Tom Brady has one thing left to prove, and that’s whether he can win a Super Bowl with the Buccaneers instead of the Patriots.
Even Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady has admitted multiple times over the years his unprecedented success in his nine Super Bowl appearances was a massive byproduct of being in one of the best possible situations as a pro football player.
He isn’t wrong. After all, getting to spend 20 years under head coach Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots, who is certainly one of if not the greatest coach of all time, put Brady into the right moment and the right time en route to establishing a dynasty.
With that dynasty broken up, though, now the focus centers on whether or not Tom Brady can win a Super Bowl outside of the New England context.
And in that vein, one could make the argument the pressure for the future first-ballot Hall of Famer will be bigger in Super Bowl LV with the Bucs than it ever was with the Patriots over his previous nine Super Bowl appearances.
It’s something former NFL linebacker Emmanuel Acho told Fox Sports leading up to Feb. 7.
“Brady, if you don’t win this Super Bowl, Belichick can still surpass you as soon as next season if we’re being honest,” Acho said.
“Brady, if you don’t win this Super Bowl, Belichick can still surpass you as soon as next season if we’re being honest.”@EmmanuelAcho tells us why there's more pressure on Tom Brady this Sunday than it is on Patrick Mahomespic.twitter.com/zkbrdZEZzH
— FOX Sports (@FOXSports) February 1, 2021
Well, maybe that’s a stretch. Belichick and the Patriots, who finished 7-9 last season and missed out on the playoffs for only the fourth time in the head coach’s 21-year tenure there, are looking at a sizable rebuild in 2020 and are still on the hunt for a long-term replacement under center to pick up where Brady’s legacy left off.
But Acho’s point carries some merit.
Brady and a talented cast of Buccaneers players elsewhere on both sides of the ball proved they can get to the Super Bowl. Yet pulling off the win over quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the imposing Kansas City Chiefs will be the ultimate test.
A test that will either forever establish Brady as the difference-maker, both in New England and with Tampa Bay, or as merely a part (granted, a big one) of a beneficial situation like the one he thrived in with the Patriots for so many years.
If Brady wins his unprecedented seventh Super Bowl, there won’t be any other questions asked. It was he, not Belichick or the “Patriot Way,” that ultimately was the key X-factor in establishing a dynasty.
In this case, however, it’ll be the Tom Brady dynasty and one Buccaneers fans everywhere can enjoy.