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After 7 games, Tom Brady (AKA Pappe) have broken the Curse and are the second Canadian MLB Team to win the World Series.

Tom was voted MVP of the series for his mentorship of pitcher Russell Wilson as the sensational one two punch to end the New York Yankees pursuit of most World Series of All time.

 

What if Nick Foles, Carson Wentz who lead the Eagles on their cinderella season pursued basketball in college vs. football?

Tom Brady, who many argue (I would argue differently due to controversies associated with the Patriots that have lead to winning records) is the best quarterback in NFL history may never have been, he was drafted in the 18^th round by the Montreal Expos in 1995.  Although his position was catcher, he was not able to catch the ball when the Patriots ran a trick play as it went off his fingertips.

Did you know that Tom Brady was not chosen by the Patriots until the 6^th round in 2000?  He was the backup to Drew Bledsoe in his first year and played only one game when Drew suffered an injury late in the season as only the second back-up quarterback to lead their teams to the Superbowl (the other ironically is Nick Foles) and has been the team’s starting quarterback since.  The Patriots under his and Bill Belichick’s (Head Coach) leadership have played in 9 Super bowls, winning 5 and are tied with The Pittsburgh Steelers, San Francisco 49’ers and Dallas Cowboys for most wins in Superbowl history.

I also feel the reason he has had such a long career is due to the fact he did play other sports in his youth, not suffering burnout or overuse injuries associated with early specialization unlike Todd Marinovich who aspired to be the greatest NFL quarterback of all time. His career was very short lived as he specialized in football starting when he was 5 years old.  Due to the pressure he received from his father, not having the opportunity to participate in other sports and activities and have a normal childhood, he fell victim to injuries, drug and alcohol abuse after his short career ended.

 

Russell Wilson

What if Russell Wilson had opted to also go down the same path when he was chosen by the Texas Rangers in the 2013 Rule 5 draft?  His “other” sport was baseball, and although below 6’ tall he has reached the highest plateau in the NFL both by having a strong and accurate arm but fleet of foot, infamous for his ability to scramble and create plays out of the pocket vs. Tom Brady being the pocket passer.

Russell Wilson was drafted in the 3^rd round by the Seahawks in 2012 and lead the Seahawks coached by Pete Carroll to back to back Super Bowls, the first they lost to Tom Brady’s Patriots in the last play of the game that will go down in history as one of the worst calls EVER that lead to an interception.  The following year,  the Seahawks destroyed the Denver Broncos in their return to the Super Bowl by a score of 43-8.

Nick Foles

 

What IF Nick Foles had been drafted and offered a spot in the NBA in lieu?

He also was selected in the 3^rd NFL round in 2012, was the original starting quarterback for the Eagles, then traded to St. Louis and even considered retirement.  In college he was recruited initially by Michigan but was the back-up of Kirk Cousins (Washington Redskins) and Brian Hoyer (Patriots) so transferred to Arizona to get a starting role.

Ironically, he also was sought after by several Div I schools for another sport, basketball, as he had been a multi-sport athlete in high school, breaking many records as QB but also a point guard for his high school basketball team.

It was under head coach Chip Kelley that Nicks NFL path took off, running the same run and gun offence Chip ran as coach for the Oregon Ducks that lead them to the BCS championship, throwing 27 TD’s with an unprecedented 2 interceptions, breaking Tom Brady’s former record.

In 2014 the Eagles struggled and in 2015 he was traded to then St. Louis (now LA Rams) and became backup to 1^st overall pick Jared Goff (who under Sean McVay – coach of the year in 2017 took the Rams to the playoffs for the first time in over decade).  He then re-joined Andy Reid in Kansas City as backup to Alex Smith and then back to Phillie for 2017 to backup Carson Wentz.

Carson Wentz

 

Like Nick Foles, the eagles QB who had an MVP caliber season before his injury leading up to Nick’s Superbowl victory, but like Nick, Tom and Russell, he also was a multi-sport athlete.  Carson could play all 5 basketball positions and in many games would be responsible for covering the other team’s best player.

He also was a near miss in the NFL draft, although picked in the first round, he did not play for a Div I school in college, but did win back to back national championships for North Dakota (Div II).

Jon Gruden, while analyst for Monday Football, was quoted as saying Wentz was the top QB available that no one ever heard of.

It was not until he got the Senior Bowl, where top players from all divisions would be seen by scouts, coaches that he caught the eye of several.

All but Carson, were not first round draft picks but all of which that lead their teams to the Superbowl, we multi-sport athletes in high school and could have potentially gone down a totally different route.

The Battle of the Coaches – David Vs. Goliath

Going into the game, the Patriots were picked as the favorites due to all past successes with Bill Belichick as Head Coach and Tom Brady as QB.  This was also due in part that Gronk cleared concussion protocols, Brady’s hand injury sustained prior to the AFC championship had healed and all other players were healthy.

As the Patriots have had more than their fair share of controversies over they years (spy-gate, inflate-gate leading to Tom’s 6 game suspension the following season) this game was no different.  Just before the game was to commence, Malcolm Butler was seen with his hand to his face with tears in his eye’s as he had been advised he would not be starting in the game due to a coaches decision.  Even his replacement, Eric Rowe, was puzzled he would start in Malcom’s place.

ADDENDUM – a week after I posted this, Josh McDaniels, offensive coordinator for the Patriots interviewed for and was offered and he accepted the head coach position for the Indianapolis Colts only to reneg and stay with the Patriots after the Colts announced his hiring.  Still no definitive reason why Malcolm Butler was sat for the game, just a myriad of reasons but Bill Belichick is infamous for keeping things very close to his chest so we may never know.

When asked after the game where once again the Patriots defence was not able to stop the Eagles offence even with Tom Brady leading the offence to a passing record, they were unable to stop the Eagles.  Just a few years back, Malcolm Butler intercepted Russell Wilson in what was many questioned was one of the worst offensive play calls in history, yet minutes before Superbowl was about to start Bill Belichick makes a call many will say cost the Patriots their 6^th and record setting team record for Superbowl wins.

After the game Cris and Al stated this was one of the greatest Superbowl games EVER, the Eagles were coached by a long time back-up quarterback Doug Peterson only in his second year as a head coach in the NFL, who then in turn due to injury relied on his backup quarterback Nick Foles to lead the Eagles into the playoffs and win their first ever Superbowl title.

The heavily favoured Patriots for this game were Goliath, and the underdog Eagles, David, who had never won the Superbowl.

Ironically, when Doug was selected as coach for the Eagles, ESPN said it was the worst coaching hire in the NFL at the time.  I guess they missed the fact that Doug was former offensive coordinator mentored by Andy Reid, one of the greatest coaches in the NFL EVER.  They felt it was a bad choice as less than a decade ago, Doug was coaching high school football and many felt his tenure as Head Coach would be short lived.

That is probably why Doug took the risks he did during the game, going for it on 4^th down 2X vs. taking the conservative route by punting the ball, one of which was the  PLAY on 4th and 1 what Cris Collingsworth stated has the opportunity to go down as one of the all time greats, just going for it …  The newbie coach beat the tenured coach at his own game, running a similar trick play that lead to a touchdown.  Doug believed in his players, provided a safe to fail environment, going for first down 26 times in the 2017 season including the 2X in the Super Bowl, converting 17 times.

We can learn numerous lessons from this year’s Superbowl, the main one is the benefits of multi-sport participation, being persistent and how great coaches, great scouts will buck the trends and see the potential in players that many others many not and providing those players an opportunity to be safe to fail.

Kudo’s to Doug, Nick and the rest of the Eagles organization, they can take their underdog masks off now, they won a closely contested game that went right down the wire.

The biggest challenge they will have now is not only defending their title, but figuring out what to do at the QB position once Carson comes off injured reserve.

We will just have to wait and see.