Getty Tom Brady and Ray Lewis at the Super Bowl in Miami.
The NFL is littered with juicy hypotheticals through the years, and perhaps one of the best has just been presented by a draft expert.
NFL Network analyst Daniel Jeremiah was on The Dan Patrick Show and was asked what he would like to know from Tom Brady if he had one question to ask him. That question was simple according to Jeremiah. How well would Brady have fared with another successful AFC team from the same decade in the Baltimore Ravens?
As Jeremiah explained, he thinks the answer from Brady would be quite good and might surprise some people. Jeremiah thinks Brady would have been even better in Baltimore.
“I bet you if he would tell the truth he would say 10. Compare the personnel of those teams outside the quarterback position for the 2000’s decade. I think he would have won 10 Super Bowls,” Jeremiah said. “People might forget about this, but you’ve got arguably the greatest middle linebacker of all-time, arguably the greatest free safety of all-time. You’ve got Terrell Suggs who is probably a Hall of Famer. You’ve got Haloti Ngata who is a perennial Pro Bowler. You’ve got Chris McAlister. You’ve got a top 3 left tackle in NFL history in Jonathan Odgen. A Hall of Fame tight end, plus his backup Todd Heap was a perennial Pro Bowler. Plus a 2,000 yard rusher. I think he’d have won 10 Super Bowls. I don’t think that’s crazy. He won 6 with the guys they had in New England.”
As Jeremiah also said, when he worked for the Ravens, the team felt as if they matched up with the Patriots very well, but Brady was the one position they could never seemingly crack.
“We couldn’t beat him. We’d look at the rosters on paper and go, gosh we feel pretty good about every one but this guy. We couldn’t stop him,” he said.
The same can be said for plenty of folks around the league. Obviously, Brady had a hugely successful career with the New England Patriots anyway.
Ravens Considered Drafting Tom Brady
History was almost written exactly like Jeremiah explains. The Ravens, according to Albert Breer, were interested in drafting Brady in 2000 thanks to the fact that their quarterback coach Matt Cavanaugh was an advocate of Brady. In fact, according to Breer, the Ravens wanted to draft Brady in the third round in 2000, but instead went with Chris Redman instead.
History hasn’t been kind to that decision, of course, but there is no telling what would have happened if Brady had ended up in one place and not the other.
Ravens High in 2020 Super Bowl Odds
Brady has changed teams now, moving on to Tampa Bay. A look at some very early odds for next season was revealed a few months back by Caesars, and perhaps surprisingly, the Ravens were high on the list in spite of their frustrating finish to 2020. Even with Brady still in New England as these odds were, as a whole, the Ravens had the second best odds to take home the Lombardi Trophy at 7-1 a year from now.
Here’s a look at some of the early odds for next season:
Next year’s Super Bowl odds released from @CaesarsEnt today:
Chiefs 6-1
Ravens 7-1
49ers 8-1
Saints 11-1
Patriots 14-1
Steelers 15-1
Cowboys, Packers 18-1
Seahawks 22-1
Browns, Eagles, Rams, Vikings 25-1
At this point, of course, very little of this matters considering the offseason hasn’t been completed and neither has the draft. Little is known about what shape teams will take moving forward and what will play out next year in terms of injuries or other pitfalls that take place.
For now, though, Las Vegas isn’t exactly betting on the stench of failure hanging over the Ravens for very long. The Ravens will try to add another