Tom Brady's football genius on display as Bucs dump Eagles
Sun, Jan 16, 2022
NFL News (AP)
AP Sports Columnist
TAMPA, Florida - As he left the locker room and approached the tunnel before taking the field for the second half, Tom Brady smiled to himself.
A few minutes later, Rob Gronkowski followed the quarterback, offering fist bumps to Bucs personnel standing along the barricades. Fans had shoved themselves up against the railing in the first row of seats, waiting for their football heroes who held a 17-0 lead over the Philadelphia Eagles. The crowd erupted when each man emerged from the shadows of the concrete and into the light.
But it was nothing compared to the noise when the two players left the field after destroying the Eagles for another two quarters to win 31-15 and secure the Bucs' first home playoff win since 2002. One woman screamed "ROB!" as Gronk disappeared into the tunnel. Gronk pumped his first and grinned as he ran to the locker room.
Brady finished his postgame interview and jogged off after his tight end, waving to the Tampa faithful wearing No. 12 jerseys. The two connected late in the game after three straight three-and-outs to give Gronk his 15th playoff touchdown. No other tight end in history has even 10.
Brady and Gronk advancing in the playoffs, a tale as old as time.
Rob Gronkowski and Mike Evans were the recipients of Tom Brady's two TD passes on Sunday.Look, happy Bucs fans and players were not a postgame guarantee. There were reasons to wonder if Tampa could pull this off. The Eagles went into Sunday with the best run game in the NFL, and a rainy field made some think Philly would actually be at an advantage. Quarterback Jalen Hurts and coach Nick Siriani had turned the Eagles' season around, and the young starter was beginning to look like maybe - after a college career of not quite being The Guy - he could be Philly's Guy.
The Bucs' defense had some key players out, and Tampa was also missing a few of Brady's favorite offensive weapons. Receivers Chris Godwin and Cyril Grayson weren't playing due to injury, and Antonio Brown was gone due to, well, taking his shirt off on the field and getting cut a few weeks ago. Running back Leonard Fournette was also still injured, although Tampa activated both RB Giovani Bernard and inside linebacker Lavonte David before Sunday.
But, at the end of the day, is any of that really meaningful? We're talking about Tom Brady in the playoffs.
Vegas wasn't too worried, seeing as the Bucs were favored by a touchdown. It's not that the Eagles weren't ready or didn't want it -before kickoff, I watched Fletcher Cox huddle up some of the defense and dance in the middle. The Eagles were jacked, and Philly faithful was out in Tampa in full force. My flight from New York was packed with people saying "Go birds!" to each other, and there were swaths of green in the stands. A flock of Eagles fans even came together to boo a bunch of Bucs fans riding a giant pirate ship mounted on a flatbed outside the stadium (sports are really something).
Yes, the Iggles had support.
But it was nothing compared to the number of pirates in attendance. Remember, this was Brady's first season of full-capacity stands and the Bucs' first true home playoff game since 2008 (which they lost). Tampa Bay has bought into the TB12 experience - women in full pirate wench dresses roamed the stadium, and one guy had a replica of a pirate ship on his head. A man and a woman walked around holding giant cutouts of Brady and Gronk's heads.
As a Pats fan who covered Brady in New England, I felt like I was watching my dad host Thanksgiving with a new, more functional family (especially after my current family suffered a blowout in Buffalo Saturday night). This was the first time I've covered a game in Tampa since Brady joined the team, and I wanted to tell everyone there that their Brady jerseys were the wrong color. But I fought the urge, and I have to hand it to the fans in Florida: They're good at this.
So is Brady. Free from the Patriot way of "don't say anything to anyone," he's grown to appear more relaxed publicly. He released a hype video before the game making fun of his history of jinxing himself with hype videos, and he looked extremely confident as he threw darts in warmups. He's getting a little cheeky, too. In the postgame presser, Brady said that the matchup "favored a running game with the wind, but we found a way to play well against a really good football team."
Was that a slight dig at the run-heavy Eagles? Maybe. Perhaps it was more of a subtle nod to the doubters.
There has to be someone saying he won't do it. Sure, they're talking about why the Bucs won't do it, but Brady is the Bucs, given the way his arrival turned the team around. The problem with Brady's success is that the story is more interesting when he loses. Not that his winning isn't impressive or notable - it's just that it feels like there's not much more to say about it.
At one point during the game, the announcer in the Bucs' press box said, "That's Brady's 84th touchdown in the playoffs, a record." It wasn't that he'd broken a record - he already had it with a huge lead. The second-most playoff touchdowns recorded by one QB is Brady's childhood idol Joe Montana, with 45. At this point, almost everything Brady does simply pads his absurd lead.
His losses mean someone else gets to start padding their case for greatness. They beget newer stories.
Assuming a Brady win also takes away the tension that makes sports fun. So people come up with reasons he could lose, no matter how weak. I saw one article that said Brady historically struggles against NFC East teams because he lost to the Giants twice in the Super Bowl and "almost" lost to Washington last year. That's real galaxy brain logic since the NFC East has been almost laughably bad the past two years (sorry, Cowboys fans).
The "NFL on AP" crew broke down Tom Brady's performance in the Buccaneers' 31-15 victory over the Eagles.Of course Brady does lose sometimes, and the rest of the playoffs won't be easy, especially if offensive tackle Tristan Wirfs' injury sidelines him. Other teams won't forget how to play football the way Philly did. This 9-8 Eagles team looked more like the one that the Bucs destroyed in Week 6 than the one that made it to the playoffs. Tampa kept the Eagles far away from their end zone until garbage time and held Philly to only 95 yards rushing.
It was a very boring game with a very predictable outcome.
The truth is that Tom Brady is just an absolute football genius. Having him on a roster instills a confidence that makes a team that much more formidable. He's a great leader with teammates who famously love him, but his sheer amount of knowledge over the years is unmatched. When you've got Brady, you've got the best coach on the field. He still studies film for a bajillion hours a week and fills in his teammates who might not. He can read a defense with his eyes closed, has a sixth sense for spacial awareness on a football field and can still get rid of the ball incredibly quickly.
Tom Brady called Tampa's victory over the Eagles "a great team win" and credited the defense and special teams.Brady has always been team-oriented. When I wrote about his silly social media a few years ago, the guys who made the graphics told me that Brady would make them change their imagery if they put him front and center. He wanted to celebrate his teammates more than himself. It's why he stayed in the game last week to make sure Gronk hit 55 catches and secured a $500,000 bonus.
"[Brady's] quick passing game was insane," Gronk said after the game. "I don't think there's anyone better than Tom Brady at dumping it down, dishing it off. He's been winning his whole career like that. Just dumping and diving."
The confidence his teammates come out with makes it seem as though Brady can sometimes make them feel invincible (a dangerous and powerful mindset for a team). If it's been done, Brady's done it before, so why not do it again?
So he does.
At this point, TB12's success is almost a medical marvel. And there's something oddly comforting about it. He's stopped time, because somehow the same quarterback who won games when I was in fifth grade is still winning when I'm 32. Everyone else might have aged out, but Brady is still there, a consistency unmatched in any other sport besides golf.
Brady's reign won't, of course, last forever. And it's unclear if we'll see this level of greatness from a quarterback again in our lifetime. So while his wins might inspire a collective eye roll from a nation sick of being beaten by Tom Brady, they do provide some semblance of order in a very disorganized world.
So even if it means watching a bunch of pirates steal my dad, I'll take it.
Charlotte Wilder is a general columnist and cohost of "The People's Sports Podcast" for AP Sports. She's honored to represent the constantly neglected Boston area in sports media, loves talking to sports fans about their feelings and is happiest eating a hotdog in a ballpark or nachos in a stadium. Follow her on Twitter @TheWilderThings.
