The NFL is by far the most popular sport in the United States. There’s no denying this and it’s irrefutable. But a storyline that makes this football season that much more exciting is the play of two all-time, great players. In fact, I believe they are the Greatest Of All Time (GOAT) in their respective positions. Being the GOAT means there has never been and never will be anyone that plays that position better.
We, as fans, have the privilege to be able to watch these two players play live every week. Just imagine how incredible it would be to be able to see Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky or Tiger Woods play live in their primes. We can do this with Tom Brady and Justin Tucker.
Tom Brady plays Quarterback and is the best to ever do it. At 44 he is still playing better than any other quarterback this season. He started his career with the New England Patriots in 2000 and has been with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers since 2020. He has gone to 10 Super Bowls winning seven with five MVPs, he’s a three-time MVP of the league in 2007, 2010, and 2017, and he’s a three-time winner of the top 100 #1 player award in 2011, 2017, and 2018.
He has 14 pro bowl selections in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2007, and 2009-2018. He’s the three-time passing yards leader for the NFL in 2005, 2007, and 2010. He has the most career wins by a QB at 231, most games played by a nonkicker at 304, most 3 plus TD games with 173, most road wins by a QB with 98, most QB wins at home with 121, most won games in a regular season with 16, and he has the most seasons with 35 plus touchdowns with five. He has the record for most career touchdown passes with 602, with only 194 interceptions.
He has the QB career record for passing attempts with 10,865, completions with 6,961, and passing yards with 81,268. Along with all this Brady has almost all the passing records in the playoffs and Super Bowl with too many to list. His career gets even more incredible by the fact that he’s the only QB to ever win a Super Bowl in three different decades.
Last year, to top it all off, in his first year with the Bucs, Brady led them to a Super Bowl win after they had been the worst franchise in the league for many previous years and were 7-9 the year before. His career has also had huge controversies that TB12, which is his nickname combining his initials with his jersey number, has risen above to become the greatest QB of all time.
Justin Tucker plays for the Baltimore Ravens and is the greatest place kicker of all time. He is the most accurate place kicker in NFL history with a 90.7% field goal percentage. Tucker wasn’t even drafted in 2012, but still made the Ravens roster and had a historic rookie season. He made all 42 of his Point After Touchdown (PAT) attempts and only missed three of his 35 field goal (FG) attempts.
During week 3 of that year, Tucker kicked the game winning FG against the New England Patriots to make the score 31-30, which was the Ravens first-ever regular-season win against the Patriots. In the playoffs, he kicked the game winning 47 yard FG to beat the Denver Broncos in double overtime in the divisional round. In Super Bowl 47 he kicked two crucial FGs to secure the Ravens win and propel him to an unparalleled great career. At six, he has the most seasons with 30 made FGs. He’s the first kicker to kick a FG in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s in the same game.
Here are more “first time ever achieved in the NFL” milestones for Mr. Tucker: three 50 plus yard FGs in one half, 10 50 plus yard FGs in one season, the fastest kicker to 1,000 career points, the fastest kicker to 300 career FGs, and longest ever FG at 66 yards which he achieved this year against the Detroit Lions.
So there’s no doubt these two are the GOATS and their clutch attitudes and performance under pressure is not able to be topped. Hopefully, we can continue watching them each week for many years to come.
Article by: Chris Steele, iHearts143Quotes Team member
