Montana's perfect Super Bowls in perspective

AndyJohnson said:

4 wins equals 4 wins, and losing in the SB twice is better than losing before getting to the SB twice.

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Exactly. Not sure who is not on board with this logical thinking but if you try to argue the 4-0>4-2 aren't you essentially saying that playoff wins mean nothing? And if playoff wins mean nothing I would assume that means Reg Season wins mean less?

1960Pats said:

I never looked that closely at the Montana 49ers. I knew at the time that they were spending more but I wasn't sure if they were doing it legally.

We (Pats fans) need to start educating people on what really went on with some of these "GOAT" teams. That post is a great start.

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prior to the cap it was legal --- you could spend whatever you wanted.
I think the way it worked back then was that other teams could poach your guys, but they would have to compensate you with draft picks and the compensation you got was directly related to their salary --- higher salary = greater comp
also, there was a right of firts refusal back then, so if you didn't want to lose a guy you'd just match the offer.

after the cap was instituted in '93 or '94 is when the niners were supposedly circumventing it by hiding guys on ir, as the only way they knew how to beat people was to outspend them.
can you imagine if the pats were allowed to double up on payroll of the other teams in our division?
we'd probably dominate that division...oh wait.........

anyway, after the cap was in place the niners saw just one conference game in the next 20 years, which they lost.
they won like every other team when they were forced to spend like every other team

eom said:

prior to the cap it was legal --- you could spend whatever you wanted.
I think the way it worked back then was that other teams could poach your guys, but they would have to compensate you with draft picks and the compensation you got was directly related to their salary --- higher salary = greater comp
also, there was a right of firts refusal back then, so if you didn't want to lose a guy you'd just match the offer.

after the cap was instituted in '93 or '94 is when the niners were supposedly circumventing it by hiding guys on ir, as the only way they knew how to beat people was to outspend them.
can you imagine if the pats were allowed to double up on payroll of the other teams in our division?
we'd probably dominate that division...oh wait.........

anyway, after the cap was in place the niners saw just one conference game in the next 20 years, which they lost.
they won like every other team when they were forced to spend like every other team

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How New York Yankees of them.

btw, for anybody interested I went back and edited in sources for that payroll stuff I posted a couple pages ago

AndyJohnson said:

You are asking the wrong question.
We are talking about their careers.
Add in the 2 extra one and dones of Montana to compare to Bradys 6 trips to the SB.
The fact that Brady won his way TO the SB twice more, is what makes 4-2 better than 4-0.
No one is saying a 4-2 record is better than a 4-0 record, they are saying 4 wins equals 4 wins, and losing in the SB twice is better than losing before getting to the SB twice.

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Well the OP was about the inferior competition OP felt Montana faced in the Super Bowls. My post focused only on the Super Bowl aspect of Montana's career, not on his playoff performance or regular season performance as a whole ( which are clearly inferior to that of Brady). I gestured towards those aspects at the end of the post but that wasn't my focus. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

Also, people are arguing that 4-2>4-0, saying that simply to get to the Super Bowl itself is an achievement which deserves credit approaching that of actually winning. I find those arguments unconvincing. To win every shot Montana got, without throwing a pick, is a massive feat deserving respect. He is better in SB than Brady thus far. BTW Montana has a 127.8 career passer rating in SB, while Brady's is 95.3.

Richard Camembert said:

Also, people are arguing that 4-2>4-0, saying that simply to get to the Super Bowl itself is an achievement which deserves credit approaching that of actually winning. I find those arguments unconvincing. To win every shot Montana got, without throwing a pick, is a massive feat deserving respect. He is better in SB than Brady thus far. BTW Montana has a 127.8 career passer rating in SB, while Brady's is 95.3.

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Interesting. I can spin it and say Brady not only won 4 Superbowls but won (2) 13 years apart, without any Hall Of Fame Support and without a cheating WR. Has any other QB done close to that? Bradshaw won 4 too.

What was Montana doing at 37? 36? 35?

Montana was clutch but his team also caught lightning in a bottle with a bunch of HOF players that would no way be able to stay together today.

Tom Brady as a QB in general, overall, and as a pro athlete, blows him away. And he dosent even seem to be slowing down at 37.

Also, lets take out the 4 Superbowl wins for each/ Lets look at the leftovers.

TBs resume there completely blows away Montanans - much more than Montana's perfect SB performances beat TB stellar Superbowl performances.

If TB did not win his 4th and was not so clutch in this one and in the others there may have been a case.

Sorry, there isn't, by a wide margin.

Richard Camembert said:

Also, people are arguing that 4-2>4-0, saying that simply to get to the Super Bowl itself is an achievement which deserves credit approaching that of actually winning. I find those arguments unconvincing.

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Then you're not really thinking it through. It's not really a close issue. As I noted earlier in the thread:

http://www.patsfans.com/new-england...ls-in-perspective.1116983/page-4#post-4122481

Punishing the guy who went further more often makes no sense. Using the 4-0 v. 4-2 logic, Brady would be a better QB if he'd lost the AFCCGs in the 2007 and 2011 seasons than he is having won them.

Deus Irae said:

Then you're not really thinking it through. It's not really a close issue. As I noted earlier in the thread:

http://www.patsfans.com/new-england...ls-in-perspective.1116983/page-4#post-4122481

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Yeah, I'll be clear. Montana has played better in Super Bowls than has Brady thus far, based on his superior record and superior QBR. That's all I'm arguing.

Richard Camembert said:

Yeah, I'll be clear. Montana has played better in Super Bowls than has Brady thus far, based on his superior record and superior QBR. That's all I'm arguing.

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I will be clear .Montana playing better than TB in Superbowls is not as wide a margin as TB's overall career VS Montanas outside of their SB games.

Since they both won 4 it really dose not matter HOW they won them. And it was not like TB diddn't make last second drives.

You really have to cherry pick really specific stats to make a case for JM>TB and you would have to undervalue a whole lot of other things, which you cant....in the real world anyway.

Bruins29 said:

to make a case for JM>TB

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I'm not arguing that.
Just saying that when you compare these two titans of the game, one of whom grew up idolizing the other, you'd have to say that Montana was better in the Super Bowls.

Richard Camembert said:

I'm not arguing that.
Just saying that when you compare these two titans of the game, one of whom grew up idolizing the other, you'd have to say that Montana was better in the Super Bowls.

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I agree.

Who was the better QB overall?

I understand why you made this thread cause i think the SB performances are overstated and think we are better off looking at playoffs as a whole.

However that being said I don't think trying to diminish Montana is needed to build Brady up. I am pretty much just of the mind and wait and see if Brady gets 5.

And you know what? If people think Brady is the 2nd best ever behind Montana I will 100% take that. If Garoppolo can "only" be #3 all time that is fine too : )

BobDigital said:

However that being said I don't think trying to diminish Montana is needed to build Brady up.

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I only see people diminishing TB in an attempt to justify Montana keeping his crown. And, the way they are doing it means that if TB won another ring it would not matter because of the criteria they have made the most important.

Bruins29 said:

I only see people diminishing TB in an attempt to justify Montana keeping his crown. And, the way they are doing it means that if TB won another ring it would not matter because of the criteria they have made the most important.

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Well I personally do think Brady > Montana but if someone disagrees I don't think it is a stretch as they have some points in their favor.

BobDigital said:

Well I personally do think Brady > Montana but if someone disagrees I don't think it is a stretch as they have some points in their favor.

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No question. I am sure if you go to Pittsburgh you hear.............

Bruins29 said:

I agree.

Who was the better QB overall?

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I think Brady's career dwarfs that of Montana. Brady has 119 more TD and only 4 more INT, 13K more passing yards, and he's not done yet. Also Brady took some of the ****tiest defenses of all time deeper into the playoffs more often. Brady has benefited from the Polianization of the league in terms of it being easier to score, and Montana had a bunch of injuries too, but Brady is clearly better overall.

BobDigital said:

I understand why you made this thread cause i think the SB performances are overstated and think we are better off looking at playoffs as a whole.

However that being said I don't think trying to diminish Montana is needed to build Brady up. I am pretty much just of the mind and wait and see if Brady gets 5.

And you know what? If people think Brady is the 2nd best ever behind Montana I will 100% take that. If Garoppolo can "only" be #3 all time that is fine too : )

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I saw Montana play. In no way am I trying to diminish him. I think you can take the top 6 "all time" QBs (Baugh, Graham, Starr, Unitas, Montana, Brady) and make an argument for every one of them. As a matter of fact, while the part about Brady is incomplete due to the date of the article, CHFF did a pretty good job of laying out that group. If you just ignore their final rankings, you get solid arguments about each of the 6:

http://www.coldhardfootballfacts.com/content/the-definitive-list-top-10-nfl-quarterbacks/6376/

That being said, I think that, when you see someone arguing "4-0 is better than 4-2!" as the basis for one QB's superiority over another, you're looking at someone who's bias is overruling his objectivity. As I noted earlier, such an argument essentially says that you're a better QB if you lose in the earlier rounds than if you lose in the Super Bowl. Taken to its logical extreme, that argument sets up as irrefutable the argument that Trent Dilfer is the better QB when compared to Brady (1-0 in SBs v. 4-2), and would have to be looked at as the better QB even if Brady won the next 6 SBs in a row, because Brady can never achieve a 100% success rate.

The 'X wins and Y losses' versus 'X wins and Z losses' makes sense when both will eventually participate in the same number of games. It is useful for comparing teams during a season that have not played an equal number of games. Specifically, this works over the course of the season in baseball, hockey and basketball where there can be a difference of several games at varying points of the year.

The fallacy in the 4-0>4-2 argument is that teams and players do not end up playing the same number of games, the way they will at the end of a regular league season.

Proponents of the 4-0>4-2 will counter that this shows the 4-0 player was more clutch. What that fails to take into account is that all the other playoff games leading up to that point are elimination games as well - and that doesn't even consider the importance of winning games during the regular season, in order to win the division, clinch a playoff spot, gain a bye, or secure home field advantage.

Claiming 4-0 is superior to 4-2 means that one believes it is better to lose - in this case, in a conference championship game or prior - than it is to win and proceed to the final round. That makes no sense at all.


One other point: football is the ultimate team sport. While the quarterback may be the most important player, many - on both sides - are overlooking that fact.

If only Tom had lost to the Chargers in 07 and Ravens in 11, he would then be in Joe's class.

A person who recently came out with the "NFL Franchise Rankings" broke ties by first looking at the number of Super Bowls, then the number of conference championships, then divisional playoffs, etc. etc.

The little trick that Montana backers use is to switch "Super Bowl performances" with "overall performance" and act like they are the exact same thing. There is something wrong with judging the greatest quarterback of all-time on account of 10 total football games.

I don't argue that Joe Montana was the best Super Bowl performer of all-time.