Tom Brady was visiting a zoo in Brisbane, Australia, a couple of weeks back when he and his friends walked past a goat pen. One of his friends said, “Coming up on the Mahomes exhibit.”
Brady, who shared the video on social media, laughed. But will anybody be laughing Sunday night if Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers in the Super Bowl for Mahomes’ second straight ring and third by the age of 28? Brady, the undisputed Greatest of All Time, has seven Super Bowl rings and had won his third by age 28 as well.
Mahomes is not even thinking about Brady or GOAT status. Unless you ask him.
“I mean, I’m not even close to halfway, so I haven’t put a lot of thought into it,” Mahomes said at Super Bowl Opening Night on Monday. “I mean, your goal is to be the best player that you can be. I know I’m blessed to be around a lot of great players around me.
“And so, right now, it’s doing whatever I can to beat a great 49ers team and try to get that third ring. And then if you ask me that question in 15 years, and I’ll see if I can get close to seven. But seven seems like a long ways away still.”
Brady played well into his 40s, winning his last two Super Bowls at the ages of 41 and 43. And Mahomes wasn’t just throwing out the “ask me in 15 years line” to brush off reporters.
“That’s the goal. You want to play as long as they’ll let you play,” he said. “It takes a lot of work outside of the building. It takes taking care of your body. It takes eating healthy and (trying) to get rid of the dad bod that I got. But try to do whatever you can just to get healthy and go out there and be the best player that you can be.”
Patrick Mahomes hopes to hoist the Lombardi Trophy for the third time Sunday. (Marc Sanchez / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Speaking of Brady, Mahomes still holds a grudge. His one loss in the Super Bowl came at the hands of Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2021.
“I’ve lost the Super Bowl, and I know how bad that hurts,” Mahomes said. “You want to make sure you stay away from that feeling. So I think even more than hoisting that trophy, when you lose and you’re in that locker room and you feel like you were that close and you didn’t get it, I’m gonna look more even to stay away from that feeling than I am hoisting the trophy.”
If Mahomes and the Chiefs beat the 49ers, he will become the first quarterback since Brady to repeat as Super Bowl champion.
“To be able to win back-to-back Super Bowls is special,” Mahomes said. “There’s only a small group of teams that have been able to do that. So for us, it’s just to prove that we can do it. I think we got the guys to do it.”
What makes Mahomes special, maybe even more so than Brady in the long run, is his ability to make plays with his feet. Besides running for first downs — never quite at full speed and just a half-step ahead of oncoming defensive players — Mahomes can buy time in and around the pocket and wait for a receiver to break open or to simply throw him open.
“(Coach) Andy Reid always reminds us that there are no dead routes,” Chiefs receiver Justin Watson said Monday night. “Patrick has such great vision. He sees everything, sometimes before it happens, so you always have to be ready.
“He will throw it to anybody, anywhere, at any time. And it will be on the money.”
The Chiefs have cashed in on 14 wins in Mahomes’ 17 career playoff games. He has passed for 39 touchdowns and 4,802 yards, numbers that Hall of Famers Steve Young, Brett Favre, John Elway, Jim Kelly, Troy Aikman, Warren Moon and Johnny Unitas never hit.
Mahomes has thrown only seven interceptions in those games, and he always seems to complete the big pass late in games. He has had 18 potential score-tying or go-ahead drives in the fourth quarter or overtime in the playoffs, and the Chiefs have tied or gone ahead on 12 of those drives. Three of them came in the final minute of regulation, which is an NFL playoff record.
“There is a quote I love that says, ‘Whether you believe you think you can or can’t, either way you’re right,’” Watson said. “We always feel like we have a chance. Down 10 points in the Super Bowl like we were last year? Doesn’t matter. We just feel like we are going to make a play and find a way to win, and that starts with Pat.”
The rest of the NFL is 8-55 since 2018 when trailing in the playoffs by 10 or more points; Mahomes is 4-2. The only quarterback with more double-digit comeback wins is Brady, with six (he was 6-8 in those spots).
There’s that name again. Mahomes is flattered and humbled by the comparison to the league’s greatest player of all time.
“It’s extremely early,” Mahomes said. “Tom’s won, like, seven Super Bowls, every single record in the book. All I can do is be the best Patrick Mahomes I can be every single day, and that’s all I’ll continue to do.”