Getty Image
Future Hall of Famer Tom Brady didn’t have a lot of nice things to say about the current state of the NFL during his appearance on The Stephen A. Smith Show this week.
He trashed the league, its new rules and called the play on the field mediocre.
That criticism, however, did not extend to his former coach of 20 years, Bill Belichick.
Belichick has been rumored to be on the hot seat in New England after going just 32-43 since Brady’s departure from New England. (He went 232-62 with Brady as his quarterback.)
Tom Brady doesn’t think that the criticism of Belichick, who may end up coaching in another city next season, is warranted.
“I think he’s an incredible coach. He’s the best coach, in my belief, in the history of the game,” Brady told Stephen A. Smith. “So I don’t know, the thought of him not being in New England is hard for me to think about.
“He prepares the team really well. And ultimately, you got to have a lot of people around you to succeed. You gotta have a lot of things in place for the organization to be successful.
“I don’t think he’s probably coaching much different now than when we’re undefeated in 2007,” Tom Brady continued. “I’m sure he’s preparing the team the same way.
“The results are different, but again, that’s why the sport’s so challenging. There’s a lot of reasons why teams win or lose.
“The head coach is a very small part on game day. The quarterback plays a really big part on game day, not the entire thing, but because you touch the ball, you have a big opportunity to impact the game.
“So if you get good quarterback play and that says nothing about the, you know, I’m just talking in general about football, you’ve got an advantage. If you play really good defense, you’ve got a great advantage. I mean, you need a good defensive coordinator. You know, ultimately it’s a lot of things coming together, why things work and why they don’t.”
Brady basically said the same thing during this week’s episode of his Let’s Go podcast.
“We have conversations,” Brady said about Bill Belichick. “I know he’s coaching the same way now that he did when we were undefeated.”
He also said the same thing about the effect the head coach has on game day.
“The head coach on game day, he doesn’t play much of a role, in my opinion, the players do. The coach’s job is to prepare the team to play, the player’s job is to go out and execute and to win,” Brady said during a discussion with actor Denzel Washington. “The coach stands on the sideline, sometimes calling plays, sometimes calling timeouts, but the players gotta make the plays.”