Will Drew Brees Go Down As The Greatest Quarterback of All Time?

[EmperorWu]

I've heard a lot of talk about Peyton now officially being the greatest ever. But will Brees end up going down as the greatest ever before he retires? The guy has shot up the record books like a rocket. He has enough years left in him to climb even higher. I'm very far from a football expert though. So I wanted to hear the opinions of the educated football fans we have on here.

[The Legend]

No, he won't go down as the greatest QB of all time. Winning is too tied to the play of the QB in these days and Brees has spent too many year on losing teams to get that sort of recognition. There's also a lot to the fact that a lot of people will be critical of the fact that Brees is a somewhat limited QB that in a lot of respects got lucky in finding himself in the perfect circumstances to be successful. He's a smaller QB with a weaker arm, odds are if he had to play most of his games outside in places with less than ideal weather or Sean Payton asked him to do things besides the short passing game, things that hide his physical limits, he wouldn't have had the same career. The other greats in the game haven't been so obviously limited.

[Everlong]

Drew Brees isn't even the third-best quarterback of his generation, let alone the best of all time. He has an outside shot at being considered a Top 15 all time QB.

He's got gaudy stats but not enough victories and he's only been in the playoffs a few times.

[Hanley!]

I think sometimes people underestimate how long 'time' will go.

[The Legend]

I think sometimes people underestimate how long 'time' will go.

OMG, Hanley posted in an NFL thread!

In reality, when people talk about "Greatest of All Time", they actually mean, "Greatest we've seen so far", because there's no way to predict the future.

[Messiah]

He's a smaller QB with a weaker arm, odds are if he had to play most of his games outside in places with less than ideal weather or Sean Payton asked him to do things besides the short passing game, things that hide his physical limits, he wouldn't have had the same career. The other greats in the game haven't been so obviously limited.

You are underrating the hell out of Brees. His arm might not have been the best, but his deep ball accuracy in his prime was amazing. His pocket presence/mobility (underrated in general), anticipation, and accuracy are phenomenal. As far as pure accuracy goes, there haven't been that many QBs better.

Brees has a 90 QB Rating outdoors, and it would probably be even higher if you didn't include his early San Diego years when he was young. Weather has nothing to do with how good he is. Another thing that gets overlooked with Brees is that, compared to some other elite/great QBs, he never had the weapons they had. He had Jimmy Graham for some years and his best wide receiver was Marques Colston (who was solid but nothing special) but otherwise, he made the most out of throwing to guys like Devery Henderson, Lance Moore, etc.

As far as the question, no Brees isn't even close to the argument. But I do think as time passes, he will become ridiculously underrated. He was an amazing QB who should have won MVP in 2009, has always done his best with teams that otherwise would have been horrendous, and when he does get in the postseason, plays marvelous. I don't know why people are holding lack of victories or stuff like that against them. People have no issue calling Marino a top 5 QB and it isn't like he was making the playoffs every year. Brees balls out in the playoffs and it isn't like he didn't win a Super Bowl.

65%, 3539 yards, 7.6 Y/A, 24 TDs, 6 INTs, 100 QB Rating in 11 Postseason Games

He is a first ballot Hall of Famer. At least he should be. I just think he gets overlooked because he played alongside arguably the 2 greatest quarterbacks to date.

[The Legend]

I looked back at that paragraph and I realize that it probably was worded a bit strongly. What I mean to say is that if you are looking for distinctions between all the greatest QB's (of which I'd put Brees somewhere in that group), things like his physical stature and arm strength will draw a seperation from him and guys like Montana, Brady, Marino, Elway, etc.

[Str8Shooter]

He may be the best fantasy QB of all time. Single handedly carried my team when I had him for like 3 years running.

[Kreashko]

As much as I like Brees as a man and a QB, no. He's not the greatest of all-time.

[Philip Rivers]

Hell no, it took getting a great system, new coach and toys for him to play with, plus the defense he had by his side during his Superbowl ride was something else, the bounty hunters and the safety rapist, them boys were good.

I think a lot of original members of the website all agree that Brees has mostly been one of those guys with crazy usage and inflated stats, I can't recall how many times he padded at the end of games that were either out of reach or they were even winning by large margins.

Brees has a ring, he defeated an amazing Peyton team and nobody can take that away from him, he hasn't been the most consistent though. I refer to him needing a change of scenery as well as injury recovery for him to take the next step in his career, he had a slow start in San Diego. Mostly we've seen his prime and his ceiling has been reached, Drew Brees can't get any better, just the team around him. Obviously, I think he's capable of still winning if the formula is right, clearly not a bad guy to have under center, the bigger pictures determines on where you lay your head at night, how equivalent is regular season statistics VS the ultimate team goal of winning and championships?

As already stated in modern day, people put a lot of weight into winning, other wise yeah, 5,000 yard seasons are a nice personal accomplishment but most people wont reflect back upon that. Winning, memorable playoff moments and victories are what will always stand out in my mind more than anything else.

I agree with Tim that he has an outside shot at being in the top 10-15 QBs in the league all-time when said and done (which isn't too shabby!) It could be subjective to change if he found a way to squeeze another ring in the mix, which I highly doubt. Who knows though?