A Critical Assessment of Drew's Postseason Career (1 Viewer)

[Christian Bale]

I respect critical analysis, something most people in forums get quite offended and outraged by, and tend to lash out in hostility rather than debate you. I respect all you've said but in Drew's defense I'd say everyone loses in the playoffs when there's only one winner per year, and up until recent years, all those losses were on the road and there were circumstances in each of those games that were not as simple as Brees blowing it.

He is absolutely a Top 10 all-time QB as a career stats leader with a SB ring and #2 only to Tom Brady for this era.

 

[Zztop]

Wasn't Manning something like 12-12 in postseason? I think some of those games the saints got whipped. But 3-4 of those games were lost in spectacular boneheaded ways. Beastquake, 2017 vikings, 2018 ref debacle, this year...I felt the team still could have won if they ran the ball more and/or left Taysom in during the 4qtr when he was unstoppable..

 

[HoustonSaint68]

I respect critical analysis, something most people in forums get quite offended and outraged by, and tend to lash out in hostility rather than debate you.

The problem is, it’s not critical analysis. The OP just took a bunch of scattered facts, threw them together in an illogical, supposed correlation and used that to allege that Drew Brees‘ career is on the same level as Matt Ryan...MATT RYAN. That is simply not a serious position to take.

I very carefully didn’t disrespect the original poster personally but his/her original post itself was not worthy of respect. And the fact that so few responding posts attempt to debate the long original post point by point means nothing. If someone posted a thread alleging that the earth was flat, I suspect not many would be interested in wasting time to debate such an obviously false allegation point by point either.

I totally get that people are emotional and ticked off about Brees’ admittedly poor game. But I respect a purely emotional response of anger more than a poor attempt to try to illogically argue down the unquestioned greatness of a 1st ballot Hall of Farmer’s entire career.

 

[Poison]

I’ve said above I don’t agree with many of the contentions in the first post, but I do think it was a concerted attempt at analysis and OP doesn’t deserve to be dead Falconed into oblivion.

To be as objective as possible, here are Drew’s average stats across 16 career playoff games:

310 yds - 66.98% completion - 2.125 TDs - 0.75 INTs - 0.75 fumbles - 99.6 rating - .500 winning record

And his career regular season averages:

281yds - 67.6% completion - 1.98 TDs - 0.86 INTs - 0.38 fumbles - 98.4 rating - .681 winning record

I have to say those stats surprise me somewhat. He passes for more TDs in playoffs (although that could be due to closer games generally) and throws fewer interceptions. The difference in QBR is negligible. As people have been at pains to emphasise, he does not win as much in the post-season but it’s a team sport and the opposition is consistently harder to beat.

The stat which stands out is that Drew fumbles that ball more than twice as frequently in playoff games. I wonder if that’s an aspect of teams sending more pressure or the fact receivers have a harder time getting open. I’d probably need to go back and look at all the film, but I also have a job so I’d suggest that’s unlikely.

Anyway, my take is that the evidence does not necessarily support the conclusions in the initial post but there is certainly some basis for a few of the observations that were made.

 

[UltraSaints]

Although I don’t agree with every thing you’ve posted, I do agree with a fair bit of it. Unfortunately you’ll get flamed massively but the truth hurts. He’s not been great when it matters in the Playoffs. Fact.

 

[Loco Hornet Fan]

Although I don’t agree with every thing you’ve posted, I do agree with a fair bit of it. Unfortunately you’ll get flamed massively but the truth hurts. He’s not been great when it matters in the Playoffs. Fact.

Not a fact at all. He is fifth all-time in passer rating in the playoffs and actually has a (slightly) higher rating in the playoffs than the regular season.

He was bad the other day but that doesn't encapsulate his entire playoff resume.

 

[UltraSaints]

Not a fact at all. He is fifth all-time in passer rating in the playoffs and actually has a (slightly) higher rating in the playoffs than the regular season.

He was bad the other day but that doesn't encapsulate his entire playoff resume.

Sunday wasn’t the only underwhelming game from Brees in the Play Offs.

 

[natedog]

Defense and Coaching win playoff games. . . Qbs manage the games. Unless you have an Offense like Kurt Warner did, Peyton Manning did etc. If not you have a Defense like the Pats have mostly had. Even as great as our D has started playing this year, it's still not enough at the right times.

If say Cooks knee wasn't down on that fumble it may have been a different story, but we seem to lose way to many of those big plays. Brees has almost always got us back to tied, or at least a shot to win the game at the end. ( that's the way most playoff games go ) We are putting too much stock in QB position. . . there are 53 guys on this team.

 

[BooBirdSaint]

Losing makes it easy to identify on the board the Falcons fans pretending to be Saints fans.

 

[FGE413]

I think he deserves to be in the NFL top 10 b/c Roger Staubach had only 2 3000 yard seasons, a number matched or exceeded by many of his contemporaries and only started for his team for a pretty brief stretch. Manning and Brees also played in the same era and Brees' numbers are better....and every criticism the OP laid at Brees for his postseason history can also be laid at Manning's feet (he was most certainly not Montana or Brady in the postseason).

I think a few of the OP's points are valid, but that he's also too hard on him in other areas. Yeah, he didn't play that well as a favorite at home vs. NYJ in 2004. He didn't play well in CHI in 06, either. However, in 06 he was not helped by Fred Thomas or Payton's refusal to let Deuce McAllister run the ball (shades of Latavius Murray on Sunday). In 2010, I thought Drew did just fine to get 36 points considering Pierre, Jimmy Graham, and Ivory were all out to injuries and Bush left the game early with an injury. Our defense needed to hold a 7-9 team to under 36. In 2011, Drew didn't play well in the first half vs. San Fran and the defense kept us in the game (we had 5 total turnovers in that game, I believe). Sadly, when Drew went into God mode in the 4th quarter, our defense disappeared. I don't really fault him for SEA in 2013, they were clearly the best team in the NFL with the best defense in the NFL. On the road vs. PHI in 2013 WC, he wasn't "wow!" but he did enough to win w/o shooting us in the foot. I'll take that. In 2017, yeah, he had a late INT vs. CAR, but I thought overall that was his last genuinely good playoff game (he even threw a beautiful deep ball for a TD to Ginn!). Against MIN in 2017, he played poorly for 2.5 quarters. Yeah, Marcus Williams deserves blame too for whiffing and the o-line deserves blame for not getting us a 1st down on 3rd and 1 before Lutz's field goal. But Drew had a bad 1st half (a Vikings score was set up by a bad INT). In the 2 playoff games last year, he looked ordinary. Not terrible, but ordinary. Some of it was the offensive line, but some of it was mistakes of his own making (the INT vs. PHI, missing Michael Thomas on 1st and 10 before the no-call). On Sunday, I thought he had his worst postseason game with the Saints.

Oh and an emphatic no on the Matt Ryan comparison. Yes, his defense should've held a 28-3 lead in the 3rd, but...at the end of the day, if he gets another first down or 2 or doesn't fumble on the sack, they win. If you're going to be that harsh to Drew, you gotta apply the same standards to Ryan (who has 4 total postseason wins despite playing in the league since 2008).

I think Drew belongs in the NFL top 10 QBs. He probably deserves more criticism for his postseason performances than many on this forum are willing to give him, but I also think the OP goes overboard.

This was a brave post. I don't agree with the conclusion that because Drew has been underwhelming (by his own lofty standards) in the post-season, he does not deserve to be in the conversation for the Top 10 quarterbacks of all-time (although equally, I think judging QBs purely by passing yards and touchdowns is a little bit disingenuous given the way the game has evolved since players like Otto Graham, Johnny Unitas and Sammy Baugh were playing).

Bear in mind Drew's peers voted him #2 on their "best player in the league" list at the start of this season second to only Aaron Donald: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap30...players-of-2019-im-here-to-correct-the-record

In saying that, you are right to conclude he has not been a truly great QB in the post-season. Other than the 2009 NFCCG, I don't recall watching any of the games on your list more than once, being live at the time. I'd like to see some counterpoints to what you've raised though because on the basis of my recollection, I'd suggest you are generally right. Drew has made more critical and costly errors in playoffs and he does tend to exhibit a lack of composure that we rarely see in the regular season. His post-season body of work is big enough to enable people to draw that conclusion. He was poor on Sunday and his decision-making was costly (the INT, holding onto the ball prior to the fumble). Everybody loves him because of what he has done for this franchise and rightly so, but neither he nor CSP deserve to be immune from objective evaluation.

 

[jbourque]

Wow, what a hornets nest. OP upset all the tender-hearts who just want to mock him and shrug off his post.

Drew Brees is definitely head and shoulders above Matt Ryan in terms of career, but I've come to believe Matt Ryan is a pretty good QB. I used to mock Matt Ryan because he was a Falcon and call him "noodle arm" while we now graciously concede Drew Brees no longer has a deep ball. Both QB's run similar offenses and can make similar throws but I think Matt Ryan can make more throws at this point in their respective careers. You don't see anyone checking in for Matt Ryan to make throws he cannot make. I think there are a lot more things that draw comparisons than the differences which separate them. Bree's has been consistent throwing the ball over a longer period of time. But, today, I don't see much difference between the two if I'm being honest. I believe Matt Ryan is on the bubble and will more than likely be in the hall of fame while Drew is a first ballot hall of famer. So, if you are talking carrer, there is a big difference. If you are taking a snapshot of today it becomes debatable.

In terms of postseason there have been several times Drew just put his team ahead in the final minutes only to watch on the sidelines as his defense let him down. Heart-breaking. Could Drew have played better in those games? Gotten off to a faster start? I'm sure if Drew was here today he would probably say yes and that's what drives him. But at the end of the day, an 8-8 record for a QB who has had such a storied career is disappointing. There are too many that got away.

One of my takeaways from the OP's post is apparently you don't need an all world QB to win a playoff game. You just need a QB to play well on that day and have a good team. The big question for me is how does this franchise move forward and at what time is it appropriate for Drew to retire and hand the reins to someone else. While I've made my feelings known on that topic-I don't think that particular subject matter is what we are discussing here.

 

[26ISTHEMAN]

Although I don’t agree with every thing you’ve posted, I do agree with a fair bit of it. Unfortunately you’ll get flamed massively but the truth hurts. He’s not been great when it matters in the Playoffs. Fact.

What you just posted was not a fact but an opinion. Fact.

 

[dtc]

Let me prelude this by saying that I love Drew Brees. Genuine love. I honestly feel like I would take a bullet for him and his family if it came down to it. Words cannot describe the amount of joy and happiness he's brought to my life by being the New Orleans Saints quarterback for almost 15 years now.

That said, he has brought me a lot of heartache as well. But that's a part of being a sports fan... you take the good with the bad. You just hope there's more good than bad. Unfortunately, for the Saints in the Brees era... it feels like there's been just as much bad as there has been good. Which is still better than what a lot of sports fans go through (especially us Saints fans before Brees got here), but I'll address that in a minute.

Anyway, for years I would get so offended by any criticism of Drew. I have so much love for the guy that it kept me blinded towards his flaws. Sunday's game though was the slap in the face I needed to wake up: Drew Brees has been a very good Quarterback in the NFL, but never a truly great one except for one season.

As much as I whined about it last week, the voters were right to leave Brees out of the NFL top 10 QB list. Drew does not deserve to be there. And his performances in the postseason are why.

Drew Brees has an NFL Playoff record of 8-8. If he returns, he'll most likely finish his career with his playoff record being below .500. That's as mediocre as it gets.

What really will baffle you though is when you look at the eight QBs Drew has lost to and has been outplayed by in the postseason.

Chad Pennington
Rex Grossman
Matt Hasselbeck
Alex Smith
Russell Wilson
Case Keenum
Jared Goff
Kirk Cousins

The only elite QB on that list is Russell Wilson, and Russell actually played pedestrian in that game. It's just Brees and the Saints played worse. You have to admit that losing to the other QBs on this list is just mind-numbing.

Can't score over 20 points against the original Carson Wence, Chad Pennington? Can't beat Rex Grossman? To be fair that game wasn't anywhere near being Drew's fault but if he played at an elite level, Saints could have won. Can't outscore Matt Hasselbeck on a Seahawks team that was 7-9 in the regular season? Getting dominated by Alex Smith in the first half? Getting dominated by Case Keenum in the first half? Can't overcome a horrific non-call and lead us to victory in OT (where we got the ball first) against proven hype job Jared Goff and a Los Angeles Rams defense we had zero issues lighting up in the regular season and in the first half of that game? Getting 100% outplayed by Kirk freakin' Cousins who was 0-9 in Primetime games beforehand?

That is unbelievably bad, guys.

Now, here are the seven QBs Brees has defeated in the playoffs.

37-year-old Jeff Garcia in a game where Deuce McAllister carried the Saints to victory.

39-year-old Kurt Warner. Great game by Drew.

40-year-old Brett Favre in a game where the Vikings had FIVE TURNOVERS and the Saints were STILL in a position to lose at the end if it wasn't for Favre throwing one of the most boneheaded INTs in history. The refs also helped us out in OT. If we can complain about the refs being against us (which the refs 100% have been against us since the NFC Championship game last year), then we should admit when they called games in our favor as well.

Peyton Manning in a game where Sean Payton had one of the greatest coaching displays in history. Brees was flawless here though, no doubt, but Sean Payton was the real MVP of the game and we honestly shouldn't have been there in the first place.

Matt Stafford in the only playoff game of Stafford's career. Great game by Drew here though.

Nick Foles in a game where Brees threw more interceptions than touchdowns and on the game winning drive, was carried by our running game. Brees literally didn't throw a single completion on the final drive that gave us the game winning FG.

Cam Newton in a game where Drew threw an INT with 2 minutes left in the 4th Quarter to give Carolina a shot to win the game. Thankfully our defense stepped up to bail Drew out.

Nick Foles again in a game where Brees played averaged at best (his first pass of the game was intercepted) and was decided by an Eagles blunder. Foles made a perfect throw to Alshon Jeffrey, who let it go through his hands and right into the hands of Marshon Lattimore. If Jeffrey catches that, Eagles are well into Saints territory with two minutes left to score the game winning TD, which we all know they most likely would have.

Listen guys, at the end of the day... I am VERY grateful for the one Super Bowl championship and to have such a GOOD quarterback for the last decade and a half. I know there are a bunch of other franchises who's dealt with bad QBs throughout that time and their fanbases are miserable, just like we once were. So please don't think I don't appreciate Drew Brees... I sincerely do with all my heart. I'm just done pretending that he's the GOAT and one of the greatest of all time. I'm not getting upset anymore when I hear someone criticize him.

When the Saints rip my heart out I tend to say I would take 2-14 seasons over losing in the playoffs like we do, but obviously I don't mean that... I'm just upset at the time. And I thought these criticisms of Brees going through my head were just me being upset after Sunday's dreadful performance, but over 48 hours later now... they're not going away. I promise I am have been completely level-headed as I typed all of this... facts just don't care about my feelings!

I used to complain and moan about Drew not having any MVPs. The fact is, the only year I can make an argument for Brees winning NFL MVP is 2009. And while I still feel he should have won over Peyton Manning that year, it was close enough where it's justified that Peyton won. Brees never had another year where he deserved to come close to sniffing an MVP trophy. How is that "GOAT" level when guys like Matt Ryan, Cam Newton, and now a 23-year-old Lamar Jackson have been able to win it during Brees' time in New Orleans? Aaron Rodgers winning it twice, Brady winning it at the age of 40...

As much as it NAUSEATES me to say this... Drew most reminds me of Matt Ryan now. Let's be honest, Matt Ryan should have a Super Bowl. Up 28-3, that loss isn't on his shoulders. Better playcalling in the 4th quarter, one more stop from the defense... ATL wins, simple as that. Ryan did enough to win that game.

Ryan's numbers in the Super Bowl: 17/23, 284 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs, 144.1 Rating.
Brees' numbers in the Super Bowl: 32/39, 288 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs, 114.5 Rating.

Very similar, no? Yet it's Ryan who gets labeled as a choke artist. Why not Drew? Because we love him and hate the Falcons like the rest of America!

I know this thread will get downvoted to hell and some will say some very harsh things about me for this post... that's fine. I would have done the same thing last week if I read someone daring to say that Drew Brees is on the same level as Matt Ryan. I just needed to vent my frustrations though and this was the place I chose to do it. Neg away my friends. I love all my fellow WhoDats even if you hate me for this!

That's not analysis.

That's junk.

Brees didn't whiff on a tackle 2 years ago.

Drew didn't miss Sunday's PI or let them throw a 50 yard pass.

Drew has been the main reason we got to the playoffs with the Saints and our horrible defense on his shoulders.

To take a career record and extrapolate from it a QB's quality is not a reasonable method of evaluation. In fact, it's silly.

 

[DABOOT162]

I didn’t even get past your first paragraph, because I feel like I already know what you are trying to say.
Quick question, how many leads in the fourth quarter has the defense blown in just playoff games? Not even counting the regular season...

To blame this loss, or any playoff loss on Drew is not accounting for all the facts. You cant cherry pick stats to prove your point.

 

[SaintsAreWinners]

Wow, what a hornets nest. OP upset all the tender-hearts who just want to mock him and shrug off his post.

Drew Brees is definitely head and shoulders above Matt Ryan in terms of career, but I've come to believe Matt Ryan is a pretty good QB. I used to mock Matt Ryan because he was a Falcon and call him "noodle arm" while we now graciously concede Drew Brees no longer has a deep ball. Both QB's run similar offenses and can make similar throws but I think Matt Ryan can make more throws at this point in their respective careers. You don't see anyone checking in for Matt Ryan to make throws he cannot make. I think there are a lot more things that draw comparisons than the differences which separate them. Bree's has been consistent throwing the ball over a longer period of time. But, today, I don't see much difference between the two if I'm being honest. I believe Matt Ryan is on the bubble and will more than likely be in the hall of fame while Drew is a first ballot hall of famer. So, if you are talking carrer, there is a big difference. If you are taking a snapshot of today it becomes debatable.

In terms of postseason there have been several times Drew just put his team ahead in the final minutes only to watch on the sidelines as his defense let him down. Heart-breaking. Could Drew have played better in those games? Gotten off to a faster start? I'm sure if Drew was here today he would probably say yes and that's what drives him. But at the end of the day, an 8-8 record for a QB who has had such a storied career is disappointing. There are too many that got away.

One of my takeaways from the OP's post is apparently you don't need an all world QB to win a playoff game. You just need a QB to play well on that day and have a good team. The big question for me is how does this franchise move forward and at what time is it appropriate for Drew to retire and hand the reins to someone else. While I've made my feelings known on that topic-I don't think that particular subject matter is what we are discussing here.

Matt Ryan hall of fame? Good numbers, but no. His teammate Julio Jones certainly is though.

Ryan has Brady, P Manning, Brees, Rodgers, Russ Wilson, and even 2x MVP Eli all so far ahead of him.