It's official: Tom Brady is just flat out a better football player than Payton Manning.

[JonLP24]

35. 1 game on the road which was their second straight week

I don't think losing at home to Arizona is a good example of their defense isn't that good. They forced 6 turnovers in that game and pretty much held them in check except for Andre Ellington (Cards are like the 2010 Chiefs who handed it off more to Thomas Jones while Jamal Charles was leading the league in rushing - handing it off more to someone who isn't there best running back). It was the Cardinals defense that won that game who also finished t-5 (San Francisco) in defensive yards per pass attempt who was playing as well as anyone in the NFC at the time.

It was also Seattle's only loss at home in the past 2 seasons.

When Seattle's defense isn't making mistakes and flying all over the place and hitting like they were things start to snowball and that is when they take over. They defeated SF at home by a combined 71-16 score who had 24 wins in 2 seasons.

They would have a lot more scores that look like this Super Bowl result if they didn't have play two top 5 pass defenses in division as well as in-conference. They held Carolina on-the-road to 7 but since Carolina's D is solid, they only scored 12.

on edit

Manning went 26/39, 377 yards, 9.6 YPA and 3 TDs - 0 Ints in a conference championship game against the #1 pass defense NYJ (as well as #1 overall defense).

Next season, Jets weren't as good but still top 10 he went 18/26, 225 yards, 8.65 YPA, 1 TD - 0 INT. They didn't win but he didn't have what I'd consider a bad game. He destroyed a top 10 pass D in back-to-back years (Denver) in the post-season. People downgraded those victories for some reason but no one else shredded them as well as he did. Does he struggle against top defenses? Yes but so does any QB. Brady has struggled against top defenses (2009 obvious example) as well as some average ones but it is interesting the Brady's numbers are better in his last 16 playoff games (8-8) than his first 10 (10-0).