Eli Manning claims Super Bowl 42 ‘still bothers’ Tom Brady

New York Giants legend Eli Manning recently spoke on one of his past Super Bowl wins ahead of Tom Brady’s 10th appearance in the “big game.”

Ten Super Bowl appearances; an indescribable accomplishment.

On Feb. 7, Tom Brady will be achieving just that, taking part in the “big game” for the first time as a Tampa Bay Buccaneer. His first nine appearances, of course, were with the New England Patriots, having gone 6-3 in those games.

Each loss was a heartbreaker, but the one that may have been the toughest to swallow — the February 2008 defeat at the hands of the Giants when the Pats entered 18-0 — still erks him. At least, according to one of his opponents in that very matchup.

“It’s one of those things, it’s not something I ever say or ever think a lot about. I’ve been around Tom numerous times, and I’ve never brought up a Super Bowl or our games versus them. He actually brings it up,” Giants legend Eli Manning told Paul Schwartz of the New York Post this week. “It still bothers him a little bit, especially the ’07 one when they had the chance to go down as the greatest team of all time.

“But I don’t have any bragging rights with Tom. This is his 10th Super Bowl, and I’m so impressed with his whole career.”

Manning and Brady will forever be linked with one another, given the pair of Super Bowls the former won over the latter. It’s even reached the point where whenever the Hall of Fame argument for Eli is introduced, so are his two big wins against the GOAT.

A few years must pass before the committee can decide whether Manning is a first-ballot inductee into Canton, but regardless, he seemingly doesn’t discuss the accomplishments. Instead, when speaking to Schwartz, Manning had a whole lot to say about what Brady has achieved in this season alone.

“It’s really impressive what Tom’s been able to do,” he said. “Just the fact, changing teams after 20 years, with one team where you’ve had so much success and going to a new team, new city, new state during a pandemic, where you have a shortened offseason and different rules and kind of get the same results. Getting back to a Super Bowl, at age 43, yeah, it’s so impressive. It was hard to think that was going to be possible. He’s obviously got a special demeanor and a special ability to get guys to rally around him.”

It’s indeed impressive, there’s no going around that.

Now we wait to see if Brady can top it off come Feb. 7.