Tom Brady Needs to Step his Game Up

Tom Brady was not very good in Sunday’s AFC Championship game win over the Ravens, he even admitted that he “sucked” after the game. Brady was 22 for 36 and threw for 329 yards, zero touchdowns and two interceptions in the Patriots 23-20 win.

Although Brady ran for a touchdown, Sunday marked the first time Brady had not  thrown for a touchdown in a game since the 2009 season finale against the Texans, and in that game he only played a half. The past full game Brady had played without throwing a touchdown pass was also in 2009, Nov. 30, a 38-17 loss to the Saints on Monday Night Football.

Despite the Patriots 10 game winning streak, Brady has struggled a bit of late.

Brady has thrown at least one interception in each of his last three games. Prior to this he had only thrown one in his previous seven. He started the season with eight interceptions through the first five games, but settled down. With that came the Patriots winning streak.

Also, Sunday was Brady’s worst quarterback rating of the season (57.5), and by a considerable margin. His second lowest total came on Nov. 6 (75.4) against the Giants.

The Giants defense is extremely tough like Ravens, and has given Brady problems in the past. He will need to be at his best for the Patriots to have any chance of winning on Super Bowl Sunday. He will definitely need to throw a touchdown pass, and he can ill-afford to thrown an interception.

Turnovers kill teams in the playoffs, and Brady and  the Patriots know how lucky they were to get away with their three turnovers (two by Brady) against the Ravens. Both of Brady’s interceptions came on spectacular plays by Ravens defenders, but that doesn’t mean they were good throws. They were both forced throws by Brady, and that is what 80 percent of his interceptions come from.

The outcome of next week’s game greatly depends on the right arm of Tom Brady and whether or not Brady plays well in the big game, or continues to struggle against good defenses.

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