QB GOAT

On this episode of the NFL explained. podcast, Mike Yam and Michael Robinson take a holistic approach in an attempt to conclude just who may be the greatest quarterback of all time. Listen as they break down the numbers and put them in historical context to give us some clues as to how the current crop of NFL quarterbacks may fare in the history books. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
NFL Explained is a production of the NFL in partnership
with I Heart Radio. All Right, I'd started off the
episode by saying, hey, beautiful people, and do my best
Michael Robinson impersonation. But there was a huge, huge, epic
mistake that I made in last week's episode, so I

(00:26):
thought this week I would rectify it right off the top.
Are you cool with that? I'm my camp, He's Michael Robinson.
This is NFL Explained. You know, last week I didn't
even introduce us. People are tuning into NFL Explained podcast
when they were on their phone and they actually clicked
the actual link. Come on, man, they knew what they
were getting. Yeah, no, no no, it's a good point. It's

(00:48):
a good point. But I'd like to think I'm a professional.
Although if you've been listening to this episode, that might
be up for debate. This episode, in particular, comes from
something that you said on a previous episode. Sometimes you
say stuff and it just, you know, it just resonates
and we started dreaming about it. And you gotta remind
me though, because sometimes I forget it. Like you did

(01:08):
say something about like the moon and the some solar
system reference had has nothing to do I want to
get into it if no, no, no, I'm not going
down that path. The path that we're going to go
down is this idea that Tom Brady is not the goat. Okay,
pause sort of kind of you said, I'm twisting it.
I'm definitely twisting it. This entire episode, really though, is

(01:30):
about the quarterback and the greatest of all time, and
we're gonna lay things out for everyone, talk about some statistics,
some of the things that you saw playing against some
of these guys, playing with some of these players as well.
But in all sincerity, I think a lot of people
say Tom Brady is the goat. You think about all
the Super Bowls and we'll get to dB twelve here
in just a minute. You had a different designation forum

(01:52):
it's goat, but it's the greatest of all time, not
necessarily quarterback. You thought winner, winner, I mean, you just
think about it. With seven super Bowls, I mean, I
don't think if you think anybody's going to ever get
close to that, that's a lot. And when you talk
about the greatest of all time with a certain position,
that's a more individual thing. Those Super Bowls as a

(02:12):
team thing, and it has a lot of different factors
to us, so I can't wait to get into it.
All right, we'll talk about Brady coming up in this episode,
but we're knocking on the door. We got run in
the postseason, we got the super Bowl around the corner.
That's the money making time, right, and like that's the
biggest stage on the planet everyone's watching. Is there a
player that comes to mind that really cemented their their

(02:33):
legacy as a player because of what they did in
that game. I would have to say Eli Manning. I mean,
think about it. I mean, if you take the super
Bowl runs, the Playoffs runs away from his career, I'm
not so sure we're thinking about Eli Manning as a
Hall of Famer. I would even throw my guy beast
Mode in there. I mean during the Playoffs, he had
Beast Quake. I mean I was in on that play.

(02:55):
It was seventy power. We blocked it terribly, and to me,
it was one of the greatest runs of all time,
regardless Playoffs or whatever. Um. But I would say Beast Mode.
And obviously you got guys like to Roll Davis, but yeah,
Eli Manning, Beam those guys that stick out from me.
The Manning one is a good one. By the way,
I know we keep throwing out that term goat. Are
you cool with that? Should? I like, is there cool

(03:15):
with it? I mean, look, so I asked my son, okay,
is there any other terms or whatever? He didn't text
back yet he was in school, so I'm still waiting.
Uh that was a test text. While look, I'm always
I'm always tested him. Like I'll send him a message
on Instagram or something like after he's not supposed to
have the phone, and if he responds, I'm like, what

(03:37):
did you respond for? He's like, but Dad, you sent
the message ahead to respond to day. Because if you
send a message in the middle of the day when
he's not supposed to have the phone and it says hey,
I love you and he says I love you, You're
not gonna get mad. It's alright, cool. We'll break the
rule that one is okay to go with um. I
mentioned this before. I think the way to do this

(03:58):
is to not just say, hey, do the greatest of
all time without giving you real analysis. So what we'll
do here is go through the backs in the Super
Bowl era, specifically, because if we said all quarterbacks and
we're going to try our best to do decades, like
the generational aspect of the game has changed. There's been
an evolution. In fact, we've done numerous podcasts about the

(04:19):
evolution of specific aspects of the game. If you've missed
any of those episodes, highly encourage you to go back.
But I do think about football as a team sport
and then to win. And yet you throughout Eli Manning
as an example of a guy that made his legacy
in that game. Do we put too much on a

(04:39):
championship when evaluating the greatest of all time? I mean, again,
yams Uh, you're talking to a former role player. I
played quarterback at times in my life when in the
National Football League, I was a role player, special team
or fullback, backup tailback at times, backup receiver, all of
those things. So absolutely, getting Super Bowls means everything, right,

(05:01):
because if you win that Super Bowl, everybody makes more money,
everybody becomes more valuable, every you know, everybody, even the
front office guys. Everything changes. So yeah, I'm not gonna
say we put too much weight on it. No we don't.
I think we put the right amount of weight on it,
because at the end of the day, that's why we
play this game. We played this game that win championships,
not just to get the goat label. It's tough because

(05:23):
I think it applies across the board in every sport.
There's enough players that played and you and I are
roughly the same age. You know, in the nineties in
the NBA there was Jordan's and you know what, Jordan's
kind of messed it up for a lot of players
because how many times do we go through a list
of guys and go they don't have a chip, you
know what? And it's like, dude, that guy was amazing,

(05:44):
and yet you didn't win the ultimate goal. I mean
to me, that has to be considered. And when you're
going up against the real goat, who's MJ Like, that's
gonna be a little bit of a problem here, all right.
I want to give some historical context on some of
the numbers, and once again Super Bowl era, So right
around nineteen seventy is where we're gonna mark this sucker here.

(06:04):
What we're gonna do here is look at an average
number of passing yards per game by quarterbacks since nineteen
seventy five year increments, So from nineteen seventy to twenty twenty,
the number of yards per game has increased by eighty four,
which does speak to the evolution of quarterback play, wide receivers,
the whole thing. We did those specific episodes once again
here uh real briefly, nineteen seventy hundred sixty one point

(06:27):
four passing yards seventy five a notch up to one
sixty two point eight, nineteen eighty a big spite, a
hundred and ninety six, then two oh four. Eventually you
get to the point in twenty twenty where you're talking
about two hundred and forty five passing yards per games,
So some rough numbers to analyze there. We saw that
number hit over two hundred, by the way in the

(06:48):
early eighties, and then boosted by a quarterback who put
up numbers that really no one has ever seen. In fact,
when I was a kid, he was my favorite quarterback
and I wasn't even a Dolphins fan. I was just
a fan of Dan Marino. N. Eighty four, the dude
through for five thousand yards, a number no one would reach.
This is when you know you're legit until Drew Brees

(07:08):
did it twenty four years later. Like to me, that's
it's not a record that happened two years later. It
got broken. No, no no, no, took twenty four years, almost
three decades for that number to be hit. Now, Marino
even through forty eight touchdowns, and that was a number No.
One hit until Peyton Manning, who something tells me you
might point to a little bit later in this podcast
had forty nine in two thousand four. We could also

(07:31):
say that he played in an arrow war defensive backs
got away with a little bit more to it, right.
I mean not to make this a basketball podcast, but
I do think about basketball in the nineties, like you
know that was that was tough. Man, were fighting out there. Legit.
Now you like you breathe too hard on a guy,
and it's for saying the wrong thing. Some words that
just weren't It's just words. When he retired, by the way, Marino,

(07:54):
he led the league and passing yards, completions and passing touchdowns.
He also led the a f C and passing touchdowns
from nineteen eighty three to nineteen So how do you
view a guy like Dan Marino? So, first of all,
people got to understand, if you haven't met this dude,
he's huge. Okay, he is a big dude. He was

(08:15):
at the Buffalo game when I was up there when
I was in my cold leather jacket and all that
stuff with Colleen and Steve Smith and m J. D Uh.
He was there and he's huge, So he's a big dude,
and he ain't running nowhere. And to to to understand
what Dan Marino met to the quarterback position, I think
he was the first guy to show coaches, to show
everybody in the football world you can will a team

(08:39):
up and down the field and win games consistently with
just your arm, just your arm. You don't necessarily need
to because you got to think the sixties and seventies
were dominated by the running back position. They ran the football.
The fullbacks even ran the football in the early years
of the game. And then you get this gun slinger
and Dan Marino coming out of Pittsburgh, who you know,

(08:59):
had a little bit of a weird delivery, but at
the end of the day, he can hit any point
on the field, any point in the field. And to me,
that's his significance to the position, the fact that he
was a guy. And again I always talk about this
on Autotal Access show. There's not a lot of human
beings who can wild their team up and down the
field with just the abilities of their arm. Dan Marino,
in my opinion, was the first, at least the first

(09:21):
big time guy where the numbers proved it and everything
on the scene at the quarterback position. All right, A
little bit of a tangent here because I had asked
you about the Super Bowl being that one moment that
kind of makes a career. And as I'm thinking about
what your response was, I almost now feel bad, And
maybe I shouldn't feel bad, but like, think about that, though.

(09:41):
You gotta have so many right circumstances to go into
place here, and it's not just about what you do
individually on the field, it's about schematically. Your coach is
the play calling your defensive which we'll talk about a
little bit later in this podcast. Like can you imagine
if and we'll talk about Joe Montana second here, if
I said Dan Marino's playing with the Niners, Like do
we have a very different conversation about Dan Marino and

(10:03):
a very different one about Joe Montana? Or absolutely? I mean,
and again I know we're gonna get to Joe Montana,
but you talk about Joe Montana. Yes, one, four super bowls,
all lit those things he wanted every time he got there,
but he had Bill Walsh, and I'm one of those
guys where to me, you cannot discount the fact that
Bill Walsh, who is one of the architects of offense

(10:24):
in our game. Almost every single offense on any level
of anything of football has some type of Bill Walsh
principle associated with it. That's how influential that guy was.
And so that's who Joe Montana had it. So I
kind of, you know, I give some of that success
to Bill Walsh as well. Yeah, I had asked you

(10:45):
on a previous podcast when we talked about running backs.
I said, Emmitt Smith, right, and he was like, dude,
he was good. But I think about those big boys
up from Larry Allen, those guys and I played with
Larry Allen, Hall of Fame guy. We we talked about
the past rushers and Lawrence Telling. Again, I think Lawrence
Tell was one of the best ever to do it right,
but he was in the Buddy Ryan defense who was

(11:05):
kind of to the National Football League, and it has
some advantageous situations for him. Let's just say that, I
say I respond to everything that m Rob said with this.
By the time we get to the end of the podcast.
Who you think is the goat or who you thought
was your selection? It might be different because as I
was going through those notes, I had a guy in
my head, and after I finished digesting everything, I said, I, So,

(11:29):
I'm just throwing that out there. It could be very
different if you just stick with us here, Joe Montana,
I will bring him up now. Obviously different than Marino.
You mentioned that offense with wash, a West Coast offense
that relied heavily on a little bit more efficiency, less
on the Dare I say that bred far sort of
gun slinger mentality. We'll talk about far of coming up here.

(11:52):
His numbers over passing yards, two seventy three passing touchdowns.
Those numbers might seem big, but for context, they're not
even in the top eighteen all time. Here's the difference.
Though he won two m v ps, and he delivered
when it mattered the most a point a passer rating
in four Super Bowls. By the way, all championships also

(12:14):
had eleven touchdowns zero interceptions in those games. And it
also helps if you have a guy named Cherry, right,
Jerry Rice the goat the greatest way I received it
we've ever seen. But I mean to hear those numbers
from Joe Montane. And again, I don't want our listeners
to say, oh, Mike rob I'm talking about Bill Walsh.
To take something away from Joe Montown, know that hundred
passer rade. I mean those are real numbers. Eleven touchdowns

(12:37):
were intercepted. He plead did that. He played those games.
He had to make the real end game decisions. He
had to be cool as a cue. Come. I remember
he would talk about it. Forget that Super Bowl where
he had to make that big long drive and he's
in the huddle talking about John Candy up in the stands.
I mean, that's that was his superpower, being calm and
collected in those crazy situations. But again, when you have

(12:58):
a guy like a Bill Walsh, who, again through necessity
because his offensive line wasn't that good at some of
the lower levels, had to the hell up a new
style of offense that the league hadn't seen. Again, Ernie's
and Pez did the same thing Mike Martz at the time.
You remember Mike Martz when he had our Kurt Warner.
Kurt Warner I mean said all types of records, right.

(13:19):
But when he left, Mike Martz and that offense wasn't
coach the same he went to the Giants. Kurt looked
a little bit different to me. That had a lot
to do again with the play called, and it flips
the other way. You know. We talked about this on
another episode about two h um Man. You know, look
at how different his season was with Mike McDaniel there.
And it's not not it's just sometimes guys gravitate towards

(13:41):
a specific scheme of just a better fit. Talked to
differently from a coach's perspective. You know, how you show
up to work like those and your mindset heading into
that day changes depending on leadership. And it's not a
positive or negative thing, you know, not to knock anyone,
it's just kind of the reality of some of those
situations I mentioned far. I think he's important to get to.

(14:03):
It's a guy who's won three consecutive mp he's seven.
He's still fourth all time in yards touchdown, only behind
a couple of guys who could be on the Mount
Rushmore of quarterbacks and Brady Breeze and Manning eighteen seasons
of three thousand plus passing yards, second only to Yacht
t Beach twelve and his eleven Pro Bowls were the
most by a quarterback when he retired. There's a lot

(14:26):
of good that comes with Brett Farve. There's also some
stuff that happens when when you play a whole lot
as well. Also the record holder in most career interceptions
thrown and fumblest six I and t s a hundred
and sixty six fumbles, a total of five hundred and
two career turnover. That doesn't even sound right you saying that,

(14:48):
right and two and he has a winning record. Wow,
I mean, that's that's all the fame worthy just in itself, right,
being able to overcome the turnover that Green Bay fans,
by the way, they love this because Aaron Rodgers is
coming up later in this episode. Think about he's kind
of the antithesis when it comes to touchdown the interception

(15:11):
ratio and yet far you know, look context here. One
in every thirty throws that far through was what's an Like,
that's crazy to me. But there's also something to be
said for playing and being available most consecutive starts by
a quarterback two hundred and that to me is as
impressive as any of the passing records that he holds.

(15:33):
It is very impressive. I mean quarterbacks sometimes, yea, we
see it all the time. I mean, hell, all referees
can't get rough in the passing right, right, because sometimes
they're in such compromising positions and situations when they're trying
to throw the football and just kind of operate their offense.
And so the fact that Brett far through deaths in
his family, through everything that's going on, through stuff going

(15:55):
on in his personal life that we all knew that
was a very public thing, he still went out there
and played football. So to me, yet that there has
to be something said about that. But there also has
to be something said about that. And again, I I
almost think I'm saying something wrong because it's Brett Farve.
He only got one super Bowl, right, one? Like I
talked about Anne Rodgers. How do you say I got one?

(16:17):
He got the same amount as me, and I had
none of the talent those guys head And if they
were that great, shouldn't we get more out of them?
Shouldn't we get more championship? Sham. I'm not saying you
can throw that out there. But once again, by the
end of this podcast, you might say there's a reason
and some guys that have more of those championships might
have just had I don't know, the top five defense

(16:39):
might have had a guy like Jerry Rice. Those circumstances
dictate a lot of this conversation. I mentioned both the
good and the bad for far and we've done that
for a lot of these players. Does is he in
this conversation? I mean, clearly he is because we're talking
about him, But should he be discussed this way with
some of those turnovers that you made reference to? I
think so, God think I think when you when I

(17:02):
think about the greatest of all time, I think about
you have to when you think about the position, you
can't think about the position without thinking about the player.
And when I think about the quarterback position, and yeah,
we can say what we want to say about Brett
father and his personal life and miss Hues Funds, whatever
it was you want to say about it, interceptions, all that.
At the end of the day, when you think about
the quarterback position in the National Football League, Brett Farve

(17:23):
does come across your brain. Uh, you've ever heard of
the word entrapment? Okay, I'm actually glad. I wasn't even
doing this on purpose, but I just realized that if
you not if you didn't give the answer that you
just gave. I was going to follow up on a
conversation you and I had off their today about Josh Allen.
We're talking about some of the turnovers and you know

(17:45):
he's leaving the NFL and takeaways at this point of
this record, and you still stand by your guy because
of that. Mental's the mentality. And again in my notes,
I talked about Brett fav being authentic. His personality was
authentic and it showed up in his play. Right. Brett
Farve was gonna try you. He was gonna talk trash
to warrant sap, he was gonna get in his face there. Yeah,
he was gonna see it tight. He didn't see a

(18:05):
window small enough that he didn't think he could get
a football through. So I can live with that, And
to a back to our conversation with Josh Allen, I
can live with it. He fights defensive tackles at practice
and in the game. I've seen it with my own
two wives jams, So yeah, I can live with a
couple of interceptions. Once again, So for anyone who's who's
thinking that m Rob talks out of both sides of
his mouth, no, he is very consistent in the line

(18:27):
of thinking. All right, still to come, we continue this
conversation on quarterbacks. In fact, we'll flip ahead in terms
of generational type quarterbacks and give you some stats that
once again might have you rethinking who you think is
the goats before listening to this entire podcast that's still
to come on NFL Explained. All right, welcome back to

(18:51):
the NFL Explained podcast. We're talking about goats, in fact,
just one goat, and I'm a little undecided on who
that go to the quarterback spot actually is. And I'll
let you guys decide by the end of this podcast,
because I'm telling you there's a crazy stat coming up
a little bit later that totally had me rethinking entire time.
I think it's going to shave every show that I

(19:12):
do on Total Access as well, because we always talk
about these skill position players and what they do. But
I'm telling you, I'm telling you the guys on the
other side of the field, they're pretty good something. Uh
as far as quarterbacks go. Drew Brees and I think
about the numbers, I think about his winning mentality, I
think about some of the production here and just how
prolific he was when he was playing. Here's some numbers

(19:34):
for you. Over eighty thousand passing yards, five hundred and
seventy one passing touchdowns, both of those numbers behind Tom Brady.
The guy owns five of the fourteen five thousand yard
passing seasons of all time. Next player, by the way,
is Tom Brady. Here's the other number for me that
is really meaningful. The three highest single season completion percentages

(19:58):
in NFL history. Those are Drew Brees seventy four point
four per sent in nineteen seventy four point I mean,
you were pointing at me when I was saying it.
It's crazy. I just want our listeners and viewers to
think about that. For three years straight Drew Brees three

(20:19):
out of every four passes was complete. Wild. That is
ridiculously crazy. And guys, the defense, defensive backs, everybody, they
get paid a lot of money to not allow the
wide receivers to catch the football. I mean, that's that
is crazy, Yams, It's crazy. What was it about Drew
Brees that had him being that successful statistically? I would

(20:42):
say accuracy and where you put the football, Because see
Drew Brees, I wouldn't sit here, and I don't. I
don't think anybody would say Drew Brees had the strongest
arm right, but his ability to fit the ball in
the tight windows right with anticipation in timing, and it's
a catchable ball. Like so everybody knows I'm Bills Mafia

(21:02):
right now. I love Josh Allen. And even when I
talked to Josh, like the conversations I've had with him,
I'm like, Josh sometimes, bro, when you throw that thing, man,
especially as a running back, when I do my punching
pivot and I turned around over the football, you're throwing
smokers man that that knows that that football is down
and to complete a reception. Yes, there's a throw part

(21:22):
to it, but the other part is me being able
to catch it. And the nose is always down. With
Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes, oftentimes the nose is a little
bit then because they're driving the football right. Drew Brees,
the nose stayed up and it allows the receiver to
snatch it out of the air right and be able
to do kind of what he wants to do with it.
To me, I'm not so sure there's been another quarterback

(21:44):
better at ball placement. And accuracy, and if you can
put the ball where you need to put it um
where the receiver can go, that means you're processing information
at a very high level. That's to me, that was
Drew Brees' superpower, his accuracy, his ball placement, and his
ability to process things. I mean, there's oftentimes on Drew
Brees second step. So for all my quarterbacks out there,

(22:06):
the first step is your power step to get away
from your understanding. Your second step is another power step
to kind of continue to drive away. By the second step,
Drew Brees oftentimes knew where he was going with the football,
and the defense hadn't always said itself by that time,
but Drew Brees knew what they were doing before often
times they knew what they were doing. Again, I don't
know if there's been another quarterback on that, you know,

(22:28):
to his level of doing it, throwing the ball, ball
placement and obviously processing data. How many Super Bowls though one? Yeah,
that's the thing for me. You just said something. We
highlighted the accuracy for Drew Brees. I would imagine you
felt like when you were playing quarterback, you could hit
any mark anywhere. I would imagine every other quarterback in

(22:49):
the NFL. When they hear accuracy, They're like, are you
kidding me? I could hit like a quarter You want
to throw a quarter down the football field, I'll hit that.
Damn le gonna stop you right there. I agree with that.
I believe every single quarterback or everybody who's played quarterback
says that publicly. Yes, I'm I'm real, Mike robbed Um okay,
And when I got to the National Football League, I
remember calling my brother, was one of my biggest fans,

(23:12):
and my dude one of my best friends, and I'm saying, Bro,
I don't know if I could have played quarterback in
this league. The accuracy and ball placement is on point.
And I used to always remember I used to always
have to think about where that ball was gonna go
in it, but went until, you know, later on in
my last year playing, and I was really feeling good

(23:33):
about it, where the ball was just coming out, just
throw it. I wasn't aiming. I wasn't aiming, and the
great quarterbacks just do that naturally. It's just what it was.
But to your point, yeah, every quarterback will say that
out loud, but what are they saying to themselves? And
I believe. Quarterbacks will say they can hit every part
on the football field, but do they really know if
they can't. No, I don't think they do. That's good.

(23:55):
I just I kind of wanted to hear that because
I heard we gave the numbers for for Drew Brees,
and yet I'm going through a short list of the
greatest quarterbacks that have played in this game, and I
think it is important to highlight those numbers in particular,
because I think all these guys can say because it's
frustrating at times when we get closer to the NFL
Draft and you hear the same phrases like pinpoint accuracy

(24:16):
or you know, a guy can make every throw on
the football field, And in my mind, I'm like, all right,
I bet that guy believes it, But how come they're
not all doing it? Well, a lot of those buzz
words come up because not everybody watches Tate, no doubt,
and so what happens is you see one guy saying that,
people start started falling back to that stuff. That's why
I always say, even talk producers here, I can't talk
about the Gunless. I've seen him on tape, ye know.

(24:38):
And I remember when Justin Herbert was coming out and
people were talking about a lack of accuracy for him
because the numbers were raw. And if you I just
happened to know this, because you know, I was obviously
covering him when he was in college. He had like
one season the team had tracked it. I think it
was like forty five drops. I mean it was something unwowable.

(24:59):
And how many times I watched the game to your point,
watching the film going, you know that that throw couldn't
have been better, and that guy football exactly. So sometimes
those numbers are a little skewed. But the point is
all these guys are super talented. But the next guy
on our list is I think a real contender for
the goat spot. That's Peyton Manning different facet of the game.

(25:19):
Here across the board what he I could see it? Man,
how about you just take this man? It was a badman.
Oh he was all right here here the numbers here,
five NFL MVP awards most of all time, three second
place finishes, seven time First Team All Pro That ties
the most by any quarterback autogram the other guy. Two

(25:41):
Super Bowl wins and a Super Bowl m v P.
Those some of the statistics and some of the numbers
there quantified for me. So yeah, yeah, I wentn't alive
when every single quarterback let's play in the National Football
League has went through. I used my favorite quarterback of
all time before I experienced Peg Manning was Joe nam Right,
And no, I wasn't alive when Joe named was on

(26:02):
the side. I was doing this thing. But when I
watched the tape and I watched film of him was
calling his own plays and then he would put on
a fur coat on the sideline. Man, you know, I
just thought that was so cool, and I'm like, damn,
how can that dude just be wearing for Coco out
party in the night before, call his own plays understand
the game that much when he can do that. So
that's why I rolled with Joe Namath and then I

(26:23):
encounter Paid Manning. Okay, so Yeams, he's the greatest quarterback
of all time in my opinion. He's the greatest quarterback
of all time in my opinion. Okay, this is so
much here. First of all, immediately when he got the
National Football League, he didn't look overwhelm. Yes, he had
the interceptions were there, but he looked like he could

(26:44):
operate in the National Football Last whatever football player wants
to know man. Like I used to tell you on
a previous episode, I would call home, man, how did
I look? Man? Forget my numbers? Did I look like
a kid out there? Did I look like a grown
man I was supposed to be out there? He looked
the part that's number one. And he basically developed an
offense like for real. And I say that because I
was in college when um, you know, it was kind

(27:07):
of early in his career in two thousand two, two three,
two thousand four. And I remember our coaching staff because
coach Carlwell used to be at Penn State, and our
coaching staff we would go to Indy to see the
passing principles and things that they were doing. And and
what he did was he married some some real cool
passing principles to the outside zone, stretched play and all
those things. He was able to kind of operate everything

(27:30):
at the line of scrimmage. He really didn't necessarily need
the guy calling plays from the sil and he needed
the information and the input from the guys and stuff
from the booth. But he was the maestro. He was
handling it all at the line of scrimmage. I think
the Denver Broncos thought that's what they were getting with
Russell Wilson, a guy who was gonna bring them a playbook. See,
I knew Adam Gates out of Gates with my guy

(27:51):
San Francisco. Adam Gates used to be the office coordinator
for Peyton Manning when he was in Denver. And Adam
told me, Mike, when Peyton got there, when he was
choosing the team, he sat me down and taught me
his offense and what we we're gonna run. Think about
what I'm saying. Your offensive coordinators paid to be there,

(28:12):
the top brain on the offense. And he said, no, Bro,
I'm you know, I'm going on my team search. I'm
going around and see what teams I want to go to.
I want to make sure the front office straight. Don't
worry about the offense. I'll teach coordinated offense. That was
his thing, and I want to make sure my defense
is straight. She went to Denver and he sat down
and talked a whole plate. But to them, okay, think
about that. To me, that is amazing. That's on that

(28:34):
Joe naming thing where I can go out the night
before and they come out of the tall place. That's
why you see my training and thought. You see my thinking. Okay,
he did it with multiple teams. He did it with Indy,
a right broke bunt records at all that, and then
he did it with the Denver Broncos. And I was
the best offensive season that our game has ever seen. It.
Of course, it ended in defeat to my Seattle Seahawks.

(28:57):
When I was in San Francisco, Yams, we played the
Indianapolis Coats. I was a returner. I got tripped up.
I'm gonna score a touchdown that game. Anyway. We were
down by two obe three. That's that's in consequence. He
got the ball on his own, like seven or eight
yard line, eight minutes left in the game. Yams. We're

(29:19):
on the side line saying, Bro, we've been to win
this thing. We're gonna get the ball back. He gonna
put it to his names. I'm telling man, we're gonna
take this thing back. Bro, We're gonna do this. We're
gonna do that. Alex Smith gonna throw me a rail
route down the We're gonna win this game, Yams. That
excitement turned into me taking a knee mad as Peyton

(29:40):
Manning is taking a knee on our four yard line.
Game over. He held the ball for eight and a
half minutes and we didn't touch the ball again. We
were we were moving the ball in their defense, but
he had to wear with all to say, you know what,
y'all ain't gonna touch the fielding. He made sure he
hiked the ball with one second on the clock every

(30:01):
single time, and he managed the entire damn thing. I
remember watching our coaches on the sideline like it's nothing
we can do, there is nothing we can do. Oh
and then one last thing. I'm sorry, Peyton Man's best
quarterback of all time in my pain after we beat
the hell out him in the Super Bowl. Okay, this dude,

(30:22):
I sat there and watched him. He waited for every
single one of us to finish our press conferences, all
of us. You know, I wo wasn't a quarterback, so
I'm a fullback. I got a little table, you know
what I'm saying. He waited for all of us to finish,
shook every last one of our hands, every last one.
I'm telling all fifty three guys that we could be

(30:43):
available for the game. He made sure he made a
connection with every single one of them. And then the
man took a picture with my mama. Okay, why he's
in the middle of bit defeated. Okay, I ain't never
seen nothing like it, So YEAHMS. The only thing that
stopped to me, that stop Peyton Manning from getting even
more Super Bowls was the fact that he physically couldn't

(31:03):
do it anymore. Towards at the end, he was as
healthy as the Tom Brady was. I think he would
get it. If he had a coach, a defensive guy
like Bill Belichick, I think he would have more. But
at the end of the day, he took two teams.
He'd been to Pro Bowl with two different teams. It
was an All Pro with two different He took multiple guys,
he elevated multiple guys, and he had his own offense.

(31:24):
For that, I give him the best quarterback of all time. Alright,
just for clarification purposes, Yeah, I just want to be
clear A lot no know. What you said about teaching
his offense like Landin in Denver sounds amazing. I just
want to be clear here. The other guys that we've
been talking about so far and the guys that we
will be talking about on this podcast, he don't do
that can't do that. I'm not saying they can't, right,

(31:47):
they just didn't do it. They haven't done it, okay,
And all I'm saying is jail. Are there some nuances
about the Mike McCarthy offense that are strictly tailor to
Aaron Rodgers? Absolutely? Are there some nuances of offense that
are strictly tailored to the Mahomes of the world and
the app slutely, but um. When Tom Brady was looking

(32:09):
for when he was a free agent, he was looking
for a team to go to. When I heard the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers general manager when he talked about him,
he was like, it was almost like Tom was trying
to get us to pick him. Right. It was almost like, Wow,
I didn't know that I would get that type of
Tom was looking for offense that fit him, and yes,

(32:30):
he had some passing principles that he would add to it.
But he won't bring an offense. He won't say, Oh no,
I don't matter. I'm gonna sit there and teach you
about what I did up in here and this is
what we're gonna do. No Bomban Leftwich and Bruce Areans
had to come together and have that play. Okay, I'm
glad you bring that up here. Last point here before
we get to Tom Brady, who's coming up next year.
We mentioned Drew Brees indoor versus outdoor played most of

(32:53):
his career indoor. I just want to throw this out there.
The numbers generally speaking are skewed better production indoor for
Drew Brees. I say that for Peyton Manning as a comparison,
the numbers generally equal indoor versus outdoor, which I think
is it speaks to your point, it doesn't matter the venue.

(33:14):
I know people talk about Peyton playing in the cold,
oh yeah. And then on top of that, he played
in a f C. Who do you have to go through?
You had to go through the Times and the Bill
Belichicks and he had to go through that guard every
single year. Alright. So once he had the leader in
the clubhouse on all this stuff, Like when I saw
we were going to do this episode, I'm like, oh,
all right, this is gonna be like the Tom Brady

(33:35):
to the Goat episode. This section is okay, uh Brady,
and the number like, are you serious? Some of this
stuff is just it's it's crazy. Here. I'll just go
through some of these wins. Entering the playoffs, Brady thirty
five wins uh three more wins which he may or
may not get next season, depending on what he decides.

(33:56):
More playoff wins than any NFL franchise, Just crazy, except
for the Patriots, who has the most with thirty seven.
Here are some of the individual numbers. Eighty nine thou
passing yards a little over that, sixty nine passing touchdowns,
seven super Bowl wins, ten super Bowl appearances, all of
those numbers, by the way, most all time. Three NFL

(34:17):
MVP Awards tied for the third best with Peyton Manning,
Aaron Rodgers still to come, by the way, only five
times super Bowl m v P and NFL history. When
I say that there is a long freaking list in
front of me, it's a long list. I will stop
there and let you explain what's the most special thing
about Brady is. Maybe the answer is longevity. But there's

(34:40):
a reason why you called him the greatest winner, and
I think it speaks to the Super Bowls that I
made reference to. But you hedge on calling him the
greatest quarterback of all time. Yeah, Um, he is the
greatest winner our game has ever seen. He is the
greatest force multiplier at the quarterback position that this game
has ever seen. And I can make arguments that those
first two or three Super Bowls were kind of one
off the defensive Proud was, running game prow was or

(35:00):
whatever before Brady kind of figured out this greatness about him.
You know, I figured out what made him himself. Right. Um,
the numbers that you just talked about, to me that
not only is a testament to the teams that he's
played on and his ability as football ability, but yeah,
it's the longevity. Man with three seasons. Nobody does that.

(35:24):
That wasn't even the thing. He's playing alongside guys that
weren't even born when he first started playing. Um, in
the in the National Football and I started playing football,
But in the NFL when he first started playing, they
weren't even born. And again, being the greatest winner is
a bad thing. And I don't want it just to
seem like I'm knocking Tom Brady or anything like that.

(35:44):
I just think that when I compare him, I'm talking
about the quarterback position and the demands and things that
are associated with the quarterback position. I just put him
a little bit of a notcher two behind Peyton Manning
the attention Siper Bowl appearances, by the way, twice as
many as any other quarterback in NFL history. The Super
Bowl completions two and seventy seven the season. Yeah, he's

(36:08):
got more completions in the Super Bowl than any other
player has attempts paint Manning by the way times it's crazy,
man And again, like, I don't know if we're gonna
see another quarterback played this long. I mean just simply
because I do think that you know when the quarterback
because they make so much money. When you look in
your bank account, you gotta hunt in fifty million dollars.
Is hard to get up and go to work. You know,

(36:29):
I'm gonna get hit up and beat up on every day.
But I don't know if we'll see a guy played
this long again. My guess is probably no. You can
make the argument yes because of nutrition and training and
all that stuff. But I think about some of the
younger guys and what this position is like. Think about
Brady's not running around here. We talked about the evolution
of some of these offenses. These dudes are expected to
take off these younger quarterbacks. I think to me, that

(36:51):
screams what we've witnessed even if it's not done, and
hopefully he keeps on playing. And I don't know if
it's gonna be with Tampa Bay or not. Hopefully hopefully
he does because I like watching them out there. But
I don't think we'll ever see this. Well, I might
get in trouble with saying this, but I think Brady
is the last of the dying breed of the statute quarterback.
And again, I'm not saying that you have to have

(37:13):
a runaround guy, but he has to be dynamic. He
has to be able to be Joe Burrow whisk right,
avoid a little bit of a pressure kind of scramble
for five or ten yards to get the first down.
You have to be able to challenge the defense. Then,
all right, still to come here on NFL explained, I
got two more quarterbacks to dissect with you, and maybe
they'll make some of our listeners goat list. We'll do

(37:34):
that coming up next. All right, I'm rob we are
all about the quarterbacks and the greatest of all time.
I got two more names for you, and then we
can although you already said to Painton Manning, so I'll
just gonna pick a little bit later here, Brett far
I've talked about the numbers, and I said we would
talk about Aaron Rodgers hard not to four NFL MVP awards,

(37:57):
second behind your guy in Peyton Manning. Fifty nine thousand
passing yards, that's in the top ten, seventy five passing touchdowns,
that's fifth all time. Yes, he's got the Super Bowl
and a Super Bowl ring. To me, what I think
is really cool. Fewest interceptions of any player with at
least three hundred and fifty passing touchdowns. The next closest
Mattie Ice, Matt Ryan. You know, I think if you

(38:19):
ask a Green Bay fan, maybe they'll say Aaron Rodgers
the greatest of all time. There's some things when I
watch him play that just this even mentality, that Tom
Brady kind of effect. I always think that's really impressive.
I don't know if there's ever been a quarterback, and
maybe you just disagree with me because I know it's
Peyton Manning, but when I watched them play, it always
looks so freaking easy. It the game looks easier to

(38:41):
me to Aaron Rodgers than any quarterback I've ever seen play. Yeah,
he may have one of the top armed talents and
guys I want to When I say armed talent, I
mean being able to throw from different arm angles, having
the big arm to be able to push it down field.
We've seen all the hill Mary's from an Aaron Rodgers,
the accuracy, ball placement, all of those. That's what I'm
talking about when I say armed talent and Aaron Rodgers.

(39:03):
There isn't an arm angle. There isn't a past. There
isn't a defender who can get their arms in the
way to stop Aaron Rodgers from completing the past if
he's trying to do that. I mean, there's a lot
to say a part Aaron Rodgers. I think sometimes he
doesn't get put into the Greatest of All Time conversation
just based off of kind of some of his recent

(39:23):
things with the media, you know, retiring and not retlying,
all those types of things. But uh, to only have
a hundred five interceptions through as many years as he's
played and as many times if they've thrown the football
as many times if they've lived in Green Bay, of
moving the offense just through his arm, that's pretty impressive.
And yeah, you can't have the go conversation without talking
about Aaron Rodgers as well. I will say this though,

(39:45):
MS I believe when I modern on it, I mean
like this generation, the Patrick Mahomes, the Josh Allen's, the
those guys. I do believe this generation is heavily influenced
about Aaron Rodgers. You can see his game in all
of them. You mentioned Patrick Mahomes. He's the guy that
we're gonna talk about here. He's twenty seven years old.
He's not in the goat conversation right now, quite honestly,

(40:08):
just because of his age. He hasn't done there. But
he's on his way. He's already got an m VP Award,
he's got a Super Bowl win, he's been a Super
Bowl m v P. I'm not even gonna get into
the numbers because they're not necessarily going to compare because
he hasn't played long enough here. But we talked about
the magic of Mahomes. He's one of the special players
that this league has of this generation here, right, Like
we've heard Brady and Rogers say, hey, that next group,
it's pretty damn good, and my Homes is there. If

(40:31):
I said to you in ten years you and I
are still working together, knock on alright, that's glass, But
knock on wood, we're still working together. We're doing this podcast,
we do another one of these versions. Is Patrick Mahomes
going to be the goat? Mm hmm if Andy Reid
stays around for that long too, Yeah, I think I
don't think it'll be a question. I mean, the rate

(40:53):
at which he's putting up these numbers, the growth in
his game. I've seen him gone from you know, not
being able to just check the ball down to now
you know, they're functioning. Right, they're being very efficient as
an offense, and he's hitting the right receiver almost every
single time. Right. But I will say this, it's tough
to anticipate the huge numbers again if he doesn't have

(41:15):
Andy Rey. And I can't wait to see him in
the playoffs without Tyrikill. I want to see that because
tyri Kill is one of those special players as well. Okay,
you bring the players perspective, like the guy who actually
did it on the field. I just bring the talking
deal and the numbers from a math perspective. I didn't
even crunch these numbers. I love how I'm taking credit
for crunching projection numbers. Whatever. But how about this. Our

(41:40):
our crew is amazing. They actually did some of the
numbers for us based on projections five years as a
starting quarterback thus far and what we could see. So,
if my Homes plays thirteen more seasons, which would put
him at forty By the way, the numbers project out
to eighties six thousand, five hundred passing yards and six
eight six passing touchdowns, it's fewer passing yards than Brady,

(42:02):
but more touchdowns. If my Homes places fifteen more seasons,
that put him at forty two. Come on, now, this
is just crazy town. The numbers nine thousand passing yards,
seven hundred and sixty two passing touchdowns, that would be
almost seven thousand more yards than Brady and a hundred
and third team war touchdowns. So it does give you
some context on the trajectory of his career. Um, did

(42:25):
they crunch his bank account to how much? Did he
make three billion through fifteen years after all of that too?
I mean jeez, But yeah again, if Andy Reid Eric
being of those play callers are there, man, uh yeah,
this run can go for a long time. Alright. One
more thing, actually two more things for context here that

(42:45):
I want to position for people listening to this podcast.
We always do. It's talk radio. I spent a long
time my career doing talk radio. Like I get it,
Like summertime comes around, you need some topics. So greatest
of all time you have all these debates here. The
generational thing is it's hard to compare across generations. Our
team try to build out some stats that compare some
of these guys within a generation to see how much

(43:07):
better they were than their peers. From twenty two, the
average passing yards in a game was two hundred and
thirty and a half. Patrick Mahomes average three hundred three
yards a game over that span, so that's almost seventy
three yards over the average. Drew Brees by the way,
fifty seven yards over the average, Peyton Manning fifty four

(43:31):
yards over the average, Damn Marino almost fifty eight point eight,
Brady forty four over the average, Rogers thirty over the average,
Far nine over the average, and then Joe Montana ten
over the average, and Rob I got one more for you,
a completion percentage over NFL average in their career. Joe
Montana when he was playing in his era, the average

(43:53):
NFL completion percentage was fifty. He was at sixty three
so his average percentage was plus seven point two. Breeze,
he was plus six point three, Manning a little over five,
fare of a little over three. Rodgers was at three,
Marino at two point eight, Brady at two point eight,
and my Homes at two point too. So you found

(44:14):
something pretty interesting when you were going through those numbers.
The average completion percentage has been going up over time.
The QB has been getting better. Yeah, the the QB
position has evolved that they've been getting better. Again, you
look at that Joe Montana, the NFL average completion percentage
right like like that's not that wouldn't be good in
today's football. You look at Patrick Mahomes NFL average sixty

(44:36):
almost jumps. So just again, just the quarterback position in
the passing game in general is getting better and they're
getting coach better as well. All Right, I threw this
out there at the top of the show. I continue
to mention it, and here's the time. This is the
number that really matters the most when it comes to
the go. Touched on this a little bit before about
Joe Montana the team around him. That is important. Defense, baby,

(45:00):
I'm talking about the defense. We looked at how often
each quarterback the ones that we discussed had a top
ten defense, and Rob Brady had top ten defenses seventeen times,
seven more than Joe Montana, Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers
only had three and Damn Marino four. So to me,

(45:21):
while we can talk about, you know, the statistics, when
it comes to what these guys did individually, having a
pretty damn good defense, that to me might be the
complete differentiator for all this stuff. I think it is
defense was championships. That's an old accident that we always say.
But I also think we have to kind of wrap
our minds around just like whenever you have And again,

(45:43):
some of these quarterbacks, like Tom Brady, when he was
first drafted, nobody knew he was gonna be what he was.
But some of these high draft picks or guys that
are with these high expectations, these big time physical attributions,
oftentimes the teams built around them aren't great because for
them to get a chance to get that person, they
were the first pick in the draft or whatever, and
the team around them wasn't so good. And so when

(46:05):
you look at it, uh like a Tom Brady, it
makes sense he was a six round pick so they
actually had all the they had to build a team
around him because they didn't know he was gonna be
that good. But it's pretty good. I didn't know Joe
Montana had a top defense ten times. I did not
know that, which, by the way, that ten times, that's
seventy seven percent of his seasons as a starter he
had a top ten defense. Brady by the way, one

(46:26):
percent of his seasons a top ten Defensemo Manning, by
the way of the time, Marino God, I feel bad
for Dan Rodgers twenty and then Drew Brees the worst.
Only fifteen point eight percent of his seasons as a
starter he had a top ten defense. Well, Drew Brees

(46:47):
probably made money in all these quarterbacks, you know what
I'm saying. So again, you're pulling the money putting it
to the quarterback. Can't build a team around you. That's
kind of how those things work themselves. Unless he got
that TV money too on the back. I'm trying to
get some of that TV money, you know what I'm saying.
All Right, we'd love to hear from you guys as well.
I know we continue to ask for questions on a
maw back episod. I'd rather this. If you like this episode,

(47:07):
share it on social media. I would love to see
some of your guys comments on who do you think
the goat is at that quarterback spot. Can't thank you
guys enough for listening, and of course we've got some
more episodes down the road of NFL explained