Uproar over Brady's foot discounts QB's true nature

With two weeks to prepare,Tom Brady won't allow himself not to be ready for the Super Bowl, no matter the ailment. Elsa/Getty Images

MAILBAG Peter King will answer your questions each week in Monday Morning Quarterback: Tuesday Edition. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

A quick take on Tom Brady's foot, then I'll let you guys trash a couple of icons.

I know Brady a little bit, well enough to have gotten to know the kind of work ethic he has and how he treats people in his professional life. I know some people who know Brady very well. And so I will speak from those two knowledge bases in telling you my feeling about his apparently injured right foot.

If you think Tom Brady would be walking around Manhattan with an injury that would threaten his availability for Super Bowl 42 instead of being back in Foxboro getting the injury treated, you are crazy. I mean, a loon. Tom Brady is not seriously injured. Clearly, Brady enjoys his quickie trips to New York because he can be more invisible than he is where he lives in Boston, but if he were injured Sunday to the point where he or Bill Belichick felt the injury should be treated by Patriots' trainers for 10 hours Monday and Tuesday, he'd be in the training room right now. He'd be sleeping there.

I can't be more sure about this. If there was any benefit to being in treatment with the team right now, and he was sitting in Manhattan with his girlfriend, he'd be sick about it. He's a competitive fool. He competes with free-agent quarterbacks for the best parking spot outside Gillette Stadium, awarded to the hardest off-season worker. Last week, Matt Light told me for the HBO cameras that Brady had his game face on trying to win at offseason Frisbee football.

I'm not saying this story shouldn't be reported; clearly, when the MVP has a boot or some sort of brace on his right foot 13 days before the Super Bowl, it's news. I am saying, though, that when the game kicks off Feb. 3, I'd be extremely surprised if Brady is at all limited in his pass-drops or scrambling ability by a sore right foot. He wouldn't be carrying a box of flowers in New York 13 days before the game, I can tell you that.

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Before I get to your email, I'd like to throw myself on the mercy of the MMQB court. A note about Monday Morning Quarterback, when it's a playoff weekend and I'm writing a late game for Sports Illustrated. It's not going to be a memorable one. It can't be. When I finished working the locker room and gathering my thoughts and started writing the NFC Championship Game story for the mag, it was 12:45 a.m. Eastern. I finished the story about 6:15 a.m. Though I had some of the web column written, I had to crash the rest of it in two hours, on no sleep, obviously. So there may be things I gave short-shrift to, which, upon further review, I would have written more about. But my first obligation is to the magazine on the weekends I'm covering a game. So keep that in mind as you skewer my judgments.

I can just hear you now: Wah, wah, wah.

Now about those icons getting trashed in the ol' e-mail box.

The first is Brett Favre, after his ill-timed and poorly thrown interception 47 seconds into overtime that, in part, handed the Giants the win in the NFC Championship Game.

Here's the take of Kevin Cohen of Boulder, Colo.: "Is Brett Favre getting a free pass on a performance that cost his team a chance to go to the Super Bowl? To drive that point home, your Monday Morning QB article did not mention a Favre interception until page five, letter G, of things you "Didn't Like" about Championship Weekend. Letter G? Sorry, Peter, but Favre's interceptions could be page 1, letter A material. And I don't think you were alone... I cannot recall any of the Fox guys even mentioning Favre's interception during the post game analysis. It was an absolutely horrendous throw and decision that cost the Packers dearly. If Favre is going to get the honor of being Sports Illustrated Man of The Year, despite being the fifth-best QB in the NFL, then surely he deserves the criticism of playing a terrible game in the biggest game of the year.''

Kevin, you're right about the throw. A terrible throw, a costly throw, a throw that had to be over Corey Webster to have a chance to be completed. Of course, it was right into Webster's hands. Favre deserves the criticism he'll get for the throw. And it cost Green Bay the game. All true. But I'll make two points about the day he had.

This was the kind of game Favre is going to take a lot of chances in, and you live or die with those chance. Why? Because the running game wasn't working. Take away the 13-yard burst by Ryan Grant in the second half, and Green Bay ran it 13 times for 15 yards. The Giants stuffed the run effectively all day. They also eliminated the screen game from being a viable option, with Antonio Pierce (what a great play he made) and Justin Tuck erasing Grant.

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