Hurley: Tom Brady never fell off "the cliff" and will be the GOAT for a long, long time

BOSTON -- Precisely one year ago, we all said goodbye to Tom Brady the football player. A handful of weeks after that, we said hello again.

And given the way that all played out, it does feel a bit challenging this time around to hit the retirement news with the full emotional force that would have come if he had simply not pulled the brief retirement last year.

What this latest retirement -- and by all indications, this is a real retirement -- does is present an opportunity to revisit what was said last year when Brady temporarily called it quits. Because while the 2022 season was by no means a great success for Brady, he still had the physical ability to play a full NFL season at quarterback, throwing more passes and completing more passes than any other player. He added 25 passing touchdowns to bring his gaudy regular-season career total to 649, and he added 351 passing yards and two more touchdowns to his postseason resume in his lone playoff game.

Considering he was 45 years old, and considering that playing football is an extremely abnormal thing for men of a certain age to do ... 

... it was, by any and all measures, an incredible accomplishment.

It brings to mind one particular ode to Brady's career, written upon last year's retirement, titled, "Tom Brady's Greatest Feat? Avoiding 'The Cliff' To The Bitter End." It was a reference to Max Kellerman's proclamation in the summer of 2016 -- almost seven years ago -- that Brady was headed for "the cliff" and that Brady was "going to be a bum in short order." As everyone knows, the prognostication missed the mark. Just a skosh.

Brady finished second in MVP voting in 2016 at age 39, despite being forced to miss four games due to a bogus suspension. And he capped off that year with a Super Bowl win, coming back from a 28-3 deficit. In 2017, he was the first-ever unanimous league MVP, and he set a Super Bowl record for passing yards -- albeit in a losing effort. In 2018, a sixth Lombardi Trophy was added to his collection. In 2020, a seventh. In 2021, at age 44, he was once again the runner-up for MVP -- and he had a great case to deserve the award himself.

Last year, this was the viewpoint on Brady retiring after an MVP-caliber year and a near playoff victory over the eventual Super Bowl champs:

Brady's retirement spares the world from seeing a drop-off that would be difficult to watch. Had it come at age 42, or 43, or 44, there would have been no shame. The human body does have its limits. But Brady spent the last several years defying those restrictions.

That's not a mark against any other Hall of Famers or media pundits who swore the end was coming. It's simply a testament to Brady doing what was previously thought to be impossible.  

Though his 2022 season didn't lead to any accolades, it was still impossible. His most impressive number was 17 -- as in games played. George Blanda, primarily a kicker at age 45 but still crazy enough to give quarterback a bit of a go, threw a total of 15 passes in his age 45 season. Brady had 15 pass attempts before halftime in Week 1.

Though his yardage and touchdowns dipped, he still posted his sixth-highest passing yardage total and threw 25 touchdowns while running an offense that ranked dead last in every rushing category and dealt with severe injuries on the offensive line as well as some annoying ailments in the receiving corps. He spent Week 17 of his age 45 season throwing picture-perfect deep balls, throwing for 432 yards and three touchdowns. He would've had 400 yards and three touchdowns in his playoff loss if not for a dropped deep ball. Physically, Brady could still be Brady, even at 45.

Unlike literally every quarterback in history, Brady kept playing and starting and succeeding at age 42, 43 ... 44 ... and 45. The cliff never came.

The prevailing thought when Brady retired last year was this: He dominated the league like nobody ever had before or ever will again. The latter part of that statement may not be technically verifiable at this point in time, but the 2022 season created even more separation from Brady and the entirety of every other football player in history on the statistical leaderboards.

From a year ago:

There can, obviously, be only one GOAT. That GOAT is the Greatest Of All Time, a singular person whose greatness cannot be matched. It's a term that has certainly lost its weight in recent years, being thrown around without regard for its meaning.

Fortunately, the sports world will always have the rare few -- the actual GOATs of their respective crafts -- to serve as reference points. And for the sport of football, for as long as any of us share this planet, the GOAT will always remain Tom Brady. It's a truth that will only become more evident in time.

In two weeks, Patrick Mahomes -- who's already been crowned by plenty of observers as the "next" GOAT, if such a thing can exist -- will try to win his second Super Bowl. He's just 27 years old, and figures to have plenty of success in his future. Yet even if he wins that Super Bowl, he'll need to win five more just to match Tom Brady. No quarterback other than Brady has ever won five, period. Assuming Mahomes can win five on top of two requires a larger leap of faith. 

Mahomes currently has 74 total wins in his career, regular season and postseason combined. He'll need to win 212 more games to tie Brady in that department. He'll also need to throw 513 more touchdowns and compile 74,471 more yards to match Brady in those departments.

If anyone is talented and dedicated enough to do it, it would be Mahomes. The point is: In a sport as grueling as football, nobody else has been able to do it as long and as well as Brady did from 2001 through 2023. Odds are, nobody will.

All that's changed now is that Brady won't be adding to those numbers. Barring an unexpected return to football, the numbers are locked in permanently.

The young guns in the game -- Mahomes, Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, maybe Justin Herbert and Trevor Lawrence, too -- will be chasing those numbers and accomplishments for the next decade and beyond. A new generation will come in behind them. And then another after that. It'll take a series of miracles for anyone to even really enter Brady's realm.

That was the case last year, just as it was two years ago and two years before that. That's what it means to be the greatest.

It didn't change over the course of the past year, and it seemingly never will.