Mo Lewis altered NFL history the second he made contact with Patriots quarterback Drew Bledsoe during the fourth quarter of the Jets’ second game of the 2001 season.
Lewis leveled New England’s $100 million quarterback and sent him to the sideline with an injury that landed him in the hospital. The Patriots were left with no choice but to turn to their second-year backup quarterback, a former sixth-round pick who had appeared in just one game as a rookie.
Thomas Edward Patrick Brady Jr. wasn’t highly thought of coming out of the University of Michigan. He spent just two seasons as the program’s starting quarterback and was far from an overly impressive athlete. The Patriots selected Brady with the 199th pick in the 2000 draft, but with Bledsoe entrenched as the starter and signed to a long-term extension before the 2001 season, Brady was viewed as nothing more than an insurance policy.
That wound up being the furthest thing from the case.
Brady didn’t lead the Patriots to a win over the Jets in relief of Bledsoe. But he did spend the next two decades torturing New York — and the rest of the league — while cementing himself as the greatest quarterback of all time.
Brady called it a career on Tuesday, bringing an end to the 21-year nightmare Lewis brought upon the Jets. New York received a bit of a reprieve when Brady left the Patriots to finish his career with the Buccaneers, but even a change in location wasn’t enough to stop Brady from inflicting one last painful moment on the franchise he owned from the second he stepped into Bledsoe’s shoes.
Wins were hard for the Jets to come by whenever they squared off with Brady. He went an eye-popping 31-8 against New York between the regular season and the postseason, routinely thrashing Gang Green’s best defenses during that span. Brady’s final triumph over the Jets came in dramatic fashion this past season, as he led a two-minute drill and fired a game-winning score with 15 seconds remaining to give the Buccaneers a 28-24 win.
Want a better idea of how long Brady’s torturous reign over the Jets lasted? Vinny Testaverde was New York’s starting quarterback when Brady replaced Bledsoe in 2001. He is now 58 years old. Zach Wilson, who happens to share a birthday with Brady, was born during the summer of Brady’s senior year at Michigan.
The Jets cycled through 18 different quarterbacks during Brady’s time in the NFL. Mark Sanchez was the only one to beat him during the postseason, and that 2010 Divisonal Round win is now considered one of the franchise’s greatest moments ever. Brady, meanwhile, won six Super Bowls with the Patriots and one with the Bucs.
Gang Green can sleep a bit easier from here on out. The recurring nightmares are over. Brady’s dominance left a permanent scar on the organization, but his days of running roughshod over New York are mercifully over.
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