Did you know that Tom Brady has been sacked 565 times in his career? Despite taking far more hits than most of his peers, some NFL fans still believe the league bent rules to protect the face of the league. Brady has a pointed response to these sentiments.
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Be it the “Brady Rule” or roughing the passer calls, the seven-time Super Bowl winner has seen the favoritism accusations follow him for multiple decades. But Brady’s had enough now. In the latest video on his YouTube channel, while reacting to some of the biggest hits he took in his 23-year-long NFL career, the former QB asserted that during his era, the NFL was a hard-nosed, physical game.
Evidently, Brady is not a fan of the game today, where the offense blames the defense for hits, rather than being proactive enough to avoid them [cough cough Caleb Williams]. As Brady passionately explained, that wasn’t the case in his era. He even showed a brief clip of being leveled by a Jets defender and called it a “good hit.”
“What I want is a tough, hard-nosed physical game. I don’t want a game where the offense can move the ball and blame the defense for getting tackled. I feel like you have the ability to protect yourself on offense or defense,” the former Patriots QB said.
“Everyone always is like ‘Oh, they changed the rules for you and you were the beneficiary’ and I’m like, what fu*king planet are you living on? I got hammered. How does everyone look at this and tell me that I was protected?” he added.
Interestingly enough, Brady hoped to see some good old-fashioned football at Super Bowl LIX this Sunday.
Tom Brady advocates for a more intense Super Bowl this year
For Brady, football is a simple game. If you want protection in the pocket, get rid of the ball quickly. If you don’t, and hold onto it until the last minute, you’ll take a hit. Football is all about quickly analyzing spaces and capitalizing on them, all while the threat of a hit looms in your mind.
However, if you soften that danger, Brady says the game likely won’t have the same impact and it won’t be entertaining to watch as well. That’s why the Patriots legend hopes to see a fierce contest of physicality between the Chiefs and Eagles this weekend.
“I’m getting ready for the Super Bowl, man. I’m fired up but I want to see some hits. I want to see some guys playing the game physically. I want to see offensive guys playing with physicality and toughness.”
While we understand Brady’s ‘game’s gone soft’ sentiment, not everyone was as fortunate as he was during his career. Yes, TB12 has taken hits, but few were dangerous enough to end his career. These hits can easily jeopardize a QB’s livelihood, which is why the rules have become more favorable to playmakers in recent years.
After all, football is just a game—it’s not worth risking your future for.
