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Report: Brady tried to push Belichick out for Bill O'Brien

Just presenting some facts. The team didn't drop-off much from 1996 to 1997... the biggest problem in both postseasons was the play of Bledsoe... in the two season-ending losses he had 6 INTs... it's hard to win with your quarterback making repeated horrible decisions.

From 1988 to 2002, the only Patriots defense to finish in the top-10 in both scoring and yards was Carroll's '99 squad. Carroll's last season the defense ranked 8th... Belichick's first three seasons... 20th, 24th & 23rd. The offense wasn't good during Carroll's last season but statistically it got worse under Belichick. I don't make up the numbers. The offense didn't get any good until Brady became the starter.

Not saying Carroll was a success in New England, because he wasn't, however (including postseason) he was 5 games over .500 preceding the Dynasty era. Since becoming the HC of NE, Belichick is 1 game below .500 without Brady, while with Brady the teams were good enough to win 17 division titles in 18 seasons. Seems like one could draw some conclusions from that.
1996 was a good team, but they were lucky to even be in the Super Bowl. They would've gotten a beat down had Denver not choked against Jacksonville. But they were clearly a top team in the AFC.

While they were pretty much the same team in 1997, Denver beats them down again with or without Curtis Martin. Denver was their daddy's. Had Martin been healthy all season, they easily beat Pittsburgh in the regular season and get the #2 seed. AFCCG is at home against Denver.

1998 you could start to see the age of this team. Aside from the draft '97 draft, letting Martin go was the beginning of the end for them. Letting Sam Gash go was unacceptable. Losing Hitchcock was another bad move.

The 1999 defense was terrible. This is why team ranks can be overrated. I do not miss the Chris Carter days. Letting Willie Clay go for that turd was a disgrace. I've never seen a S so stiff and clueless. Ty Law was also really bad in '99. Defense couldn't stop Ray Lucas and the damn Jets at home on MNF. O-line was old and overpaid (Rucci and Lane). Running game was embarrassing after the unfortunate Robert Edwards injury. And good 'ole Tony Simmons. How about Rod Rutledge?

While I liked Carroll as a Coach, I agree with the others that he was running them into the ground with horrendous personnel decisions and atrocious drafts.
 
What a ridiculous argument he's making there.

Brady made 10 fing SB's. Of course there's going to be a few SB losses. It's basic math. Again, 7 gold medals with 3 Silvers is better than 4 gold medals.

Montana gets credit for not making it to the big game enough. It's a bizarre argument.

Well, those 3 silver medals came as a result of losses to Eli Manning and Nick Foles. It's not as if the Pats lost to the 85 Bears. You can't just forget about them and say "oh well. at least they made the super bowl!" Doesn't work that way. If the Pats lost to more worthy opponents, it'd be a different story.
 
1996 was a good team, but they were lucky to even be in the Super Bowl. They would've gotten a beat down had Denver not choked against Jacksonville. But they were clearly a top team in the AFC.

While they were pretty much the same team in 1997, Denver beats them down again with or without Curtis Martin. Denver was their daddy's. Had Martin been healthy all season, they easily beat Pittsburgh in the regular season and get the #2 seed. AFCCG is at home against Denver.

1998 you could start to see the age of this team. Aside from the draft '97 draft, letting Martin go was the beginning of the end for them. Letting Sam Gash go was unacceptable. Losing Hitchcock was another bad move.

The 1999 defense was terrible. This is why team ranks can be overrated. I do not miss the Chris Carter days. Letting Willie Clay go for that turd was a disgrace. I've never seen a S so stiff and clueless. Ty Law was also really bad in '99. Defense couldn't stop Ray Lucas and the damn Jets at home on MNF. O-line was old and overpaid (Rucci and Lane). Running game was embarrassing after the unfortunate Robert Edwards injury. And good 'ole Tony Simmons. How about Rod Rutledge?

While I liked Carroll as a Coach, I agree with the others that he was running them into the ground with horrendous personnel decisions and atrocious drafts.
Look, I SAT through every home game Pete the Cleaner coached. His third year, game 10 or 11, team comes out after halftime, takes the kickoff, proceeds to have THREE friggin' 12 men on the field penalties in a row! Of course they lost the game. Post game interview the MORON reiterated what he said for THREE straight years..."we just gotta clean some things up...clean some things up"...jeezus krist..every single Pats fan in my section where I had season's tickets for a decade wanted this shytbird to GTFO of town.
 
Certainly, it is my opinion that the fan base is somewhat fractured in so called different camps. I am going to assume you are aware of this.For all my time here over the years this was not the case, but it is now. It is my opinion that this takes from the enjoyment of what I had grown accustomed to on this brilliant Patriots message board for so many,many years. You may have a different opinion and that is perfectly fine.
Thanks for the clarification and you're correct. This site has become a different place.
 
Thanks for the clarification and you're correct. This site has become a different place.
100% correct, it now has a contingent of Tampa Bay Bucs trolls who despite having their own forum to talk about their Bucs insist upon using the Patriots forum to relitigate the past over and over and over and over………..


We never had that before, now we do.
 
Wait so Mac 10 is trying to make a case the 07 Giants were one of the worst teams to make a SB?

This is why you can never look at just records. Yes their regular season record wasn't good. But anyone who watched football knew that defense was top tier.

If you want to blame Brady for losing to huge underdogs. Well...you have to go the other way too. Patriots don't win SB 36 without Brady. If you look at media predictions going into that game, everyone had the Rams winning big. Especially on that track in NO.

So let's just go with the premise Brady cost the team SB 42 (Not true). But let's give you that.

Brady is directly responsible for SB 38. 29 points (Carolina) will win most SB's. Brady got 32. Led the game winning FG drive at the end.

Now let's go to SB 49. Down 24-14 with time running down against the LOB. Brady has two TD drives to win the game. Now, you may say "Seattle should've run it. Brady got lucky". Ok. But do you realize how lucky Seattle was to even be in position to win that game? David Tyree nearly happened all over again.

SB 51: 28-3 with like 23 minutes left. I don't care how piss poor Brady might've played up to that point. When you do what he did--that is a once in a billion type situation. No other QB would've pulled off what he did. If he had 3 SB wins before 28-3, then won his 4th, I think the comeback would've been enough to put him ahead of Montana. But this game, and his 5th, ended the debate forever.

SB 53: That was a defensive slugfest. Best defense on the other side. Regardless, Brady led another game winning score. Everyone knew the game was over after the Gronk catch. But I will give Belichick credit for redeeming himself after SB 52. Because as terrible as he was that day, he was equally as brilliant against the Rams.

SB 55: Three TD passes. 10 points would've won the game. But TB isn't in the SB if Brady never went there imo. His D played great. But Brady was still great too.

SB 52 was lost due to coaching. Nothing else. Brady getting strip sacked is stuff that happens. But the man put up 33 points.

SB 39: Balanced win. No doubt. The final score of that game doesn't truly reflect the game itself. NE was better.

SB 46: Brady's "worst" SB game. Yet...he left the field with the lead. Manning made a great throw. And the other dude made an equally better catch. Again...that defense was top notch.

So if your going to say Brady was "lucky" for the pick and 28-3, you have to say he was equally unlucky when Tyree happened. And what about Welker? Yeah it wasn't a perfect throw. But he's caught worst thrown balls. Brady was especially unlucky when the 2nd best CB got benched in SB 52.

Luck goes both ways.

Brady is 7-3. Sounds about right.

Btw, Montana did throw a pick in SB 23. Let's be honest. The dude had it and dropped it. And Brady has been in 6 more SB's than Joe. So obviously he's going to have more picks. And being in more SB's increases the likelihood of you losing a few.

I don't know where the Brady hate comes from. But he's the undisputed GOAT. There's no argument to be had he isn't.

Ugh.
This is a really good rendition with a couple quibbles.

First agreed on 2003, Brady was stellar. People keep saying it was the Patriots D without realizing that Brady put up the second greatest statistical performance in SB history at the time.

As for 2007, the Patriots were playing beaten by the better team on that day.

So--I do disagree with you on 2011. It was definitely not Brady's worst performance. It was actually a pretty good performance. And it shows you what can happen when you go all in for a Super Bowl. Sometimes the clearly better team (the Patriots) can lose because of a totally unprecedented turn of events coupled with self-inflicted miscues, and really just outright weirdness. The Patriots defense got manhandled in the first half and the offense really got itself its first chance a good chunk of the way thru the 2nd quarter. How they ended up leading going into half time is a mystery. But that safety in the 1st qtr when Brady overthrew Branch? I'm not doubting he threw it past him intentionally, but as soon as Brady threw it, Branch cut toward the sideline which showed the QB and WR weren't even on the same page. Both of the announcers opined that they'd never seen a penalty called ever before in that situation, and on the halftime show Boomer Esiason said it was one of the most ridiculous calls he'd ever seen. Whatever--the point is, the Patriots barely got the ball because of this really weird turn of events.

Here's why I believe Brady had a good game. Second half, he broke the Super Bowl record for consecutive completions. The Giants were reeling as the Patriots were already up on them trying to go up 2 scores in the 4th quarter. After a string of completions, the Giants were gassed. Bill O'Brien for some bizarre reason took his foot off the gas pedal and decided to bring in a jumbo package when the Patriots got down to the Giants 30. The Giants countered with a big unit replacing their gassed defense. They run blitzed and stuffed the Patriots for a 3 yard loss. The next 2 plays are well remembered, 2 drops by WRs including Wes Welker's infamous drop. The Patriots didn't score. A week later we were treated in game audio of not only the refs saying, "That would have been game," after Welker's drop, but Strahan and a couple of Giants muttering to one another, "We've got no answers right now, they're doing whatever they want."

The game got shortened by the Giants, kudos to Coughlin, but the Patriots were by far superior, and only crazy things prevented that win. It happens.

About the Bucs-Chiefs Super Bowl, people tend to forget that Brady put up a huge amount of points in the first half and another 10 early in the second half. One could argue this is what made Mahomes look so bad. When you become one dimensional, the opposing team is going to blitz you mercilessly, but you need that big lead to take those big risks. The Bucs offense went into kill the game clock mode.

SB 55: Three TD passes. 10 points would've won the game. But TB isn't in the SB if Brady never went there imo. His D played great. But Brady was still great too.
 
100% correct, it now has a contingent of Tampa Bay Bucs trolls who despite having their own forum to talk about their Bucs insist upon using the Patriots forum to relitigate the past over and over and over and over………..


We never had that before, now we do.
That's not true.
The vast majority of folks on this site are Pats fans and they shouldn't have been relegated to a sub-forum to discuss the greatest QB who ever played. I've been here for 10 years and this is the first time that Pats fans complained about other Pats fans and had one of our own player's threads moved.

We never had THAT before, now we do.
 
This is a really good rendition with a couple quibbles.

First agreed on 2003, Brady was stellar. People keep saying it was the Patriots D without realizing that Brady put up the second greatest statistical performance in SB history at the time.

As for 2007, the Patriots were playing beaten by the better team on that day.

So--I do disagree with you on 2011. It was definitely not Brady's worst performance. It was actually a pretty good performance. And it shows you what can happen when you go all in for a Super Bowl. Sometimes the clearly better team (the Patriots) can lose because of a totally unprecedented turn of events coupled with self-inflicted miscues, and really just outright weirdness. The Patriots defense got manhandled in the first half and the offense really got itself its first chance a good chunk of the way thru the 2nd quarter. How they ended up leading going into half time is a mystery. But that safety in the 1st qtr when Brady overthrew Branch? I'm not doubting he threw it past him intentionally, but as soon as Brady threw it, Branch cut toward the sideline which showed the QB and WR weren't even on the same page. Both of the announcers opined that they'd never seen a penalty called ever before in that situation, and on the halftime show Boomer Esiason said it was one of the most ridiculous calls he'd ever seen. Whatever--the point is, the Patriots barely got the ball because of this really weird turn of events.

Here's why I believe Brady had a good game. Second half, he broke the Super Bowl record for consecutive completions. The Giants were reeling as the Patriots were already up on them trying to go up 2 scores in the 4th quarter. After a string of completions, the Giants were gassed. Bill O'Brien for some bizarre reason took his foot off the gas pedal and decided to bring in a jumbo package when the Patriots got down to the Giants 30. The Giants countered with a big unit replacing their gassed defense. They run blitzed and stuffed the Patriots for a 3 yard loss. The next 2 plays are well remembered, 2 drops by WRs including Wes Welker's infamous drop. The Patriots didn't score. A week later we were treated in game audio of not only the refs saying, "That would have been game," after Welker's drop, but Strahan and a couple of Giants muttering to one another, "We've got no answers right now, they're doing whatever they want."

The game got shortened by the Giants, kudos to Coughlin, but the Patriots were by far superior, and only crazy things prevented that win. It happens.

About the Bucs-Chiefs Super Bowl, people tend to forget that Brady put up a huge amount of points in the first half and another 10 early in the second half. One could argue this is what made Mahomes look so bad. When you become one dimensional, the opposing team is going to blitz you mercilessly, but you need that big lead to take those big risks. The Bucs offense went into kill the game clock mode.

SB 55: Three TD passes. 10 points would've won the game. But TB isn't in the SB if Brady never went there imo. His D played great. But Brady was still great too.
SB 46 was his "worst" game relative to his other SB performances I meant. I didn't mean to insinuate he played bad in that game. Maybe there's another SB he wasn't as sharp? I mean I'd have to go watch SB 39 maybe. But they did win. SB 42 was more kudos to Giants. Your probably right.

Wasn't Strahan retired in 2011? I believe that Giants line had Tuck, Osi, and maybe JPP?

Regardless, he's played in 10 SB's. Thus, he's going to have more SB picks than a guy (Joe) who played in 4. Mac 10 seemed to.be holding the picks against Brady.
 
Well, those 3 silver medals came as a result of losses to Eli Manning and Nick Foles. It's not as if the Pats lost to the 85 Bears. You can't just forget about them and say "oh well. at least they made the super bowl!" Doesn't work that way. If the Pats lost to more worthy opponents, it'd be a different story.
How were the 07 & 11 Giants not worthy opponents? Hell, the 11 Pats weren't that great either. Wasn't their D one of the worst? Brady getting them to the SB was impressive. That said, they still win with a healthy Gronk imo.

I'm not going to suggest Brady has played perfect in every big game. That's impossible.

But who are your top 5 QB's of all time in order? I just don't see where Montana can be ahead of Brady. Idk.
 
SB 46 was his "worst" game relative to his other SB performances I meant. I didn't mean to insinuate he played bad in that game. Maybe there's another SB he wasn't as sharp? I mean I'd have to go watch SB 39 maybe. But they did win. SB 42 was more kudos to Giants. Your probably right.

Wasn't Strahan retired in 2011? I believe that Giants line had Tuck, Osi, and maybe JPP?

Regardless, he's played in 10 SB's. Thus, he's going to have more SB picks than a guy (Joe) who played in 4. Mac 10 seemed to.be holding the picks against Brady.
Right about Strahan. I know the Giants defenders were having a discussion in between plays.

I would say his 3 worst are 2001, 2018, 2007 in that order. In 2007, he was getting hit pretty hard, as our guys just got destroyed.

One thing totally unrelated to all this, but which shows you the weirdness of Super Bowls in this era, teams don't hit as hard. In watching the Bengals-Rams this year, I felt like they were playing patty-cake out there. I was kind of stunned by it.

This means a team like the 07 Giants can come in or the 18 Patriots and just knock the snot out of the opposition, and it's like a wake up call that is never answered. You'd think everyone would come ready to play in a Super Bowl but it' just not true. This year's SB was an example of 2 teams that seemed to be playing by gentleman's rules.
 
1996 was a good team, but they were lucky to even be in the Super Bowl. They would've gotten a beat down had Denver not choked against Jacksonville. But they were clearly a top team in the AFC.

While they were pretty much the same team in 1997, Denver beats them down again with or without Curtis Martin. Denver was their daddy's. Had Martin been healthy all season, they easily beat Pittsburgh in the regular season and get the #2 seed. AFCCG is at home against Denver.

1998 you could start to see the age of this team. Aside from the draft '97 draft, letting Martin go was the beginning of the end for them. Letting Sam Gash go was unacceptable. Losing Hitchcock was another bad move.

The 1999 defense was terrible. This is why team ranks can be overrated. I do not miss the Chris Carter days. Letting Willie Clay go for that turd was a disgrace. I've never seen a S so stiff and clueless. Ty Law was also really bad in '99. Defense couldn't stop Ray Lucas and the damn Jets at home on MNF. O-line was old and overpaid (Rucci and Lane). Running game was embarrassing after the unfortunate Robert Edwards injury. And good 'ole Tony Simmons. How about Rod Rutledge?

While I liked Carroll as a Coach, I agree with the others that he was running them into the ground with horrendous personnel decisions and atrocious drafts.
I looked it up. Jacksonville beating Denver was one of the biggest NFL playoff upsets. Ever. Crazy.

Here's a what if (I wasn't around then):

Does Denver beat GB in SB 31 in your opinion?

Obviously they beat GB in 97. But different players etc.
 
How were the 07 & 11 Giants not worthy opponents? Hell, the 11 Pats weren't that great either. Wasn't their D one of the worst? Brady getting them to the SB was impressive. That said, they still win with a healthy Gronk imo.
The '11 Patriots were in the middle of a 3 or 4 year run that is still the greatest offensive explosion in NFL history. This was the Gronk-Hernandez-Welker-Ridley-Vereen era. The offense was like a knife slicing through butter.

Those offenses at the time (2010-2011-2012) ranked in the top 10 of offenses ALL TIME.
 
Right about Strahan. I know the Giants defenders were having a discussion in between plays.

I would say his 3 worst are 2001, 2018, 2007 in that order. In 2007, he was getting hit pretty hard, as our guys just got destroyed.

One thing totally unrelated to all this, but which shows you the weirdness of Super Bowls in this era, teams don't hit as hard. In watching the Bengals-Rams this year, I felt like they were playing patty-cake out there. I was kind of stunned by it.

This means a team like the 07 Giants can come in or the 18 Patriots and just knock the snot out of the opposition, and it's like a wake up call that is never answered. You'd think everyone would come ready to play in a Super Bowl but it' just not true. This year's SB was an example of 2 teams that seemed to be playing by gentleman's rules.
Here's what's crazy.

If someone just looked purely at Brady's stats immediately after SB 52, they'd say NE won big time.

If someone just looked purely at Brady's stats immediately after SB 53 (See I forgot this because they won.), they'd say the Rams high powered offense won big time.

I think one think that needs to be clarified (Not directed at you. In general), is the difference between effort and execution. A team can have 100% effort. Trying their hardest. But it's just not there. Sometimes that gets mislead as a team unprepared etc. It's hard to explain in words. But ESPN is bad for this. They always say "Did x team win or y team lose it"? Insinuating that the loser played bad or gave it away almost.
 
The '11 Patriots were in the middle of a 3 or 4 year run that is still the greatest offensive explosion in NFL history. This was the Gronk-Hernandez-Welker-Ridley-Vereen era. The offense was like a knife slicing through butter.

Those offenses at the time (2010-2011-2012) ranked in the top 10 of offenses ALL TIME.
I'm just referring to Patriots defense. I read here alot that 2011 D wasn't good at all.

Obviously the offense was lethal of course.

It's a shame what happened to Hernandez. Not going to try and open a can of worms. Just my feelings. He was so talented.
 
Not the GOAT of the Super Bowl. He can't even beat one of the worst teams to ever field a team in the super bowl in the 2007 NYG.

Brady before Super Bowl 42:



Brady during Super Bowl 42:


 
That's not true.
The vast majority of folks on this site are Pats fans and they shouldn't have been relegated to a sub-forum to discuss the greatest QB who ever played. I've been here for 10 years and this is the first time that Pats fans complained about other Pats fans and had one of our own player's threads moved.

We never had THAT before, now we do.
conveniently leaving out that he now plays for another team.

So, yes, it should be in another forum, as this one is for The New England Patriots, not tom bradys current team.
 
How were the 07 & 11 Giants not worthy opponents? Hell, the 11 Pats weren't that great either. Wasn't their D one of the worst? Brady getting them to the SB was impressive. That said, they still win with a healthy Gronk imo.

I'm not going to suggest Brady has played perfect in every big game. That's impossible.

But who are your top 5 QB's of all time in order? I just don't see where Montana can be ahead of Brady. Idk.

The Giants in 2007 were a 10-6 wild card team with a point differential of 22. Let's not make this complicated.

As far as Montana vs Brady is concerned, I'm just talking Super Bowl performance.
 
Mac 10 seemed to.be holding the picks against Brady.

It's not just Brady's SB interceptions. It's his intentional grounding in SB 46, which led to 9 points by NYG, and fumbles. I think Brady was responsible for at least 10-11 turnovers in the super bowl, while Montana had none. This is probably the biggest reason for why Montana's SB rating is 30 points higher. In my view, there was no one better in the big game than JM. The Bradyites on this board don't like it because in their view "Tommy is the best at everything."
 
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Here's what's crazy.

If someone just looked purely at Brady's stats immediately after SB 52, they'd say NE won big time.

If someone just looked purely at Brady's stats immediately after SB 53 (See I forgot this because they won.), they'd say the Rams high powered offense won big time.

I think one think that needs to be clarified (Not directed at you. In general), is the difference between effort and execution. A team can have 100% effort. Trying their hardest. But it's just not there. Sometimes that gets mislead as a team unprepared etc. It's hard to explain in words. But ESPN is bad for this. They always say "Did x team win or y team lose it"? Insinuating that the loser played bad or gave it away almost.
I promise you though that if you watched the 2018 game, you'd see the Rams get punched in the face. Like this:
 
It's a shame what happened to Hernandez. Not going to try and open a can of worms. Just my feelings. He was so talented.
I think that is something a lot of people (outside this forum) fail to realize. Aaron Hernandez was a phenomenally talented TE. Had he not been a murderer, he could have been a part of arguably the best 1-2 TE tandem in NFL history.
 
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