Tom Brady : Why He Shouldn’t Win MVP
Tom Brady is arguably the best quarterback in the game. Every year he comes back better and stronger. He outplays everyone on the field and leads an alright offense to victories. Tom Brady does not have a star WR. Tom Brady does not have a star RB. Julian Edelman and LeGarrette Blount are good players, but they’re not Le’veon Bell or Antonio Brown. Tom Brady and Bill Belichick consistently elevate players above their talent. That’s what makes him great. Imagine if Brady was throwing to an Antonio Brown, Julio Jones or Jordy Nelson: you can’t because your brain just broke.
Now the regular season is over and everyone’s debating who should win MVP. Besides Brady, we have Aaron Rodgers, Matt Ryan, and Ezekiel Elliott leading the conversation MVP.
An MVP candidate has to prove he was the most valuable player in the league for the whole season. The WHOLE season. Regardless of whether or not you agree with the NFL’s ruling, Brady was suspended 4 games. There’s no arguing that. He came back week 5. Without Brady the patriots were 3–1. Not bad. Obviously Brady is better then Garoppolo and it’s safe to assume that Garoppolo wouldn’t have led the Patriots to more wins than Brady (14 this season). Now thats really good for Brady, but because he did miss games and because there are other MVP contenders who played just as well or better for the whole season, he doesn’t deserve to win it as much as these other players.
A player must be valuable and available for his team. Missing 4 games is a lot, a quarter of the season to be exact. To put that into perspective, that’s the equivalent of missing ~2o games in the NBA. Could you have imagined awarding the 2016 NBA MVP award to Anthony Davis, who despite being one of the best players in the league and the only reason the Pelicans did not finish at the bottom of the league, missed 21 games? No, it’s inconceivable. Matt Ryan, Aaron Rodgers, and Zeke were always available to their teams. They played. They were not suspended and they were just as good as Brady. You could even make the argument that Ryan and Zeke were better. Zeke put his blood, sweat, and tears into this season. He led his team from week 1. He was ready to go. Don’t you think someone who is on the field for 16 games (Zeke’s case: 15 games. Final game was rested) is more worthy of the MVP award than someone who only played 12? I do.
Matt Ryan is being seriously considered for the MVP so let’s compare him to Brady for the season. Ryan actually beat Brady in a few categories including completion percentage, yards per game, and QB rating. Ryan also had a running game that included Tevin Coleman and Devonta Freeman so you would think Brady would have better passing numbers. Now, some people will come back and say, “Brady only played 12 games, had he played all 16 he would have annihilated Ryan statistically.” Well, thats his problem, he didn’t play all 16 games. Why should he win MVP then? He shouldn’t.
Aaron Rodgers started off slow and Brady had slightly better numbers, but Rodgers still played the full season and brought his team all the way back from a 4–6 record, a team that is currently on an 8 game win streak including playoffs. Just for being there for his team the full season and putting the team on his back, I would give Rodgers the MVP over Brady.
Lastly, there is Elliott. This RB phenomenon is a pleasure to watch. He is special! He carried his team all the way to the playoffs, playing better and better each week. He improved their record from the previous year by 9 games. He played every week but the last due to rest and just kept gobbling up yards. He led the league in rushing this season and delivered his team a first round bye. He was valuable and always available.
The main difference between these guys and Brady is that they were there for the whole season. If you told me Brady had ended the season with numbers that were never seen before or just way better than these other guys, I might be tempted to agree with you. Problem is… he didn’t. He was outplayed by Ryan and Zeke and didn’t do that much better than Rodgers.
Brady is great. Brady is special. Brady is an MVP player, but he should not be this year’s MVP.
