Its very close and a great case could be made for Brees. I just think the Saints faultering the last few weeks will hurt. While Mannings numbers have stayed up there. Favre is also up in the discussion as is Johnson. Although I think its a two horse race.
The more I think about it the more I believe that the MVP winner will be Chris Johnson. Brees, Manning and Favre are all QBs with great numbers who led their teams division championships. If I was a voter and not a fan of any of their teams I would be torn about which one to vote for. They are all deserving but they will split the votes of those voters inclined to pick a Division winning QB. Even though the Titans got off to a horrendous start of the season CJ did do something that only 5 running backs had done in the past: rush ror 2000 yards. He is going to get a lot of votes. Maybe enough to win. If Brees had passed for 5000 yards like he did last year he would win. If Manning had passed for 50 TDs the way he did a few years ago he would win. This year CJ is the player who set a statical milestone. As a Saints fan I would vote for Brees, but I don't have a vote
It's hard to say with CJ. Jamal Lewis got 2000+ yards a few years ago and wans't even close to winning the MVP if I remember correctly. The Titans needed to make the playoffs for CJ to have a chance. The more that I think about it, the voters will probably give it to Favre. Manning had a great year...but was not the clear cut top QB in the league and was below the radar. Brees got the most publicity and props for having the Saints undefeated, but that went down as we lost.
You think? The Saints faultering at the end hurts Brees, but the Colts tanking two at the end doesn't hurt Manning? Truth is, Brees only had one bad game all year; against the Bucs. He also sat out the final week while Manning played in a game that was clearly all about padding individual statistics for his team. In spite of all that, Brees set a new NFL completion percentage record, while averaging a half yard more per completion than Manning. He also threw for more yards per game, more touchdowns and fewer interceptions. Brees' final QB rating was nearly 10 points higher than Manning's. More from Duncan on the subject of QB rating: Brees's rating is better than 2 MVP winners, including Marino, who obviously did not cap his MVP performance by leading his team to the Super Bowl. (I add that just to make the point that a championship is not a pre-requisite to an MVP award. Manning '04 and Brady '07 didn't win the title either)
Yeah, don't forget Farve ended up just slightly above 107 as well. So if he wins it, that trend would still continue.
