Tag: tom brady touchdown

Rob Gronkowski gives Tom Brady his first first-quarter Super Bowl TD ever

A strong rushing attack led to Tom Brady’s touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski.

When Tom Brady hit tight end Rob Gronkowski with an eight-yard touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski with 37 seconds left in the first quarter, it did a couple things besides giving the Bucs a 7-3 lead in Super Bowl LV

First, it game Tom Brady his first touchdown pass or touchdown of any kind in any of his Super Bowls, win or lose. An incredible but true stat!

Second, the hookup gave the Brady-Gronk combination the most touchdowns by a quarterback-receiver duo in NFL history with 13.

The Bucs had been running the ball and hitting short passes to deflect the effect of Kansas City’s pressure, and the run game was taking advantage of Kansas City’s tendency to run with lighter personnel — more dime defense this season than all but two other NFL teams. This is why I posited during the week that the Bucs would be wise to make their run game a relative strength, both in efficiency and volume.

How Tampa Bay’s run game could upend the Chiefs’ dime defense in Super Bowl LV

And that set up this. Watch how the Chiefs flow to the back on play-action, leaving the outside opening for the score.

 

 

Watch: Tom Brady throws a strike for six

Veteran quarterback Tom Brady connected with O.J. Howard on an absolute strike of a vertical route.

Tom Brady read the tweets.

After throwing a Pick Six in the first half, the second time he was victimized on the speed out route this season, many on Twitter and elsewhere started to question the veteran quarterback’s arm strength – or lack thereof. As the jokes go, Brady read all your tweets and took them to heart in the second half, finding tight end O.J. Howard for a beautiful touchdown on a vertical route:

This play is a great example of how offensive coordinators can use personnel to set up huge plays in the vertical passing game. The Buccaneers come out with 13 offensive personnel, putting three tight ends on the right side of the formation. That gets the Chargers to respond with their base defense, expecting the run. Tampa Bay uses that to their advantage, showing a run fake before Brady retreats to pick between two vertical routes along the right side.

The Chargers play man coverage here, and that isolates Howards on a linebacker. The tight end accelerates past the coverage and Brady hits him with the strike, getting the Buccaneers back on the board.

Providing evidence that the veteran quarterback read the tweets, as they say.