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Brady and the Belichick effect

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Tom Brady’s story is a cliche at this point.

A successful but unheralded two-year starter at the University of Michigan, Brady was selected in the sixth round (199th pick) of the 2000 NFL draft. After throwing three passes in his first season, an injury forced him into the starting role one game into his second year. Since then he’s been a two-time MVP and a 12-time Pro Bowler. He’s reached the Super Bowl seven times and won four. Brady went from doughy draftee to Ugg icon. He married a supermodel, and even at 39, he’s a major factor in the Patriots’ continued dominance over the NFL.

I’m not here to dispute his legacy, mostly because I think that’s impossible. He towers from a statistical standpoint: the fourth-most passing yards, the fourth-most touchdowns, the third-best quarterback rating. Couple that with the Patriots making half of the Super Bowls in the last 15 years, and you have a legitimate argument for Brady being the most “successful” quarterback of all time. Troy Aikman seems to think so, but I’m not ready to hand over the crown just yet. It’s because of the Belichick effect.

Bill Belichick is the scheming mastermind behind the Patriots machine. Belichick became New England’s head coach the same year Brady was drafted, and since then, the duo has given an absolute middle finger to NFL parity. Brady throws passes and looks good; Belichick wears a hoody, doesn’t smile and somehow, someway is able to squeeze every last bit of talent out of his. He makes cast-offs into Pro Bowlers, only to have them turn into pumpkins after signing big contracts elsewhere. No one is doubting Brady’s place in the “greatest ever” argument, but maybe it’s a good idea to talk about the possibility that Boston’s prodigal son is one of those pumpkins.

Let’s lay out a couple career stats. In 17 seasons, Tom Brady has a 97.2 quarterback rating (third all time), 63.8 completion percentage (8224 attempts), a 1.8 interception percentage and 7.5 yards per attempt. These are all great numbers, befitting Brady’s stature.

Now, I’ll give you another set of numbers: an 88.2 rating, 62.9 completion percentage (555 attempts), a 2.3 interception percentage and a 7.1 yards per attempt. Aside from the rating, those numbers are awfully similar. Can you guess who those numbers belong to?

Matt Cassel. He’s a well-known replacement-level journeyman, but those numbers are from the 30 games he played as a Patriot. All four of those stats shifted in a bad way after he left New England (76.8 rating, 57.9 comp. Pct., 3.2 int. pct, 6.4 Y/A). Maybe Belichick was able to make Cassel look like Brady because the mastermind can do that with any quarterback who walks into the practice facility.

The next two exhibits have small sample sizes, so take them with a grain of salt. One area you have to give Brady credit for is his health and longevity. Since taking over full time in 2001, Brady has played in all but 19 of the Patriots’ 254 regular season games. That leaves little room for experimental comparisons, not to mention most of those missed games were started by Cassel in 2008, when Brady suffered a season-ending knee injury.

Jimmy Garoppolo has attempted just 94 passes since being drafted by New England in 2014, but when he has seen the field, his numbers are even better than Brady (106.2 rating, 67.0 comp. pct., 0 int. pct., 7.3 Y/A).

Even Jacoby Brissett, the Patriots’ third string quarterback, drafted this year without even a notion of getting playing time, did alright in his limited action (83.9 rating, 61.8 comp. pct. in 55 attempts, 0 int. pct., 7.3 Y/A).

Of course, using backup quarterback performances is a flimsy argument, but finding any kind of statistical metric at all to determine the Belichick effect is difficult.

Football is scheme-based by nature. So, the performance of a player is going to vary drastically depending on the coach and talent around him. For example, the best wide receiver in the world would look terrible on paper if his team ran the ball 70 times a game and his quarterback was Macaulay Culkin. So, unless you can make a player play across 32 teams with all other factors equal, there is no direct way to test whether the system makes the player or the other way around.

Would Brady have been Brady if he played for New York Jets? Given Belichick’s track record of elevating the performances of his players, probably not. Would he still be a good quarterback? Probably, yes. Would having Brady wear green and white give Jets fans less to complain about? Also yes. Using the what-if machine in football is unreliable. That’s in comparison to a sport like baseball, where skillsets are much more easily transferable from team to team.

Still, looking at Cassel, Garoppolo and Brissett’s near Brady-like performances in their short time, it makes you at least consider the notion that Brady is a product of circumstance.

This is by no means an attack on his legacy, merely a point to think about.


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