For a while, there was a trend in popular history writing to tell a vast tale, often world history, via one particular and unexpected item, usually involving food. There was a book called “Salt: A World History.” There was “The Truth About Baked Beans: An Edible History of New England,” and “The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell,” and “The Course of History: Ten Meals that Changed the World,” and “Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World.”
It
would be possible to write a similar tome about Tom Brady. Maybe it wouldn’t cover the history of the
world, but his story could certainly be used to tell the history of the NFL
over the last twenty years, and maybe even a bit more than that. It would be possible to stretch the Brady
story into the history of America over the first bit of the 21st
Century.
It
began with XXXVI, when Brady was
basically unknown, but led his 14-point underdog Patriots to defeat the
Rams. Then there was XXXVIII, in which we all learned what a
“wardrobe malfunction” is, and XXXIX,
where Donovan McNabb puked on national TV.
His next win was in XLIX,
which left us all with two questions: 1) why didn’t they call it Superbowl IL? and 2) why didn’t they just hand it
off to Marshawn Lynch? He then gave us LI, memories of which still cause Matt
Ryan to awaken screaming in the middle of the night, and LIII, which was tied 3 – 3 at the end of the third quarter and is
arguably the most boring Superbowl of all time.
Then
there were the three losses, in XLII,
after an undefeated season, XLVI (losing
AGAIN to Eli Manning) and the glorious LII,
in which Brady set a Superbowl record with 505 passing yards but could not
beat the sainted Nick Foles.
QBs who lost to
Brady in the Superbowl were named Kurt Warner, Jake Delhomme, Donovan McNabb,
Russell Wilson, Matt Ryan and Jared Goff.
Mahomes won last year in his only Superbowl appearance. His victim was Jimmy Garoppolo.
Superbowl
LV is unusual in that both starting quarterbacks have already led teams to
Superbowl wins. This has only happened
on five prior occasions, three of which occurred back in the Pleistocene Era
when the Earth’s crust was just beginning to cool and all the quarterbacks were
named Starr or Bradshaw or Staubach. The
other two times both involved---wait for it---Brady. In XXXXVI,
Eli beat Brady to win his second ring. Then
in XLIX, Russell Wilson sought his
second consecutive ring, but Tom Brady said no.
All of
which means what? Well, maybe not much.
In our
all-important adjusted yards/pass, KC is a 7.4, and Tampa comes in with a 6.7
AYP. Of course, Tampa has already beaten
Green Bay (NFC 1-seed, 7.7 AYP) and New Orleans (NFC 2-seed, 6.8 AYP), so maybe
Tampa is good enough in other ways to beat KC as well. Their defensive AYP is slightly better than
the Chiefs’ and they outscored their opponents this year by more than the Chiefs
did.
Brady
and Mahomes have faced off four times and each QB has won twice. All four games have been decided by seven
points or less and KC has outscored Brady’s teams by 121 – 120. In the most recent matchup, on November 29,
2020, Mahomes and KC beat Brady and Tampa Bay by a field goal.
The
game is being played in Tampa Bay and there will be about 22,000 people in the
stands, which will probably be this season’s largest attendance at any
game. They will not all be Buccaneers
fans, but this might actually be a 2020-21 game where the home field can make a
difference.
Everything
I see about this game suggests it will be close. Kansas City is favored by three points and I
cannot say the line is wrong, but I will be taking Brady and the points.
Copyright2021MichaelKubacki
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