Tom Brady Shows Signs of New Life

Week three, vs Oakland Raiders (win)

No two consecutive performances (from Brady, of course) this season have conflicted like Tom Brady’s game vs Minnesota and his game vs Oakland. Against Minnesota, the offensive line looked somewhat competent as a unit and Brady looked to have confidence in the team around him. When facing Oakland, the offensive line reverted to its week one form, leaving Brady to also revert to week one habits.

While the offensive line once again crumbled, it was in a different fashion- sort of. By now, I sound like a broken record by saying Sebastian Vollmer was a liability, but he was. That said, he could not be picked out from the others, as the entire offensive line struggled. Left tackle Nate Solder had his worst game of the season as he faced Khalil Mack, and the interior looked lost on a number of occasions. The front line, as a group, forced Tom Brady to create for himself. Luckily, Brady was up for the challenge, to a degree.

In regards to navigating the pocket and creating time for himself, Brady was as natural as ever. He was stepping in, around, and out of the pocket to evade incoming pass rushers. There were a number of sacks that should have been, but Brady was the sole reason that they did not happen. Unfortunately, the added pressure gave Brady a case of tunnel vision.

Partly because of tunnel vision and partly because of rushed mechanics due to having pass rushers in his face, Tom Brady threw a handful of passes that were dropped by defenders. Brady would get too focused on a single target (often Gronkowski) and fire away in the midst of a broken pocket, thus leading to poor throws into tight coverage. Brady was lucky to have walked away from the game without an interception on the stat sheet.

Tom Brady’s tunnel vision was especially problematic in New England’s final few drives of the game. He was missing wide open receivers underneath and nearly threw an interception to linebacker Miles Burris. Granted, New England had a lead, so it was not as if Brady needed to lead a final charge, but Oakland nearly scored on their final drive and it would have given Oakland the lead.

GIF summary of week three