Gronk retiring

[plennis]

My 6 year old grandson will be upset.  He thinks he is little Gronk.  He is big and he is awesome.  LOL

[gogeta_god]

First, he is smart to retire early. Look at what they found in Aaron Hernandez's brain autopsy after he died in prison.. the CTE brain damage that comes from literally getting hit in the head to many times, and he was very young to have it! He was also a young really good Patriots TE.. also a convicted murderer who committed suicide but I don't think that applies to this discussion. Gronk can retire a champion, with health intact.

Second... Sorry but man oh man y'all are naive. It is all about Bill Belichick. Not Gronk. Not Brady.

The Patriots won before Gronk.
The Patriots went 11-5 without Brady and with MATT CASSELL at QB, who was a backup in COLLEGE and never became a legit NFL starter. This was the year Brady broke his leg in the opening game and missed the whole year. Still they went 11-5! NO Brady.

The one constant to their success? Bill Belichick!

Gronk is a beast at TE, one of the best currently, not all time though (think of Tony Gonzalez, Antonio Gates, etc.).
Brady is a beast at QB, one of the best. NOT the best all time! More on that in a second...
Belichick is hands down the best NFL coach of all time. I dare someone to argue that he is not

they still will survive with out him One person doesn not a team make

This is incorrect to an extent if applied to the coach. Bill makes the team. But it is only because of the chess peices he has placed on the field and their talent that they have success. It is a team sport after all.

The following has been a HOT topic for me lately, so please bare with me...
TOM BRADY is NOT THE G.O.A.T. (Greatest Of All Time).
PEYTON MANNING IS!!

Manning has NFL records for: Most passing TDs in a season (55), most passing TDs in a career (539), Most passing yards in a season (5,477), 2nd Most passing yards in a career (71,940, Drew Brees is #1, Brady is #4), Most MVPs (5), and more. These are individual stats, not team stats like championships, which is the area Brady is top dog. Brady won't pass the single season records or MVP record, but will pass the career records by virtue of more games played.

Remember I pointed out the Patriots went 11-5 with Brady missing the entire year?
Well the Colts went 2-14 the first year without Peyton Manning when he injured his neck!
Both teams always won 10+ games.. Patriots still did it without Brady, Colts did not even get close without Manning.

Anyone dare to debate this? Or is the only thing you can say "but, but, but the team championships."
Brady has more durability and will play more games, I give him that. He is top 5 but Peyton is #1.

This is all coming from a huge Houston Texans fan, who HATED losing to Manning twice a year. And I root against dynasties too, especially the Patriots. I hated / rooted against these guys but respect their game and assess this with no bias. I wish the Texans had a coach like Bill Belichick, but every team will say that.

[hawkeye3210]

Not too much.

[UGetPaid]

Belichick is hands down the best NFL coach of all time. I dare someone to argue that he is not

Challenge accepted.


You dared, so here it is. I am not going into any deep analysis of point and counterpoint and arguing against him in general is a tough hill to climb. If it weren't for the cheating that the Patriots have done on a routine basis, I would label Belichick as the GOAT. But when you factor in the unfair advantages and rule violations that he or his players have engaged in you have to take the GOAT label off the table in my opinion.


By analogy = very few people will say that Barry Bonds is the GOAT in baseball -maybe the more appropriate analogy is that there is significant and legitimate debate over Bonds being considered the home run king even though he clearly hit more than any other player in history. Why is that? Because he cheated to get those numbers. There is absolutely no argument that Barry Bonds was an amazing baseball player and possibly one of the best ever (the same way that Belichick is an amazing football coach and possibly one of the best ever) but Barry Bonds, like Bill Belichick, was a cheater.  Both Bonds and Belichick (and Pete Rose for that matter) belong in their respective Halls of Fame, but only one deserves to be in consideration for the GOAT - and he's the one in that trio without B.B. initials.

[dwiley11]

He will be fine and the patriots won't miss a step

[gogeta_god]

Belichick is hands down the best NFL coach of all time. I dare someone to argue that he is not

Challenge accepted.


You dared, so here it is. I am not going into any deep analysis of point and counterpoint and arguing against him in general is a tough hill to climb. If it weren't for the cheating that the Patriots have done on a routine basis, I would label Belichick as the GOAT. But when you factor in the unfair advantages and rule violations that he or his players have engaged in you have to take the GOAT label off the table in my opinion.


By analogy = very few people will say that Barry Bonds is the GOAT in baseball -maybe the more appropriate analogy is that there is significant and legitimate debate over Bonds being considered the home run king even though he clearly hit more than any other player in history. Why is that? Because he cheated to get those numbers. There is absolutely no argument that Barry Bonds was an amazing baseball player and possibly one of the best ever (the same way that Belichick is an amazing football coach and possibly one of the best ever) but Barry Bonds, like Bill Belichick, was a cheater.  Both Bonds and Belichick (and Pete Rose for that matter) belong in their respective Halls of Fame, but only one deserves to be in consideration for the GOAT - and he's the one in that trio without B.B. initials.

Fair point. I did not take that into consideration. However, despite the cheating at times, I still feel like he is the best coach of all time. It is not like he has been cheating / having an unfair advatage his entire career, only at very limited times, and I don't consider 'DeflateGate' to have anything to do with him or his coaching. 'SpyGate' on the other hand is incredibly horrendous, and that should count against the entire patriots organization. It does not change how good of acoach Belicheck has been at all other times in all other regards.

And again,I do NOT like the patriots, I root against them as vigorously as I root for my team to win (Texans), so no biases.

You did not propose an alternate for best coach of all time (NFL). I would be interested to know who you think if not Belichick.

As for Barry Bonds... It is called the steroid era of baseball for a reason. The steroid cheating was pervasive, and for every player that was caught I'm sure there was another that wasn't. Now, that is not to say it is ok or right. It definitely is/was wrong. Atrociously so even. I hate that players took steroids.

In Barry Bonds case, you can tell when he started taking steroids, as he beefed up very quickly. He was a hall of fame caliber player before then, so I believe he deserves to go to the Hall. As for the HR record.. put an * next to it. He DID hit the most HRs but it should be clearly noted he was caught cheating.

[UGetPaid]

You did not propose an alternate for best coach of all time (NFL). I would be interested to know who you think if not Belichick.

That's where the uphill battle gets even more difficult... I am in agreement that Belichick is a great coach, and despite my argument above against him, I am hard pressed to say who should be the GOAT if not him - which is why I didn't propose an alternative.  So, you got me there.
 


I would be showing my bias if I said Chuck Noll - even if just based on SuperBowl wins. I guess I would need to think on it some more to come up with someone, which admittedly undercuts my opposition to Belichick.

[vg7405]

Ah, nuts to the Patriots. I cannot stand them. Personally bias aside, I am glad that Gronk was able to retire on his own terms. He is still very young and he seems to have a good head on his shoulders to where he may be good with money management. With his resume in the NFL, he can pretty much do what he wants.

[beatsdrop]

Sad, but it needed to happen. He was so prone to injuries.