The Pittsburgh Steelers featured a top deep-ball thrower during 2024 with Russell Wilson. His trademark “moon ball” was one of the best assets in the Steelers offense last season. But this year, the Steelers will have one of the best all-around passers the NFL has seen in Aaron Rodgers.
According to seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady, Rodgers is the very best passer in NFL history. Brady shared that opinion while making an appearance on the Pro Football Focus YouTube channel.
But Brady also issued a challenge of sorts to Rodgers just ahead of what’s expected to be the quarterback’s final season.
“You don’t have the same 2011 version of Aaron Rodgers,” Brady said to PFF host Cris Collinsworth. “We all have to evolve and grow, and there’s other ways to evolve and grow.”
Tom Brady Shares How Aaron Rodgers Can Experience Success With Steelers
It’s hard to argue anyone evolved and grew better than Brady.
There’s only two other quarterbacks in league history who have won four Super Bowls. Brady won four Super Bowls after turning 37.
Brady won his last league MVP at 40 during the 2017 season.
Rodgers captured two MVP awards when he was 38 and 39 years old. But his play has declined faster than Brady’s did early in his forties. Rodgers has also not won a Super Bowl since he was 28.
Brady is not counting out Rodgers, who will turn 42 in December, this season. Brady addressed, though, what Rodgers will have to do to experience success with the Steelers.
“Some of it is more mentally,” Brady said. “How do we make the game a little more simple for ourselves so that we can execute faster? And then emotionally, how do we connect with our teammates and bring that competitive positive attitude to work every single day?
“And sometimes when you go through tough times like he did with the Jets, you know you get reinvigorated by going to another organization like the Steelers that has had so much consistency in their success and that could allow Aaron to achieve what he hopes to go out on the highest of possible notes.”
It’s hard not imagining a lot of it being mental. At 41, Rodgers can’t do the same things he physically could when he was in his prime.
But the question is does Rodgers’ experience give him enough of an edge to overcome his physical deficiencies.
Brady beat opponents well into his forties because of the mental advantages he possessed.
Brady Raves About Rodgers as a Passer
No one has a more impressive quarterback resume than Tom Brady. But Brady wasn’t the most physically gifted quarterback, so other signal-callers such as Rodgers are still in the “GOAT” conversations for some pundits.
Brady didn’t address the “GOAT” conversation while talking to Collinsworth. But Brady ranked Rodgers at the top of the NFL quarterbacks list in one particular attribute.
“I think what I’ve always appreciated about him is his ability to throw a football and pass it,” Brady said. “Aaron in his prime is the greatest passer of the football the league has ever seen.
“He could get the ball from Point A to Point B faster and more accurate than any player in the history of the NFL.”
It’s difficult to disagree with that statement. From an eye test perspective, few have been better than Rodgers.
In his prime, he could also run. While he didn’t do that often, it made him all that much more difficult to defend. Because on third-and-medium, the threat he could pick up the first down with his legs also existed.
Rodgers will make his Steelers debut Sunday against, ironically, his former team, the New York Jets. Brady won the only matchup versus his former team, the New England Patriots, when he finished his career with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Like Heavy Sports’s content? Be sure to follow us.
This article was originally published on Heavy Sports
The post Tom Brady Issues Indirect Challenge to Steelers’ Aaron Rodgers appeared first on Heavy Sports.