Patrick Mahomes Is Blocking His Peyton Manning From Arriving
Tom Brady has seven Super Bowl Rings, and Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw have four. Patrick Mahomes tied Troy Aikman, winning his third ring after beating the San Francisco 49ers in overtime in Super Bowl LVIII Sunday Night.
Mahomes led the Kansas City Chiefs on a game-winning touchdown drive in overtime to see his third ring in his first six seasons as a starter and seventh year in the league.
Where Is This Generation's Manning
Mahomes has been the best quarterback in his generation and has yet to find his Peyton Manning. Tom Brady and Peyton Manning were arguably the best quarterbacks in their generation, and we always talk about how Manning and Brady were one of the best quarterback rivalries we have ever seen in the sport.
Here is the thing: Brady was just like Mahomes, winning three Super Bowls before Peyton or whoever's Mahomes rival will be even got to one, but Manning was a two-time NFL MVP before he won his first ring in February of 2007, and was looking like one of the best quarterbacks in the history of the sport.
Manning was a great regular-season quarterback but didn't get over the hump in the postseason, and many thought Manning was a better quarterback than Brady around the mid-2000s. Still, he needed hardware in February to show for it.
The difference between Mahomes and his generation's quarterbacks is that he has been the best regular-season and postseason quarterback. The only quarterback who has beaten him is Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, and that was the worst second half of football Mahomes has ever played in six years.
Where is Mahomes, Manning? It's not Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen, who is 0-3 against him in the postseason. It's not Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson, who might have two league MVPs but couldn't get past Mahomes in the postseason two weeks ago; it's not Trevor Lawrence, Deshaun Watson, Tua Tagovailoa, Justin Herbert, and Burrow took him off once, but Burrow has played four seasons and has only been a factor in two of them.
Burrow was a perfect 3-0 vs. Mahomes before he knocked him off in last year's AFC title game, and two of those three wins came in the regular season, so they count, but not as much as the postseason.
Brady's first seven seasons in the league looked like this: didn't play, Super Bowl win, didn't make the playoffs, won Super Bowl, won Super Bowl, lost to Denver in the divisional round, which paved the path for Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger who was in Brady's generation to win his first ring and then lost to Manning and the Colts in the AFC title game and Manning went on to win his first ring.
So after Brady's first seven years, he had three rings and two playoff losses, which led to two quarterbacks winning rings in his generation. He missed the playoffs, and year one doesn't count for anything because he didn't play.
During Mahomes first seven years, he didn't play, lost to Brady in the AFC Championship, won the Super Bowl, lost the Super Bowl to Brady, lost the AFC title to Burrow, who then lost in the Super Bowl, and then won Super Bowl, and then won it again.
So after Mahomes first seven seasons, he has three rings, four Super Bowl Appearances, and two AFC title losses. Only one of those losses came to a quarterback from his era, and the only thing he did was help Brady get two more rings, six and Seven, and gave 34-year-old Matthew Stafford a ring since he didn't make the Super Bowl where Stafford won.
Mahomes has blocked every quarterback from his generation except Burrow from reaching the Super Bowl. Burrow couldn't capitalize on it and win the thing, so Mahomes has also blocked every quarterback from his era of winning a ring. Two quarterbacks in Brady's generation had rings by the time Brady was going into year eight, and two guys are also first-ballot Hall Of Famers, and Mahomes has no competition right now in his conference.
Mahomes might not tie Brady in rings and get to seven. Mahomes will always have the two postseason losses over his head to Brady that led him to two more rings. Still, the way Mahomes is dominating his generation of great quarterbacks in his conference is like when Lebron James went to eight straight finals and won the Eastern Conference and blocked many great young players from getting to the title.
Mahomes might not be the greatest quarterback of all time, but as of right now, he most likely is the best, and he is only 28, so he has ten-plus years to come.
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