Joe Namath: ‘No one’s ever been better than Tom Brady’
By Phil Watson
Hall of Famer Joe Namath has witnessed the rise of professional football from a niche sport in the 1950s to the giant of today and he a fan of Tom Brady.
The unwinnable debate rages on over who is the best quarterback of all-time and Hall of Famer Joe Namath, while not ready to declare an outright winner, says New England Patriots star Tom Brady is in the conversation at the highest levels.
“No one’s ever been better. No one’s ever been better than Tom Brady,” Namath told MMQB.com. “And I go back to watching the guys earlier in some of the darker days, in the ’50s.”
More from New England Patriots
- Patriots backup plan for DeAndre Hopkins is a shot in the dark
- NFL rumors: Patriots screwed themselves with DeAndre Hopkins pursuit
- Bill O’Brien arrival did not end the road for one disliked Patriots coach
- 3 biggest mistakes from the NFL offseason
- NFL Rumors: Dalvin Cook free agency complicated by court filing
A player who grew up idolizing Cleveland Browns legend Otto Graham and won perhaps the most important Super Bowl victory in history—the 16-7 win by the New York Jets in Super Bowl III that legitimized the fledgling AFL less than two years before it would merge with the established NFL, Namath has seen the changes in the game as it rose in popularity to become the behemoth it is today.
But Namath won’t be pinned down on picking just one quarterback from a group that includes Brady, Joe Montana, Johnny Unitas, Roger Staubach, among others
“Better than, better than, better than. The best, the best, the best. To each his own,” Namath said. “I have a hard time calling anybody in any sport ‘the best’ because of the changes in the game, certainly, and because of the greats that were ahead of them. But I will say no one has ever played the game better than Tom Brady.”
With New England’s 28-24 win over the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIX, Brady joined the pantheon of quarterbacks with four Super Bowl wins, a club that claims only Montana and Terry Bradshaw as its other members.
And Brady’s four wins were stretched out over 15 seasons, whereas Montana claimed four titles in nine years and Bradshaw won his four in a six-season span.
And Namath is actually a great example of how difficult it is to compare quarterbacks across eras.
His career numbers—173 touchdown passes and 220 interceptions—don’t scream Hall of Famer. But he spent the second half of his career playing through multiple knee injuries for some really, really bad Jets teams.
He was the first pro quarterback to ever throw for more than 4,000 yards in a season, when he racked up 4,007 in a 14-game schedule in 1967. For a three-year stretch from 1967-69, Namath was as good as anyone’s ever been, when taking into account rules at the time that allowed defensive backs to pretty much assault receivers downfield and passing games that only knew one way to throw the football—long.
So is Brady the best? I’m with Namath.
Or as the late coach Bum Phillips once said of his superstar running back Earl Campbell when they were with the Houston Oilers in the 1970s: “He might not be in a class by himself, but whatever class he’s in, it don’t take long to call the roll.”
More from FanSided
- Joe Burrow owes Justin Herbert a thank you note after new contract
- Chiefs gamble at wide receiver could already be biting them back
- Braves-Red Sox start time: Braves rain delay in Boston on July 25
- Yankees: Aaron Boone gives optimistic return date for Aaron Judge
- MLB Rumors: Yankees-Phillies trade showdown, Mariners swoop, India goes to Seattle