Falcons coach Mike Smith thinks his team might be facing the best quarterback ever to play the game when they take on Drew Brees and the Saints tonight.
“Drew is playing as well as anyone has played the quarterback position, in my mind,” Smith told Albert Breer of NFL Network. “He’s 72 percent for the season, and it’s not just dink-and-dunk -– he’s gonna break [Dan] Marino’s record –- it’s mind-boggling. So I think all our guys know they’ll have to have their best game.”
Marino’s record of 5,084 yards in a season, set in 1984, will be broken tonight if Brees throws for 305 or more yards against the Falcons. If Brees comes up short tonight, he’s highly likely to break the record in Week 17. Brees is also leading the league in completion percentage, at 71.5 percent, and he’s likely to break his own NFL record of 70.6 percent, set in 2009.
Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers has played such exceptional football that Brees may not get any All-Pro votes this year, so it sounds a little overboard to say Brees is playing as well as anyone has ever played the quarterback position. And yet Brees will probably break the records for both passing yards in a season and completion percentage in a season. Maybe Smith is right.