by Sweetbob

Created on: January 28, 2007   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

The Tom Brady/Joe Montana comparison has been floating around the mainstream since Brady won his first Super Bowl. At the time I believed that it was an unfair comparison 'cause Montana had achieved so much more than, at the time, a flash in the pan QB who rode momentum through the playoffs. Well, it's many years later and the talk is still in the air, although the topic is rather stale, i can see it better now than when the topic was initially presented.

Tom Brady has won three Super Bowls and has a playoff record of 12-2. His overall playoff is better than Montana's and Montana didn't start off as well as Brady has in the playoffs. Brady's instant post-season success makes it somewhat unfair to compare them to each other's entire careers. Brady is still young and has many more games to play, Montana has had his cleats hung up for quite some time now. If you segment Montana's career in a 5 year period and do the same with Brady, you can see a lot of similar post-season statistics. A person who is Pro-Brady could use "The Rice Factor" to help their argument. "The Rice Factor" is the question "If Tom Brady had someone the caliber of Jerry Rice, what would his numbers look like?" I think it's a valid question to ask, but you have to remember, some of those 49ers teams had more than just Rice, they were full of stars, the Patriots teams that won Super Bowls prided themselves on team-play and refused to be singled out during the Super Bowl and was introduced as a team instead of individual players. Would the Patriots chemistry have worked if someone like Jerry Rice, Roger Craig, Brent Jones, or Harris Barton been on the team? The periods of time in football were so different as well, during the 49ers dynasty, free agency wasn't around, you could keep your guys easier, Brady has had to endure multiple receiver changes and still kept a high level of play.

As much as it annoys me to admit this, as I am an Indianapolis Colts fan, Brady has so far had a better career than Montana. I should put an asterisk by that statement. If Brady goes cold or if he doesn't end up winning another playoff game throughout his career, going 0-10. He will end up being 12-12 with three Super Bowl rings, it would still be hard to put Montana ahead of him, but Brady is still young and has a lot of time left, let's put this to bed and wake it up in ten years, it will be better answered then.

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