The New England Patriots Super Bowl victory gave Tom Brady the fifth ring of his career. He joins Charles Haley in one of the most exclusive clubs in sports, and of course, surpasses Joe Montana in Super Bowl rings.
In the two weeks leading up to the Super Bowl, there was plenty of discussion about how Brady and Montana compared. Once Brady helped guide New England to the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history, most people decided the debate was over and Brady had claimed the mantle of GOAT.
Joe Montana disagrees, albeit not quite like you might imagine. TMZ grabbed some video of a recent appearance Joe and Jennifer Montana made on the Hallmark Channel. The host pressed Montana on the subject, and he said he didn’t think you could put either him or Brady in the bucket as the best of all time.
“I think that it’s really hard to put anyone in that bucket. Even before he got five, you look back to some of the guys some people don’t even know, Sammy Baugh or Otto Graham, I can’t remember which one but one of them won like seven or nine championships and so far ahead of their time. It’s so hard to compare guys from then to now, how they would compare here and how we would compare back then.”
Amusingly enough, Jennifer Montana said that Joe referred to himself as the GOAT when they are at home.
This is actually not the first time that Montana has commented on this. Prior to the Super Bowl, we found this short interview where he made a similar comment about Baugh and Graham.
It’s a very reasonable point of discussion. No matter what comparison you make, so much changes between eras. Tom Brady and Joe Montana played in drastically different eras, but the difference between those two and pre-Super Bowl quarterbacks is even more drastic. That might make it more fun to debate because there are going to be arguments and counter-arguments all day long.