New England star quarterback Tom Brady is facing mounting criticism after a 2-2 start, including a humbling 41-14 loss to the Kanas City Chiefs on national television in Monday Night Football this week.
Some critics even likened Brady's disappointing game stats — including a 59.1-percent completion average, 79.1-percent quarterback rating, and a fourth-quarter interception that was returned for a touchdown — to the Dallas Cowboys' Tony Romo, while others wondered if, at 37, he's just getting too old.
But Pete Prisco, of CBS Sports, wrote that all the talk about Brady being over the hill is just that — talk.
"The knee-jerk reactionaries, a list of many, have brought the hammer down on Brady's ability to play quarterback for the New England Patriots — or even at a starting level," Prisco wrote. "It's as if they are waiting to take down the guy who seemingly has it all, including three Super Bowl rings and a model wife who earns an enormous paycheck. The foolish police, a force of many, raced to bang out copy and tweets and anything else to decry that Brady was finished as a quality starting quarterback."
The Huffington Post's Jordan Schultz said most of the fan reaction to Brady's slow start comes with the fact that it is so unusual for him and a squad that has played in the AFC championship game for the past three seasons and also appeared in the 2012 Super Bowl.
"Brady is a first ballot Hall of Famer with three Super Bowls and two league MVPs to his name, and we are not accustomed to seeing him and the Patriots struggle to score points," Schultz wrote. "It would however, be premature to suggest Brady's done, just as it would be to say [New England coach Bill] Belichick has somehow lost his way."
Christopher Gasper, of the Boston Globe, said the Patriots' struggles have more to do with the talent overall and less with Brady's decline as quarterback.
"It's clear that the 37-year-old Brady can't avoid the rush as well as he used to," Gasper wrote. "There is . . . wait for it . . . decline in that area. But pinning all the blame for a scuffling offense on the franchise quarterback is like labeling your Bentley a lemon for failing to start when you didn't put any gas in it."