On Thursday night, Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes dislocated a kneecap while executing a quarterback sneak. The prior Thursday, Patriots quarterback Tom Brady ran multiple quarterback sneaks without incident.
So what does Brady do to avoid injury on a play like that?
“Pliability, man,” Brady told reporters on Saturday. “That’s what I work on every day.”
So was the Mahomes injury a freak thing?
“I mean, it’s football,” Brady said. “It’s a contact sport, so guys get hurt all the time. I think that’s the nature of a physical sport, whether it’s football or -- you run around, it’s part of it. So, you’ve just got to do the best you can to try to avoid getting injured, but sometimes you can’t.”
When running a sneak, Brady has a simple strategy for gaining the needed yardage and avoiding injury.
“I’m just trying to get the first down,” Brady said. “If that’s what it’s got to be, I try to get as many yards as I can, so I try to go to the soft spot of the defense and -- yeah, try to get as many as I can.”
Although the connection between pliability and health remains unclear, Brady has been able to play effectively into his 40s without getting injured. This year, with so many quarterbacks getting injured, Brady just keeps going.