For the vast majority of the 21st century, the New England Patriots have been a safe bet in the AFC. That’s largely because of the dominance of Tom Brady, as he became a major barrier to overcome for about two decades.
One of the teams that has felt that weight the hardest is the Cleveland Browns. For as much success as the Patriots have had, the Browns have had just about as little success as possible in the 21st century. Still, they’re a professional team and had to go into each season with the goal of winning the Super Bowl.
Among the best Browns players ever was left tackle Joe Thomas. He was a bright spot in the team’s recent history, but he recently admitted that the Patriots and Brady were able to break him all the same.
The New England Patriots Got to Joe Thomas Late in His Career
The third overall pick in the 2007 NFL Draft, Joe Thomas had a long and successful career that ended with 10 Pro Bowl selections and got him to the Hall of Fame. He also never played in a playoff game, despite going into the season with plenty of confidence.
“The way I entered every season was like, if I need to get the most out of myself, I’ve got to convince myself this is a Super Bowl roster,” Joe Thomas recently said. “That’s the mentality I have to have when I’m training, when I’m practicing, when I’m going through film study. And so you trick yourself every year, but after a while, you’re not that dumb anymore. Going into year 10, we had traded away the first overall pick. We were trading guys away, saving capital for the future. The writing was on the wall that we were in a pretty significant rebuild. I kind of knew at that time, even though I was still trying to trick myself, in the back of your head you know you’re not going to be any good.”
Thomas’ 10th NFL season would have been 2016. The Browns would go 1-15. The Patriots were in a Super Bowl year. In Week 5, the Browns lost 33-13 to the Patriots in a home game. That, seemingly, was the breaking point for Thomas.
“Then, about midway through that 10th season, we were playing the Patriots. Tom Brady comes to town, and I fucking hated Tom Brady, as everybody did in the league. I hated the Patriots. I just wanted to smash him so bad. We lost like 30 to 0. And I remember sitting in the car after the game, and I was just crying. I had ice on both elbows and knees. I was in pain, my wife was driving and I was just looking out the window. It was that moment when I realized I’d been kind of fooling myself for a while, and we were not going to win no matter what I did,” Thomas said.
“She finally said, ‘Are you okay? Did you have a bad game?’ Then the tears really came because I said, ‘I played a perfect game, and we lost by 30.’ It really sunk in at that moment that you don’t control the situation anymore. That feeling of loss of control is really hard. No matter what situation you’re in in life, it just feels like everything I’m working for, I have no control over the outcome. That’s a bad feeling.”
Thomas had one more season following the 2016 campaign. That ended up being a winless effort for the Browns.
“I ended up meeting with the team psychologist and talking to somebody about it because it had been almost 10 years built up to that moment when you come to the realization that I’m kind of fooling myself,” Thomas said. “We’re not that team and we really don’t have a chance. And I don’t impact this game the way I’d hoped.”
The Patriots Won’t See the Browns in 2026
For both the Patriots and the Browns, the coaching staffs and rosters have changed in the last decade. New England even had its turn struggling at the bottom of the AFC. However, after another Super Bowl run in 2025, the Patriots are once again considered a contender while the Browns are in a rebuilding year.
The two met in the preseason, where the Browns won in a game filled by backups. However, they won’t have a game against one another in the regular season.
Both teams started 0-1. However, there is an expectation that the Patriots figure it out while the Browns continue to struggle. So, it isn’t likely they end up with a playoff game either.
Browns Legend Joe Thomas Shares How Patriots, Tom Brady Made Him Cry