Is Tom Brady really MVP material? (Part 2)
Another thing to look at are yardage statistics. On passes that were 10 yards or less, Roethlisberger was on average half a yard better than Brady. On passes longer that 10 yards, he was only 2/10th of a yard behind Brady.
70.7 percent of Brady’s passes are 10 yards or less, whereas Big Ben throws only 55.9 percent of his passes below 10 yards. This makes sense when you look at their statistics. Brady has a completion percentage of 65.9. Roethlisberger’s is 61.7 percent. However,
wouldn’t throwing longer passes result in a significantly lower percentage? Brady throws 15 percent more short passes than Big Ben but his completion ratio is only 4.2 percent better.
Another quarterback to compare to Brady is Michael Vick. Vick also missed three games in the middle of the season with a rib injury, and the last game of the season because of a leg injury. Even so, he has had the best season of his career. He has surpassed
all of his personal records including passing yards, passing touchdowns, rushing touchdowns, and quarterback rating.
Compared to Brady’s 3,900 passing yards and 36 touchdowns, Vick has 3,018 yards and 21 touchdowns. That gives him an average of 251.5 yards and 1.75 touchdowns per game. If he had played in all 16 games of the season, he would have 4,024 passing yards and
28 touchdowns; Passing touchdowns that is. Brady has had one rushing touchdown whereas Vick has had 9. If you include those, Vick would have had 12 rushing touchdowns as well giving him a total of 40 touchdowns, which is better than Brady’s 37 touchdowns.
Brady’s one rushing touchdown was for only three yards, and he attempted only one run. Vick has attempted 100 carries for 776 yards. That gives him an average of 7.76 yards per carry and 64.7 rushing yards per game. If he had played in all of his games,
he would have 133.3 attempts for 1035.2 yards. It might be good to know that the Patriots’ lead rusher, BenJarvus Green-Ellis, has had 1,008 rushing yards this season along with 13 touchdowns.
Overall, Vick is a much, much better all-round player than Brady could ever hope to be. Or it might be that Pats’ head coach Bill Belichick does not want his precious quarterback to come into harm’s way, which is why he doesn’t let him rush much.
The next player who could give Brady a run for his money is Peyton Manning. He has .04 higher completion percentage than Brady. Brady has completed 65.9 percent of his passes while Manning has completed 66.3 percent. Manning has accumulated 4,700 passing
yards this season. Yes, 4,700. As in 800 more yards than Brady. He also has 33 touchdowns, four less than Manning. Ok, so he has almost as many touchdowns and a lot more passing yards. Why isn’t he in the running for league MVP?
Well, the answer to that question lies with the rest of the team. If you take a look at the Colts’ injury reports, they have had about one-third of their roster on injured reserve at one point in the season. Now if Manning had his full arsenal of players
such as Reggie Wayne and Austin Collie for every single game, then he would have had a lot more passing yards and touchdowns. This is incredible because he already has the best passing offence in the league, meaning that the Colts can only get better.
The article will be continued in part 3.
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