In many ways, the game in Denver mirrored that vomit-inducing loss in the 2007 season to the New York Football Giants. If anyone remembers that game (and I know, I know, Pats fans have been trying so hard to forget), it wasn't really Eli Manning that won that game for the Giants. It wasn't that miracle helmet catch. It wasn't even that dropped Asante Samuel pick that would have put the NFC champs on ice. It wasn't New York's running game or receivers or special teams. It was barely even their coaching, really. It was their defensive front's execution.
In that Super Bowl, Brady was sacked five times and got pressured throughout the entire game. Though he completed 60.4% of his passes, he had to get rid of it quickly to avoid the rush. He averaged a paltry 5.5 yards per attempt, with 29 completions for 266 yards. Outside of the two Giants Super Bowls, Brady has typically excelled. Here, he looked mediocre, largely because of the pressure. Make no mistake about it, the true MVP of the game was the entire Giants defensive line.
The same was especially true in 2011 as well. The pressure doesn't exactly show up on the stat sheet - Brady was sacked twice - but the numbers are fairly similar. Brady completed 65.8% of his passes, but still averaged just 6.7 per attempt (although at this point, that was more normal as they had restructured their offense around the short game). Yet the game was impacted greatly by the consistent pressure. Recall that the game started with an intentional grounding safety on the Patriots' opening possession. (Since a lot of people have been playing the "blame Gostkowski game" for the most recent loss in Denver, let's keep in mind that if in that Super Bowl Brady makes a smarter play or a better throw, the Patriots are down by two points going into that final drive, instead of the four. Imagine Brady only needing to get into field goal range to win the game, instead of needing to drive eighty yards, most of which on a last second Hail Mary. Point being, no one play decides the outcome of a game, even late.)
Since those Super Bowls, teams have been trying desperately to copy that. The success for the Giants was not so much in the game plan itself; it was in the execution. It's no secret that every quarterback will struggle if you can get consistent pressure. This always seems to be the big knock on Brady. "He's great! But if you can get pressure on him, he's not that good, really."
Well, no duh. Virtually every quarterback sees their performance drop significantly under pressure. It's always been strange that this is something people use to diminish Brady's talent, but that never gets applied to anyone else (and certainly, that argument always held true of Peyton Manning too). At the same time, Brady is slightly worse than most others when pressured. Only two other quarterbacks see a bigger drop in QBR with pressure than Brady (Philip Rivers and Drew Brees - two guys well respected, especially Brees, who nobody knocks for being bad under pressure). Even more, you don't have to look that hard to find video evidence of it. Brady doesn't lose a lot in the post season, but when he does, it's almost always against the Giants, Broncos, or Ravens.
Speaking of, remember that two year stretch when Rex Ryan was a somewhat decent coach and had a pretty great defense? The Jets succeeded against New England in their divisional game - an MVP season for Brady - largely due to their pass rush. Brady completed 64.4% of his passes, and he threw one of the only picks he had all year. Though he completed 29 passes, he averaged 6.6 yards per attempt and threw under 300 yards. More importantly, he was sacked five times.
When you go back and watch the 2016 AFC Championship, Manning had almost nothing to do with it. He'll get the credit, and Brady-bashers are quick to point out that Manning has a winning record against Brady in AFC title games. But the only way this game could have been less about Manning is if Brock Osweiler had started. The Patriots offensive line had been a problem all season. They couldn't block someone on Twitter. And it culminated in one of the most dominant performances by a defensive line since the 2011 Super Bowl.
What's ultimately interesting about Brady's post season statistics is that he's played in so many damn games. Consider the fact that he's played in ten AFC championship games. That's almost three quarters of an additional season, just in AFCCGs alone! Never mind all the divisional games, and the few wild card games, or the almost half a season in Super Bowls too. No quarterback has played in more post season games. It's actually kind of ridiculous. He's probably played in more post season games than most NFL quarterbacks play regular season games in their careers! The post season is different than the regular season too. It's against superior competition, and it's so much harder to win in the playoffs. It's funny that people mock Brady for losing those two Super Bowls, and yet, Peyton Manning has also lost two Super Bowls. There's a good chance he's about to lose his third too! What will the talking point be if Manning loses almost as many Super Bowls as Tom Brady has won? (I imagine that it will default to "team if Brady succeeds / team if Manning loses" and "Brady if Brady loses / Manning if Manning wins.")
Inevitably, Manning v. Brady arguments will, at some point, devolve into who had better weapons. In recent years, Brady has had the greatest tight end to ever play the game (and who can barely last a whole season because of the way he plays mixed with the way the NFL doesn't actually give a crap about player safety.) For one year, he even perhaps the greatest receiver in history in terms of pure talent. But then what else? People drop Wes Welker in there, or Julian Edelman. To be clear, those are great players. The importance of Edelman was excruciatingly obvious in the month of December when he was out. But let's not forget what we're saying here: Tom Brady has had better weapons because he had...slot receivers? Again, they are absolutely all-time great slot receivers, but how strange is it that we're looking at that position as the key to offensive success? (Also, let's not forget that Manning had a few great slot receivers, in addition to his great wide outs.)
When all is said and done, however, the talent is pretty even, but I'd argue it's skewed more in Manning's favor. Even now, Manning has some of the best receivers in the league, which he can barely do anything with due to his noodle arm. Either way, it's not a large enough gap overall to definitively grant one player the GOAT on surrounding offensive talent alone. However, it is worth reminding people that so much of Brady's career has been about him "making due." He gets weapons and talent, but it's usually not much. (And if we want to go back to playing the "what if" game, Peyton Manning doesn't win his only Super Bowl if Brady has actual receivers in 2006. I'm not sure how many non-Pats fans remember the likes of Reche Caldwell and Jabar Gaffney...)
Reflecting on it highlights something about this Patriots organization. Stripped of all hatred of the team and its success, from a purely football and institutional standpoint, the Patriots with Brady at the helm have been one of the most fascinating organizations. They've fundamentally revamped their offense every three to four years, often setting the trends. Consider that Brady's most traditional years were early in his career. Where the Indianapolis Colts always built their team specifically around Peyton Manning, overloading with offensive talent often at the cost of defense, the Patriots never seemed to care that much. When they started losing that traditional structure - losing guys like Troy Brown to retirement and David Givens and David Patten to free agency - they attempted to plug those holes with whoever (namely, the aforementioned Gaffney and Caldwell).
Things changed in 2007, when they signed Randy Moss and Wes Welker. Though more traditional in its structure, and one of the only years Brady had a typical wideout, the offense was actually built on more of a high/low game. Slot receivers had been used before (especially in Manning's offense with the Colts); the Patriots revolutionized the position. After that stint, they revamped again to heavy use of tight ends. When Aaron Hernandez wasn't shooting people, he was carving up NFL defenses. Rob Gronkowski emerged as an almost literal monster that defenses are still struggling to figure out.
So none of this is to suggest that Brady hasn't had real talent around him. Gronkowski has redefined the tight end position while Julian Edelman has somehow emerged as an even more prolific and significant slot receiver than his predecessor (Welker). But let's just be clear about this: for the last five or six years, the Patriots offense has been consistently impressive while being built around tight ends and slot receivers! Stop me if this sounds like talent your team will win with: Edelman and Gronkowski (the exceptions), Danny Amendola, Brandon LaFell, Keshawn Martin, Kenbrell Thompkins, Aaron Dobson, Brian Tyms, DeAndre Carter, Scott Chandler, and Michael Hommanawanui. Let's factor in end-of-their-careers Chad Ochocinco and Brandon Lloyd (who, to be fair, was actually a much better target for Brady than most Pats fans seem willing to recognize).
Point being, unlike Manning-led offenses, Tom Brady has never had the benefit of an offense specifically built around him. Quite literally, he has always had to adapt his game to his constantly changing offense. Of course, we can't knock Manning on this: we've never really seen him have to have to do that. This year might very well be the first in which Manning is on a team that specifically focused on building outside the offense, recognizing that the quarterback is hardly the player he once was. His game has changed dramatically due to injuries and age, not because his team has changed. Even still, this highlights that Manning has always had teams catered to him, whereas Brady has had to maintain relevance by fitting into the new offense. It's easily one of the most overlooked and underappreciated elements of Brady's game, and something few Brady-bashers or Manning-maniacs will acknowledge.
That out of the way, Brady is hardly the infallible quarterback he's sometimes made out to be. His postseason numbers are impressive as a whole - although some of it is due to the sheer number of games played. For example, setting the record for most passing yards in the playoffs makes sense given no quarterback has played in more games.
One way that Brady and Manning are similar though is that Brady can be a bit erratic in the post season. His best and most consistent statistical years were actually earlier in his career, when he was part of a more traditional offensive structure (and the kind that Manning enjoyed for most of his career). Some might make note that his most impressive post season performances have come against somewhat lackluster teams. For example, his six touchdown game came against the Denver Broncos led by Tim Tebow. He's also had a bunch of success against the hapless (and defenseless) Indianapolis Colts as led by Andrew Luck.
Over the course of his thirty-one post season games (nearly the equivalent of two full additional seasons, mind you), Brady has completed 741 out of 1183 passes (62.6%) for 7,957 yards (265 yards per game) and thrown for 56 touchdowns to 28 interceptions (a 2:1 ratio). He's also got a 22-9 record overall (.709 winning percentage). While he's had his struggles too (especially, strangely, in AFC championship games), it's also worth noting that the playoffs are always harder on any team and quarterback. After all, Brady has faced a top ten defense in two-thirds of his post season games.
I've written before about something of a pattern that emerges when examining his yearly playoff performances. Most often, he starts off looking great, follows it up with a bad performance, and then follows that up with an average game (if they make it to a third game.) Seriously. It's super weird, but also totally true.
In all of his thirty-one post season games, he's only played in the wildcard round three times. He's 2-1, completing 58.2% of his passes, 189 yards per game, and throwing a total of 7 touchdowns to 3 interceptions. All three games were against top ten defenses.
He's played twelve divisional round games, and this is typically excels. He's 10-2 there, completing 63.3% of his passes, averaging 284 yards per game, and logging 24 touchdowns against 9 interceptions (so almost a 3:1 ratio). 8 of those 10 games were against top ten defenses.
Of course, he's also played in six Super Bowls. Those two Giants games were a bit of an outlier in terms of his typical play in the big game, but it's worth remembering that those Giants teams had a killer pass rush, which dramatically impacted the game. Overall though, he's completed 67.6% of his passes, averaging 267 yards per game, and he's tossed 13 touchdowns to 4 interceptions (so he's thrown a bit over a 3:1 touchdown to interception ratio). And, obviously, he's 4-2. What's strange is that his best performances were against all the teams except New York, which was the only team without a top ten defense he's faced in the Super Bowl.
So he's pretty great in Super Bowls, and he's almost automatic in the divisional round. And while not super impressive, he's pretty reliable in wild card games - if he ever plays them. And yet, in AFC championship games, he's completed 59.6% of his passes, averaged 237 yards per game, and has thrown 12 touchdowns to 12 interceptions. What's strange is that only half of these matchups were against top ten defenses. Disregarding his wild card games due to the severally limited number, Brady's completion percentage drops about four points from divisional rounds and eight points from Super Bowls. His yards drop by thirty to fifty yards per game. And his pretty usual 3:1 touchdown to interception ratio is altered to a mediocre 1:1.
It's super weird. What is it, exactly, that makes the AFC championship game so much tougher for Brady and company? Part of it, of course, is the inherent nature of the playoffs. People tend to take the Patriots continued success for granted. They're the only team I've ever seen become favorites just by simply being there (looking specifically at the 2011 Super Bowl when there was no reason for them to be favored against a clearly superior and more complete Giants team). Yet winning in the NFL is pretty hard; winning in the post season even more so. The competition gets better, defenses get stiffer, and when you've played in 30+ post season games, it's just literally impossible to win them all. People knock the Patriots whenever they fail, but even the most ardent haters are holding them up to an insane standard, because they're the most successful dynasty in NFL history. (Seriously, for the Patriots to have proved the haters wrong, they'd have had to win 13 Super Bowls in the last 15 years...That's barely even possible in Madden games!)
Part of it too is, of course, while the Patriots regularly get the bye week, they're not always the number one seed. This means that most of their divisional games are played at home, while a fair amount of the AFC title games are on the road, and Super Bowls are on "neutral" territory. Brady hasn't exactly been at his best on the road in playoff matches. While he's 15-3 at home, he's also 3-4 on the road. (Worth noting, three of those losses were in Denver.)
Keeping everything in perspective of the increased difficulty of the post season, and with how the NFL is set up to prevent teams from having this kind of sustained success, Brady's numbers are still very impressive. Still, he's not perfect. He'll struggle if you get a great pass rush, and if it's on the road, but he's still reliable and great much more often than he's not.
Really the only thing that stands out, when all is said and done, he's at his weakest in AFC title games. He's managed to get his teams to overachieve on numerous occasions, most notably 2006, 2011, and 2015. (Seriously, it's hard to win on the road in the playoffs when you've got a weak o-line and virtually no running game due to injuries. And yet, the Patriots were a two-point conversion away from bringing that game to overtime.)
Manning supporters will regularly discredit Brady's post season numbers for being team achievements, yet will give Manning credit for his. At the same time, Brady fans do tend to sell Manning a bit short. It's true, Manning took a while to eventually get good in the post season. He actually had largely turned it around. 2006 was definitely a turning point for him. (Of course, that AFC title game pretty much was the Super Bowl given the winner went onto face the Chicago Bears...led by Rex flippin' Grossman.)
While Manning has played in five fewer post season games, it's still enough to compare. Here are some comparisons.
RECORDS:
Playoffs/Total:
Tom Brady: 22-9 (.709)
Peyton Manning: 13-13 (.500)
Home Playoff Record:
Brady: 15-3 (.833)
Manning: 10-6 (.625)
Road Playoff Record:
Brady: 3-4 (.428)
Manning: 2-5 (.285)
Wildcard Games:
Brady: 2-1
Manning: 3-4
Divisional Games:
Brady: 10-2
Manning: 5-6
AFC Championship Games:
Brady: 6-4
Manning: 4-1
Super Bowls:
Brady: 4-2
Manning: 1-3
Playoff Games Versus Top Ten Defenses:
Brady: 20
Manning: 15
Record Versus Top Ten Defenses:
Brady: 16-4 (.800)
Manning: 8-7 (.533)
INDIVIDUAL STATS:
Totals:
Brady: 741/1183 - 62.6% 7957 yds - 265 ypg 56 TDs 28 INTs (2:1) 67.7% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 636/1004 - 62.3% 7198 yds - 276 ypg 40 TDs 24 INTs (1.7:1) 57.7% against top 10 defenses
In Wild Card Games:
Brady: 60/103 - 58.2% 567 yds - 189 ypg 7 TDs 3 INTs (2.3:1) 100% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 153/228 - 61.7% 1969 yds - 281 ypg 13 TDs 6 INTs (2.1:1) 42.8% against top 10 defenses
In Divisional Games:
Brady: 298/471 - 63.3% 3413 yds - 284 ypg 24 TDs 9 INTs (2.7:1) 80% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 268/436 - 61.4% 2830 yds - 257 ypg 15 TDs 9 INTs (1.7:1) 45.5% against top 10 defenses
In AFC Championship Games:
Brady: 216/362 - 59.6% 2372 yds - 237 ypg 12 TDs 12 INTs (1:1) 50% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 125/208 - 60% 1539 yds - 307 ypg 9 TDs 5 INTs (1.8:1) 100% against top 10 defenses
In Super Bowls:
Brady: 167/247 - 67.6% 1605 yds - 267 ypg 13 TDs 4 INTs (3.25:1) 67% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 90/132 - 68.1% 860 yds - 286 ypg 3 TDs 4 INTs (1:1.3) 67% against top 10 defenses
Versus Top 10 Defenses:
Brady: 466/742 - 62.8% 5103 yds - 255 ypg 38 TDs 20 INTs (1.9:1 ratio)
Manning: 368/581 - 63.3% 4208 yds - 280 ypg 23 TDs 13 INTs (1.7:1 ratio)
Basic point here is that Manning and Brady have been a lot more even than backers of both seem to realize. On the surface, of course, Manning fans (Fannings?) will suggest that the even play, yet heavily skewed record indicates that Brady has simply been part of a better team, hence more success. Stats don't exactly tell the whole story, of course. It would be a little hard to argue that Brady hasn't benefited from a more well run organization that actually knows how to build a team. People mention that Manning was drafted by a dismal Colts franchise, which is true, but ignores that the Patriots weren't exactly top notch when Belichick took over in 2000 either.
But here's the thing: remember Peyton Manning's one Super Bowl success? If the argument is that Brady won due to team effort, that argument goes double for Manning's ring. In his 2006 campaign, Manning threw six interceptions to just three touchdowns. He threw more interceptions than touchdowns in two consecutive games. On the one hand, he did face the top three ranked teams in total defense. On the other, he faced only one of them during his horrible stretch. I've noted before that the Patriots sometimes win in spite of Brady (see 2006 and 2007, when Brady combined for four touchdowns and six interceptions against the Chargers), but Brady has never had a bad stretch in the post season like that. At least, none that the Patriots survived. Brady has only ever accounted for more turnovers than scores in a post season run once - in 2009 when they went one-and done.
Speaking of, Manning has also gone one-and-done eight separate times, compared to Brady's two. Again, natural inclination is to say, "team effort!" Indeed, Manning's success has evened out since joining the Broncos, a team wherein John Elway has wisely built arguably the strongest overall team Manning has ever played for. (Is it wrong that I think of Elway as a better GM than he was a quarterback?) But the stats tell a story of a mediocre Manning in most of those games. They also tell of a poor Brady in the one-and-done campaigns he's been a part of. Point being, to simply shrug everything off as "team effort" ignores the role a quarterback has on a game. For example, you can't ignore Manning's role in a loss wherein he completed 45% of his passes for 137 yards, 2 interceptions, and 0 touchdowns (as he did in his third post season, facing the New York Jets). Nor can you ignore his inefficiency in the red zone in 2005 against the Steelers.
Plus, if the argument is always "Brady succeeds with team effort," then we can't turn around and pin Manning's success in AFC championship games on primarily him. You don't really get to pick and choose when to apply that argument. Either it applies to both or it applies to neither.
At the end of the day, these guys are two of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. The fundamental difference though is that when push comes to shove, in the biggest game of the year, Brady's just better at scoring.
Reflecting on it highlights something about this Patriots organization. Stripped of all hatred of the team and its success, from a purely football and institutional standpoint, the Patriots with Brady at the helm have been one of the most fascinating organizations. They've fundamentally revamped their offense every three to four years, often setting the trends. Consider that Brady's most traditional years were early in his career. Where the Indianapolis Colts always built their team specifically around Peyton Manning, overloading with offensive talent often at the cost of defense, the Patriots never seemed to care that much. When they started losing that traditional structure - losing guys like Troy Brown to retirement and David Givens and David Patten to free agency - they attempted to plug those holes with whoever (namely, the aforementioned Gaffney and Caldwell).
Things changed in 2007, when they signed Randy Moss and Wes Welker. Though more traditional in its structure, and one of the only years Brady had a typical wideout, the offense was actually built on more of a high/low game. Slot receivers had been used before (especially in Manning's offense with the Colts); the Patriots revolutionized the position. After that stint, they revamped again to heavy use of tight ends. When Aaron Hernandez wasn't shooting people, he was carving up NFL defenses. Rob Gronkowski emerged as an almost literal monster that defenses are still struggling to figure out.
So none of this is to suggest that Brady hasn't had real talent around him. Gronkowski has redefined the tight end position while Julian Edelman has somehow emerged as an even more prolific and significant slot receiver than his predecessor (Welker). But let's just be clear about this: for the last five or six years, the Patriots offense has been consistently impressive while being built around tight ends and slot receivers! Stop me if this sounds like talent your team will win with: Edelman and Gronkowski (the exceptions), Danny Amendola, Brandon LaFell, Keshawn Martin, Kenbrell Thompkins, Aaron Dobson, Brian Tyms, DeAndre Carter, Scott Chandler, and Michael Hommanawanui. Let's factor in end-of-their-careers Chad Ochocinco and Brandon Lloyd (who, to be fair, was actually a much better target for Brady than most Pats fans seem willing to recognize).
Point being, unlike Manning-led offenses, Tom Brady has never had the benefit of an offense specifically built around him. Quite literally, he has always had to adapt his game to his constantly changing offense. Of course, we can't knock Manning on this: we've never really seen him have to have to do that. This year might very well be the first in which Manning is on a team that specifically focused on building outside the offense, recognizing that the quarterback is hardly the player he once was. His game has changed dramatically due to injuries and age, not because his team has changed. Even still, this highlights that Manning has always had teams catered to him, whereas Brady has had to maintain relevance by fitting into the new offense. It's easily one of the most overlooked and underappreciated elements of Brady's game, and something few Brady-bashers or Manning-maniacs will acknowledge.
That out of the way, Brady is hardly the infallible quarterback he's sometimes made out to be. His postseason numbers are impressive as a whole - although some of it is due to the sheer number of games played. For example, setting the record for most passing yards in the playoffs makes sense given no quarterback has played in more games.
One way that Brady and Manning are similar though is that Brady can be a bit erratic in the post season. His best and most consistent statistical years were actually earlier in his career, when he was part of a more traditional offensive structure (and the kind that Manning enjoyed for most of his career). Some might make note that his most impressive post season performances have come against somewhat lackluster teams. For example, his six touchdown game came against the Denver Broncos led by Tim Tebow. He's also had a bunch of success against the hapless (and defenseless) Indianapolis Colts as led by Andrew Luck.
Over the course of his thirty-one post season games (nearly the equivalent of two full additional seasons, mind you), Brady has completed 741 out of 1183 passes (62.6%) for 7,957 yards (265 yards per game) and thrown for 56 touchdowns to 28 interceptions (a 2:1 ratio). He's also got a 22-9 record overall (.709 winning percentage). While he's had his struggles too (especially, strangely, in AFC championship games), it's also worth noting that the playoffs are always harder on any team and quarterback. After all, Brady has faced a top ten defense in two-thirds of his post season games.
I've written before about something of a pattern that emerges when examining his yearly playoff performances. Most often, he starts off looking great, follows it up with a bad performance, and then follows that up with an average game (if they make it to a third game.) Seriously. It's super weird, but also totally true.
In all of his thirty-one post season games, he's only played in the wildcard round three times. He's 2-1, completing 58.2% of his passes, 189 yards per game, and throwing a total of 7 touchdowns to 3 interceptions. All three games were against top ten defenses.
He's played twelve divisional round games, and this is typically excels. He's 10-2 there, completing 63.3% of his passes, averaging 284 yards per game, and logging 24 touchdowns against 9 interceptions (so almost a 3:1 ratio). 8 of those 10 games were against top ten defenses.
Of course, he's also played in six Super Bowls. Those two Giants games were a bit of an outlier in terms of his typical play in the big game, but it's worth remembering that those Giants teams had a killer pass rush, which dramatically impacted the game. Overall though, he's completed 67.6% of his passes, averaging 267 yards per game, and he's tossed 13 touchdowns to 4 interceptions (so he's thrown a bit over a 3:1 touchdown to interception ratio). And, obviously, he's 4-2. What's strange is that his best performances were against all the teams except New York, which was the only team without a top ten defense he's faced in the Super Bowl.
So he's pretty great in Super Bowls, and he's almost automatic in the divisional round. And while not super impressive, he's pretty reliable in wild card games - if he ever plays them. And yet, in AFC championship games, he's completed 59.6% of his passes, averaged 237 yards per game, and has thrown 12 touchdowns to 12 interceptions. What's strange is that only half of these matchups were against top ten defenses. Disregarding his wild card games due to the severally limited number, Brady's completion percentage drops about four points from divisional rounds and eight points from Super Bowls. His yards drop by thirty to fifty yards per game. And his pretty usual 3:1 touchdown to interception ratio is altered to a mediocre 1:1.
It's super weird. What is it, exactly, that makes the AFC championship game so much tougher for Brady and company? Part of it, of course, is the inherent nature of the playoffs. People tend to take the Patriots continued success for granted. They're the only team I've ever seen become favorites just by simply being there (looking specifically at the 2011 Super Bowl when there was no reason for them to be favored against a clearly superior and more complete Giants team). Yet winning in the NFL is pretty hard; winning in the post season even more so. The competition gets better, defenses get stiffer, and when you've played in 30+ post season games, it's just literally impossible to win them all. People knock the Patriots whenever they fail, but even the most ardent haters are holding them up to an insane standard, because they're the most successful dynasty in NFL history. (Seriously, for the Patriots to have proved the haters wrong, they'd have had to win 13 Super Bowls in the last 15 years...That's barely even possible in Madden games!)
Part of it too is, of course, while the Patriots regularly get the bye week, they're not always the number one seed. This means that most of their divisional games are played at home, while a fair amount of the AFC title games are on the road, and Super Bowls are on "neutral" territory. Brady hasn't exactly been at his best on the road in playoff matches. While he's 15-3 at home, he's also 3-4 on the road. (Worth noting, three of those losses were in Denver.)
Keeping everything in perspective of the increased difficulty of the post season, and with how the NFL is set up to prevent teams from having this kind of sustained success, Brady's numbers are still very impressive. Still, he's not perfect. He'll struggle if you get a great pass rush, and if it's on the road, but he's still reliable and great much more often than he's not.
Really the only thing that stands out, when all is said and done, he's at his weakest in AFC title games. He's managed to get his teams to overachieve on numerous occasions, most notably 2006, 2011, and 2015. (Seriously, it's hard to win on the road in the playoffs when you've got a weak o-line and virtually no running game due to injuries. And yet, the Patriots were a two-point conversion away from bringing that game to overtime.)
Manning supporters will regularly discredit Brady's post season numbers for being team achievements, yet will give Manning credit for his. At the same time, Brady fans do tend to sell Manning a bit short. It's true, Manning took a while to eventually get good in the post season. He actually had largely turned it around. 2006 was definitely a turning point for him. (Of course, that AFC title game pretty much was the Super Bowl given the winner went onto face the Chicago Bears...led by Rex flippin' Grossman.)
While Manning has played in five fewer post season games, it's still enough to compare. Here are some comparisons.
RECORDS:
Playoffs/Total:
Tom Brady: 22-9 (.709)
Peyton Manning: 13-13 (.500)
Home Playoff Record:
Brady: 15-3 (.833)
Manning: 10-6 (.625)
Road Playoff Record:
Brady: 3-4 (.428)
Manning: 2-5 (.285)
Wildcard Games:
Brady: 2-1
Manning: 3-4
Divisional Games:
Brady: 10-2
Manning: 5-6
AFC Championship Games:
Brady: 6-4
Manning: 4-1
Super Bowls:
Brady: 4-2
Manning: 1-3
Playoff Games Versus Top Ten Defenses:
Brady: 20
Manning: 15
Record Versus Top Ten Defenses:
Brady: 16-4 (.800)
Manning: 8-7 (.533)
INDIVIDUAL STATS:
Totals:
Brady: 741/1183 - 62.6% 7957 yds - 265 ypg 56 TDs 28 INTs (2:1) 67.7% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 636/1004 - 62.3% 7198 yds - 276 ypg 40 TDs 24 INTs (1.7:1) 57.7% against top 10 defenses
In Wild Card Games:
Brady: 60/103 - 58.2% 567 yds - 189 ypg 7 TDs 3 INTs (2.3:1) 100% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 153/228 - 61.7% 1969 yds - 281 ypg 13 TDs 6 INTs (2.1:1) 42.8% against top 10 defenses
In Divisional Games:
Brady: 298/471 - 63.3% 3413 yds - 284 ypg 24 TDs 9 INTs (2.7:1) 80% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 268/436 - 61.4% 2830 yds - 257 ypg 15 TDs 9 INTs (1.7:1) 45.5% against top 10 defenses
In AFC Championship Games:
Brady: 216/362 - 59.6% 2372 yds - 237 ypg 12 TDs 12 INTs (1:1) 50% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 125/208 - 60% 1539 yds - 307 ypg 9 TDs 5 INTs (1.8:1) 100% against top 10 defenses
In Super Bowls:
Brady: 167/247 - 67.6% 1605 yds - 267 ypg 13 TDs 4 INTs (3.25:1) 67% against top 10 defenses
Manning: 90/132 - 68.1% 860 yds - 286 ypg 3 TDs 4 INTs (1:1.3) 67% against top 10 defenses
Versus Top 10 Defenses:
Brady: 466/742 - 62.8% 5103 yds - 255 ypg 38 TDs 20 INTs (1.9:1 ratio)
Manning: 368/581 - 63.3% 4208 yds - 280 ypg 23 TDs 13 INTs (1.7:1 ratio)
Basic point here is that Manning and Brady have been a lot more even than backers of both seem to realize. On the surface, of course, Manning fans (Fannings?) will suggest that the even play, yet heavily skewed record indicates that Brady has simply been part of a better team, hence more success. Stats don't exactly tell the whole story, of course. It would be a little hard to argue that Brady hasn't benefited from a more well run organization that actually knows how to build a team. People mention that Manning was drafted by a dismal Colts franchise, which is true, but ignores that the Patriots weren't exactly top notch when Belichick took over in 2000 either.
But here's the thing: remember Peyton Manning's one Super Bowl success? If the argument is that Brady won due to team effort, that argument goes double for Manning's ring. In his 2006 campaign, Manning threw six interceptions to just three touchdowns. He threw more interceptions than touchdowns in two consecutive games. On the one hand, he did face the top three ranked teams in total defense. On the other, he faced only one of them during his horrible stretch. I've noted before that the Patriots sometimes win in spite of Brady (see 2006 and 2007, when Brady combined for four touchdowns and six interceptions against the Chargers), but Brady has never had a bad stretch in the post season like that. At least, none that the Patriots survived. Brady has only ever accounted for more turnovers than scores in a post season run once - in 2009 when they went one-and done.
Speaking of, Manning has also gone one-and-done eight separate times, compared to Brady's two. Again, natural inclination is to say, "team effort!" Indeed, Manning's success has evened out since joining the Broncos, a team wherein John Elway has wisely built arguably the strongest overall team Manning has ever played for. (Is it wrong that I think of Elway as a better GM than he was a quarterback?) But the stats tell a story of a mediocre Manning in most of those games. They also tell of a poor Brady in the one-and-done campaigns he's been a part of. Point being, to simply shrug everything off as "team effort" ignores the role a quarterback has on a game. For example, you can't ignore Manning's role in a loss wherein he completed 45% of his passes for 137 yards, 2 interceptions, and 0 touchdowns (as he did in his third post season, facing the New York Jets). Nor can you ignore his inefficiency in the red zone in 2005 against the Steelers.
Plus, if the argument is always "Brady succeeds with team effort," then we can't turn around and pin Manning's success in AFC championship games on primarily him. You don't really get to pick and choose when to apply that argument. Either it applies to both or it applies to neither.
At the end of the day, these guys are two of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. The fundamental difference though is that when push comes to shove, in the biggest game of the year, Brady's just better at scoring.
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