the ball. So no matter how good an NFL player is, he's not going to be able to dominate on both sides of the ball like an NBA player could. It's also highly unlikely he'll be able to even dominate on just the offensive side of the ball like Michael Jordan did. There are ten other players on offense. In order for a play to be successful, the five linemen have to block effectively enough to open a hole for the tailback or give the quarterback ample time to complete a pass. That's not the case in basketball. There are only ten players on the court at a time, which creates more space, and allows more freedom and flexibility to individual players. Often times basketball is more about individual players and football is more about coaching.
That brings us to the comparison I mentioned at the outset. Is Tom Brady the Michael Jordan of the NFL? No. No football player could ever be the Michael Jordan of the NFL for the reasons I outlined above. Even if we're just going by the category of "greatest of all-time in their respective sports," how can we say that one player on a team with 24+ starters in a sport where there are 22 players on the field at all times, is the greatest player in the history of his sport? Simple, we can't. Now, if we condense that category to "greatest quarterback of all-time," then there may be room for debate. We'd then have to condense Jordan's domination to a single position, however, and that would then defeat the purpose of the larger debate, making it moot.
Going another direction, I wrote a while back that while Michael Jordan is the greatest player in NBA history, LeBron James is the most valuable. Just look at the Cleveland Cavaliers without James this year for further proof... Can we go that route with Tom Brady and contend that he's the most valuable player in NFL history? No again. Since becoming the starting quarterback for the New England Patriots, Tom Brady only missed more than four regular season starts once, back in the 2008 season. He only started one game that year, which the Pats won. In the other 15 games, the team went 10-5, right in line with the Brady-led Patriots' teams. Matt Cassel. Here's a guy who has a career 26-40 record outside of Patriot-country. He's combined to throw 81 touchdowns and 69 interceptions away from Belichick, with a quarterback rating of 75.9.
Cassel with Belichick: 10-5 record (.667); 62.9% completion percentage; 7.1 yards per attempt; 1.77:1 TD:INT ratio; 88.2 rating
Cassel away from Belichick: 26-40 (.394); 57.8% completion percentage; 6.4 yards per attempt; 1.17:1 TD:INT ratio; 75.9 rating
Under Belichick's leadership, Cassel saw his win percentage increase almost two-fold. His completion percentage increased over 5%. The quarterback's yards per attempt moved up about 3/4 of a yard. His touchdown to interception ratio improved by nearly 2/3. His quarterback rating went up 12.5 points from a mediocre 75.9 to a very respectable 88.2 (especially in 2008, prior to all of the recent quarterback-friendly moves/rules).
So not only is Tom Brady not the Michael Jordan of the NFL; he's not the LeBron James of it. Now, if you wanted to say Bill Belichick is the LeBron James of the NFL (MVP), I'd probably agree. Tom Brady is a great quarterback, one of the best of all-time, but he's likely needed Bill Belichick for his success much more than Belichick needed him for his.
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