Tom Brady was sacked 32 times last season, the most since his first year as the Patriots’ starting quarterback, and he’s already been sacked three times in just 30 dropbacks this preseason. But he doesn’t agree with those who see that as evidence of a problem on New England’s offensive line.
Brady said on WEEI that people who blame the offensive line for sacks don’t understand the full picture.
“Offensive football, 11 guys need to be on the same page,” Brady said. “When the offensive line’s expecting me to get the ball out quick and I hold on to the ball and I get sacked, then people may blame the offensive line, but really it’s the quarterback’s fault. Sometimes there’s coverage sacks, where the defensive coverage, there’s just not a place to find to throw the ball, and the offensive line, like I said, is expecting a certain rhythm of a play and it doesn’t come out that way. It could be a number of things.”
According to Brady, he’s getting everything from the offensive line that he needs.
“Our offensive line, they work their tail off,” Brady said. “They’re out there giving everything they’ve got. From a quarterback standpoint, we’ve got plenty of time to throw the ball and find the right guy. We have to do a better job of doing our job, which is getting the ball out when we need to get it out, get it to the open receiver and let our guys do something with it.”
Brady standing behind his offensive line is admirable. But if he keeps getting sacked once out of every 10 times he drops back, he’s going to have a hard time standing behind his offensive line all season.