Peyton Manning responds to Tom Brady’s comments on football being ‘dumbed down’ for young QBs
The game is still hard, and coaches are smart to install some plays that rookies already know, Manning said.
Tom Brady and Peyton Manning had different paths to greatness. Manning was a first-round pick who started right away as a rookie. Brady was a sixth-round pick who had to sit and develop.
Both sat down with ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith recently and discussed their views on how young quarterbacks should be developed.
Brady said he felt that taking time to sit and learn the game is valuable, and that he believes the game is being dumbed down to accommodate rookies who are playing early.
Smith asked Manning for his thoughts on Brady’s comments.
“It’s hard to say. To me, there’s different offensive systems,” Manning said. “You bring up my rookie year with the Colts, thank you for bringing that up. We won three games. I threw 28 interceptions. I don’t think y’all understand how hard that is to do.”
Manning marveled at the fact that he still holds the record for most interceptions by a rookie quarterback more than two decades later. He’s in favor of letting young quarterbacks learn the hard way, but many coaches aren’t.
“The problem is, if the rookie quarterbacks struggle early, what do they do? They take him out. I go ‘no, no, leave him in there, let him learn the hard way,'” said Manning.
Installing plays from college programs to help young quarterbacks get comfortable isn’t necessarily dumbing the game down, Manning said.
“The game is still hard. NFL coaches, I think smartly, are doing the best job they can of adapting their offense to the quarterback that is playing. If that means putting in some plays that the player ran in college, I’m for it. I promise you Andy Reid watched Texas Tech’s film and said these plays worked pretty well for Patrick Mahomes in college, we’re going to put some of these things in.”
“That’s different. It used to be ‘oh, we’re the NFL, we’re not going to run any plays that colleges run, that’s beneath us.’ That’s not true anymore and guess what? It’s smart what they’re doing now. The best quarterbacks that play well, they feel comfortable.”
Manning said it took him a while to get comfortable the NFL and joked that his younger broke Eli would have broke his rookie interception record if he played all 16 games during his rookie season.
He said being able to tell coaches what plays he is comfortable running helped him significantly.
“I didn’t learn that until my second year, that’s why I threw 28 interceptions. I think it’s a great game,” Manning said. “Colleges now with players transferring a lot, that does change probably what they’re learning in college. They’re not spending four years under the same system as much if they’re transferring so that could affect what they know coming in.
“But, I think there’s a lot of NFL quarterbacks that are playing at an incredibly high level. I think there’s still some good football out there.”
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com