The NFL playoffs are in full swing, and three of the best to ever do it are ready to show they still have what it takes. All three of these quarterbacks are Super Bowl Champs and would like nothing more than to win another. Patrick Mahomes, Tom Brady, and Aaron Rodgers definitely have the advantage over the other five starting QBs and are ready to prove it.
Patrick Mahomes, for the Kansas City Chiefs, has played five seasons in the NFL, and all have been incredible. In only his second season, he became the starter and promptly won the league MVP after becoming only the second quarterback to ever pass for 5,000 yards and throw 50 touchdowns in the same season. Mahomes continued to outdo himself in his third year in 2019. He didn’t quite have the numbers from the previous year but had more of a command of the Chiefs.
They won Super Bowl LIV in February 2020 by beating the San Francisco 49ers 31-20. His fourth season was almost his best yet. He finished the regular season with 4,740 passing yards and 38 TD passes while leading Kansas City to an AFC Championship victory over the Buffalo Bills 38-24. But they couldn’t win a second consecutive Super Bowl because of the Tampa Bay Bucs and Tom Brady.
The Bucs won 31-9 with the Bucs defense shutting down Mahomes. The Chief’s injury-ravaged offensive line allowed Mahomes to be pressured a Super Bowl record 29 of 56 dropbacks while also being sacked three times. So this leads us to this year. Mahomes has shown why his greatness can’t be challenged, but through the first half of the season, many people were.
Kansas City started the season with a 4-4 record while Mahomes was posting career lows in rushing yards and passing attempts with a career high in interceptions. Everyone had written this team off until they got it together and won eight of their last nine games to end the regular season as one of the league’s hottest teams. Mahomes finished with 4,839 yards, and 37 touchdown passes. No one can stop them, and Mahomes is determined to get back to the promise land.
Ever since the Green Bay Packers drafted quarterback Jordan Love two years ago, Aaron Rodgers has been on a regular-season tear rarely seen in the NFL. With the Packers’ brass ready to give his job to someone else, his Green Bay teammates helped Rodgers win his third MVP, throwing for 4,299 yards and 48 passing touchdowns with only five interceptions. While this pushed the Packers’ decision makers to silence, Rodgers still had to produce in the playoffs.
His all-time great Hall of Fame career was punctuated when he won Super Bowl XLV in 2011 against the Pittsburgh Steelers, but he hadn’t come close to returning since. For this reason, Packers fans hoped 2020 was their time to return to glory. With their MVP QB in hand, they steamrolled the Los Angeles Rams 32-18 to set up Green Bay’s 1st home NFC championship game in Aaron Rodgers’ career. The magic didn’t continue when Tampa Bay came to town as they upset the favored Packers 31-26.
Going into the 2021 season, all analysts were down on Rodgers because of his off-season off the field problems. Aaron didn’t listen, went out, and again had an incredible season. He probably is going to win the MVP again since he led his team to a 13-4 record. With 4,115 yards passing, 37 touchdowns, and only 4 interceptions, he killed it again.
What he meant to the team, however, doesn’t show up on any chart. After a rough start, he led the team on a seven-game winning streak while missing one game per the league’s COVID 19 policies. Him and his Packers now have a chance, with home field advantage throughout the playoffs, to get revenge on last year.
Now we come to Tom Brady. He isn’t playing any better than Patrick Mahomes and Aaron Rodgers right now, but he has revolutionized the game by winning seven Super Bowls and breaking almost every QB record there is. At 43, he became the oldest quarterback to ever play in and win a Super Bowl when his Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the Kansas City Chiefs 31-9 on February 7, 2021.
Along with owning almost all the QB records, he has won seven Super Bowls with the New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Bucs, won five Super Bowl MVP’s, three NFL MVPs, three First-team All-Pro selections, 15 Pro Bowl selections, is a five-time passing touchdowns leader, a two-time passer rating leader, is a Unanimous NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team member and won a national championship with Michigan University in 1997.
Most analysts call Brady the Greatest Of All Time (GOAT) quarterback. Along with being the defending Super Bowl champs, the GOAT brought his team into this season with even higher expectations than last year. Tampa Bay re-signed every starter from last year’s team and added talented running back Giovanni Bernard and former Super Bowl champion defender Richard Sherman. Before the season started, it was revealed that Tom played on a torn MCL all of last year.
This makes the Super Bowl win even more impressive, but he had to have surgery before the season. Thankfully this didn’t stop Brady from starting this season with a bang. In Game 1 against the Dallas Cowboys, he threw for 379 yards and four passing touchdowns to lead the Bucs to a 31-29 win. Tampa did have some hiccups during the course of the season.
They surprisingly lost four games, had many injuries throughout, lost wide receiver Chris Godwin to injury, and had to let go star receiver, Antonio Brown. They still finished with a 13-4 record, and Tom Brady had a career-high 5,316 passing yards, 43 passing touchdowns, and 12 interceptions. He also finished the season with an NFL-record 485 pass completions as he became the oldest player in NFL history to pass for at least 5,000 yards. Some consider his season to be worthy of an MVP trophy, but his interceptions are too high. Do the Bucs, with Brady, have enough greatness to win it all again?
These three great players comprise the most intriguing storyline for this weekend’s divisional playoff games, but every team, player, and game will pack its own punch.
If you watch the Cincinnati Bengals and rookie QB Joe Burrow go against the talented Tennessee Titans, with All-World running back Derrick Henry, you’ll see what young stars can do.
Talented defenders Nick Bosa and Josh Norman of the San Francisco 49ers will try to stop the dynamic duo of Aaron Rodgers and Wide Receiver Davante Adams, for Green Bay, in the second game Saturday.
Tampa Bay doesn’t have a cakewalk at all in their game against the Los Angeles Rams. They have two of the best tandems in the NFL in Wide Receivers Odell Beckham Jr. and Cooper Kupp, and All-Time great defensive players Aaron Donald and Von Miller. Brady will have his work cut out for him.
The last game on Sunday pits two teams against each other, with both having great Quarterback and Wide Receiver connections. The Buffalo Bills have All-Pro QB Josh Allen throwing it to Stefon Diggs, and Mahomes will be throwing it to Tight End Travis Kelce and Wide Receiver Tyreek Hill. No matter which games you watch this weekend, get ready for some great football!
Article by: Chris Steele, iHearts143Quotes Team member
