Rating: (0 votes - average)

CHFF: Brees delivers greatest performance in modern NFL history
Drew Brees did more on Monday night than embarrass the Patriots and establish the Saints as the team to beat in 2009.

He gave the greatest regular-season passing performance in modern NFL history, carving up the once-proud Patriots defense with the bloody efficiency of a Civil War sawbones in a battlefield hospital.

It all starts with the Cold, Hard Football Facts. And here’s Brees’ stat line from Monday night.

18 of 23 (78.3%), 371 yards, 16.13 YPA, 5 TD, 0 INT, 158.3 passer rating

For more:

Cold, Hard Football Facts.com: Brees: the best day ever

Sonny Jurgensen, Eagles vs. Cowboys (Nov. 25, 1962)
13 of 21 (61.9%), 342 yards, 16.3 YPA, 1 TD, 2 INT, 82.0 passer rating

Johnny Unitas, Colts vs. Falcons (Nov. 12, 1967)
17 of 20 (85.0%), 370 yards, 18.5 YPA, 4 TD 0 INT, 158.3 passer rating

Joe Namath, Jets vs. Colts (Sept. 24, 1972)
15 of 28 (53.6%), 496 yards, 17.7 YPA, 6 TD, 1 INT, 123.5 passer rating

Charley Johnson, Broncos vs. Chiefs (Sept. 21, 1975)
12 of 20 (60.0%), 329 yards, 16.5 YPA, 3 TD, 2 INT, 104.2 passer rating

Drew Brees, Saints vs. Patriots (Nov. 30, 2009)
18 of 23 (78.3%), 371 yards, 16.1 YPA, 5 TD, 0 INT 158.3 passer rating

Brees, in other words, is the first player in 34 years to average more than 16 yards per attempt in an NFL game. Three of the four quarterbacks who did it before him are in the Hall of Fame.

A closer inspection of the numbers also reveals that Brees’s performance Monday night stands out even from these best efforts by some of the best passers in history.

Jurgensen in 1962 carved up a struggling young Cowboys expansion team that had won just eight games in nearly three seasons before facing his Eagles.

Unitas in 1967, likewise, faced a struggling young expansion Falcons team that had had gone just 4-17-1 in its first season-and-a-half before succumbing to the Colts legend.

Namath in 1972, meanwhile, tore apart a Colts team that was shadow of the 1970 Super Bowl champions. Baltimore head coach Don McCafferty was canned after a 1-4 start to what ended up a 5-9 season in 1972, while Johnny Unitas was quite literally on his last legs. He was benched that season and his career fizzled out the following year in San Diego (though he did play well in this Week 2 loss to the Jets).

Johnson, a relatively unknown journeyman playing his last year in 1975, is the anomaly on the list. He opened up Week 1 of the season with a career performance. But he did it against the struggling Chiefs and rookie head coach Paul Wiggin, who had just replaced Hall of Famer Hank Stram.

None of those quarterbacks faced a team with a winning record, let alone one of the great winning organizations in history. Only Jurgensen, like Brees, had faced one of the great coaches of his generation, but Tom Landry would continue to struggle to turn the Cowboys into a winner until 1966.

But there’s one more reason Brees’ performance stands apart. His 16.1 average is simply not supposed to happen in today’s game.

Offensive theory in pro football was much different in the 1960s and into the 1970s than it is today, back when Jurgensen, Unitas and Namath had their great prolific days.

Back then, teams attempted to stretch defenses vertically with long, high-risk passes. Completion percentages were much lower and INTs were far more likely in that era.

However, averages per attempt and averages per completion were much higher back then than they are in today’s game, the game revolutionized by the Bill Walsh-Joe Montana tandem and the early 1980s and defined by low-risk, high-percentage passing attacks.

Quarterbacks do throw a lot of touchdown passes in today’s NFL, as Brees did Monday night. Quarterbacks do have high completion percentages, as Brees did Monday night, and they do have high passer ratings, as Brees did Monday night.

But quarterbacks simply do not average 16 yards per attempt in today’s NFL. It hadn’t happened in 34 years. It doesn’t happen on the big stage of Monday night football. It doesn’t happen against Bill Belichick. It doesn’t happen against the mighty New England victory machine. It doesn’t happen for an 11-0 team that has never won a Super Bowl.

But it all came together for Drew Brees Monday night, in the single-greatest regular-season passing performance in modern NFL history.

LordOfEntropy

Pretty damn amazing, eh? Wow.

foreverfan

WarEagle

Wow, I knew it was an aweseom performance, but didn't realize how historically awesome it was.

Rugby Saint II

It was still too incredible for words to describe. It is by far the best game I've ever seen.