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The Eternal Sunshine Of Tom Brady

Take a look at Tom Brady's stats for his six full seasons in the NFL.

Year G GS Att Comp Pct Yds TD Int Rate
2001 15 14 413 264 63.9 2843 18 12 86.5
2002 16 16 601 373 62.1 3764 28 14 85.7
2003 16 16 527 317 60.2 3620 23 12 85.9
2004 16 16 474 288 60.8 3692 28 14 92.6
2005 16 16 530 334 63.0 4110 26 14 92.3
2006 16 16 516 319 61.8 3529 24 12 87.9


That is amazingly - almost unbelievably -- consistent. The one year that stands out is 2005, when he shot up to a career high in passing yards. That was due to the running game though; Corey Dillon only started ten games and the Pats were forced to utilize Patrick Pass and Heath Evans at RB. Their team rushing yardage dropped a whopping 29% from the year before.

Through several running backs, through the rise and fall of Deion Branch, through about a dozen tight ends, Tom Brady keeps putting up the same stats. Why? Because that's the way Bill Belichick likes it dammit! The Pats run their offense like a well-oiled machine and as long as all the pieces are playing, the offense will continue to run.

Will the addition of Randy Moss change that? I say it won't. Even if the Pats were getting vintage Randy Moss I don't think that they change what's been working. Considering they're getting a physically and perhaps mentally banged up Randy Moss, they're definitely not going to change. Sure, we'll see more long passes and Brady's yardage totals may tick up a bit from last year, but I don't think there's anyway he gets close to the 4110 yards he put up in 2005. If you're drafting Brady thinking he's going to put up 4000+ passing yards, I think you're buying into the hype.