Vintage Tom Brady vs. Ravens: That's Why Opponents Hate, and Respect, Pats QB

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Some Baltimore Ravens players have never had high regard for New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady. Grudging respect, yes. OK dude, yes. Fine player, sure. They think that. But high regard? No way in hell.

To some Ravens—and this is true, though they would never say it publicly—Brady is a crybaby. Protected by the NFL. A player who symbolizes offensive favoritism. Offensive-rules rigging. Offensive sleekness. Made man by the league and Spygate and the tuck rule.

None of this is true, of course. Brady is eternal. Probably the best to ever do it. A sixth-round pick, the draft equivalent of Yonkers. But the Ravens hate him nonetheless. They see him as propped up, and they want to smash him in the face. I've heard this out of that locker room privately, over and over. I heard it this week from several Ravens defenders privately, over and over. 

Nothing epitomized this disdain for Brady than a scene in the second quarter of the Ravens-Patriots divisional round, a nerve-tingling masterpiece won by New England, 35-31.

After Brady was sacked, linebacker Pernell McPhee threw a sort-of knee into Brady's mainframe. Brady fell back and was clearly angry. He got up, yelled at McPhee, who yelled back, and then Brady got literally an inch from referee Bill Vinovich's face and yelled at him, too.

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The Ravens were relentless and fearless. They fought the weather, as just about the entire team wore short sleeves as the wind-chilled temps dropped into the single digits. Some players slathered Vaseline on their arms and dared the cold to confront them. Then they focused their attention on Brady.

And you know what Brady did? He did Brady. That's what he always does. Yes, the Ravens have had success against him in the past, and, yes, Brady hasn't won his last two Super Bowl appearances, but on Sunday afternoon, Brady was Brady. He set the postseason playoff record for touchdowns passes with 46, passing Joe Montana, which is fitting, since he might be better than Montana now.

Year	Cmp-Att	Yds	TD-INT	Rating	W-L
2001	60-97	572	1-1	77.3	3-0
2003	75-126	792	5-2	84.5	3-0
2004	55-81	587	5-0	109.4	3-0
2005	35-63	542	4-2	92.2	1-1
2006	70-119	724	5-4	76.5	2-1
2007	77-109	737	6-3	96.0	2-1
2009	23-42	154	2-3	49.1	0-1
2010	29-45	299	2-1	89.0	0-1
2011	75-111	878	8-4	100.4	2-1
2012	54-94	664	4-2	84.7	1-1
2013	37-63	475	1-0	87.7	1-1
2014	33-50	367	3-1	99.3	1-0
Career	623-1000	6791	46-23	88.0	19-8

He was down 14-0. He was down 28-14. So what? So Brady. As Pro Football Talk pointed out:

But then, if any team was going to do it, it was the team that has Brady.

"No quarterback I'd rather have," coach Bill Belichick said, "than Tom Brady."

The Ravens sacked him, pressured him, bashed him, threw him to the ground and got in his face. It was impressive to watch on both sides. Impressive the Ravens got to him and equally impressive that Brady stood tall. It was Brady's will against a Baltimore team that uses us-against-the-world as a performance-enhancing drug.

"We definitely got to him a little bit more than he'd like," Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs said, "but he's a pretty good quarterback, and he stood in there and made the plays he needed to make."

He's a pretty good quarterback.

There's that pretty begrudging acknowledgment.

Date	Cmp-Att-Yds	TD-Int	Rating	W-L
1/12/08	26-28-262	3-0	141.4	W 31-20
1/14/12	26-34-363	6-1	137.6	W 45-10
1/23/05	14-21-207	2-0	130.5	W 41-27
1/7/06	15-27-201	3-0	116.4	W 28-3
1/13/13	25-40-344	3-0	115.0	W 41-28
2/6/05	23-33-236	2-0	110.2	W 24-21
1/7/07	22-34-212	2-0	101.6	W 37-16
2/1/04	32-48-354	3-1	100.5	W 32-29
1/10/15	33-50-368	3-1	99.3	W 35-31

It was Brady's pretty good 19th career postseason win, extending his pretty good NFL record.

At one point in the second half, the Patriots had 27 pass attempts and just one rush attempt. The sole attempt? A pretty good Brady on a sneak.

He had no running game, a defense that got housed early, and then again in the third quarter, and still he won.

This game was why, despite the problems of football, we love it. And Brady is one reason so many wax poetic about it.

The game does not get much better than this, and neither does quarterback play.

Flacco was brilliant for most of the game before throwing his first two playoff picks since 2011. The Ravens stunned the Patriots, taking a 14-0 lead, with Flacco and that offensive line absolutely dominating. But Brady kept New England in it, running in a TD and then throwing for one to tie it 14-14.     

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The bruising chess game between this Ravens defense and Brady went on and on and on. Brady was intercepted after he was completely fooled by Daryl Smith. Punch, counter. Duck, weave. Back and forth this went.

As Brady was under siege, Flacco had time to throw.

In the first half, especially, his coolness and accuracy were unchanged from when he demolished the Steelers last week. Flacco ran a read-option play, he went deep, he went short.

On 4th-and-6 in the third quarter, Flacco threw one of his patented passes that was purposely short, drew a pass-interference penalty, and one play later, threw a swing pass to Justin Forsett for a 16-yard score.

The teams fought and fought. Brady threw a short touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski and then came the craziest play of the game.

Wide receiver Julian Edelman, who was a quarterback in college at Kent State, but had never attempted a pass in the NFL, took a short pass from Brady and then launched it downfield to Danny Amendola for the 51-yard score.

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Edelman said he has worked on that play for five years in practice.

"We have to make some rules that he can't throw it better than I can," said Brady.

That was Brady's best quote after the game. That's also typical Brady. He doesn't care about providing juicy quotes, because he's on to the next game. Probably flashing through that big brain of his was the fact they were twice down by two touchdowns.

Other quarterbacks would go to sleep Saturday night content they were in the AFC title game. Brady will be bothered by the fact he threw an interception, which led to a Ravens score, which led to this:

He might not sleep for two days.

The Ravens added a field goal after the Edelman throw and then came vintage Brady. His 23-yard pass to Brandon LaFell was perfect. After the play, the word "dime" fluttered across Twitter.

Brady became the Patriots' starting quarterback in 2001. The Patriots have since been to eight title games and five Super Bowls. This is Brady's fourth consecutive title game.

Along the way, Brady has engendered jealousy, hatred, model and hair jokes. The Raiders despise him, the Ravens loathe him and almost everyone in football fears him.

And here he is again.

Mike Freeman covers the NFL for Bleacher Report.