For the 36th time in his career, Tom Brady will face the Buffalo Bills in Week 14 of this year’s NFL season. For the first time, he won’t be a New England Patriots player. But as in years past, Brady can still screw up the Bills’ season.

Munich/Tampa Bay – Tom Brady played for the New England Patriots for 20 years. Accordingly, with few exceptions, he also played twice a season for 20 years against the Buffalo Bills.

And to say Brady enjoyed the clashes more would be an understatement.

Historic Dominance

32 wins Brady picked up against the Bills, more than against any other opponent in his career. In fact, that’s even an NFL record, no player picked up that many wins against a single team. In those games, Brady threw 68 touchdowns, also a record.

Probably the most devastating record for Bills fans from his time with the Patriots: The quarterback with the most wins in the Bills’ home stadium since the turn of the millennium was not one of their own, but New England’s No. 12, with 15 successes. That didn’t change until January 2021, when Josh Allen passed him.

So 32 of the Patriots’ now 77 wins against the Bills have come against “TB12”. Proportionally, that’s also almost logically a record.

Bills fans are mostly not Brady fans

Besides this dominance, Buffalo Bills supporters are rarely fans or even sympathizers of Tom Brady. On the Buffalo Bills’ largest Reddit forum, one of the highest voted posts is simply “F*ck Tom Brady”. It stands at 896 upvotes as of Dec. 9, 2021.

“As a lifelong Bills fan, there’s no question about it,” said one user, “I’ll always be for the team that plays Tom Brady. For the rest of his career.” Logically, Patriots fans, meanwhile, refer to Brady as the official owner of the Bills. On more than one occasion, the Bills’ Wikipedia article has been adjusted by fans.

Even the mayor of the city of Buffalo called for celebrations after Brady announced he was leaving the New England Patriots after 20 years. But with the Corona pandemic already looming, he warned that it should be done in moderation. “Please celebrate the departure of Tom Brady from the New England Patriots and hopefully from the AFC East with less than ten people,” Mayor Byron Brown said.

Mayor Byron Brown asks that you celebrate Tom Brady’s departure from the @Patriots at home tonight, and in a group of less than 10.

He really said that.

– Chris Horvatits (@ChrisHorvatits4) March 17, 2020

The continuation of the “reign of terror”?

Were the Bills rather far away from winning the division most years, even in the rare good years there was actually always one man standing in between: Tom Brady.

Such was the case in his final year in the AFC East, 2019. The Buffalo Bills travelled to Foxborough in Week 16 and would have taken over the top spot in the AFC East with a win. They were up 17-16 in the fourth quarter. But Brady led a game-winning drive and the Patriots went on to win 24-17 and take the division crown once again. It was to be his last win in a Patriots jersey.

In 2021, things come full circle. While the “GOAT” is now a member of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, he could still screw up the Bills’ season for the second time on Sunday.

When he and his Bucs host the men from New York State, he could worsen their record to 7-6 and thus make the division victory, which was the clearly stated goal before the season, a distant prospect.

What started out very promising could now become every Bills fan’s worst nightmare: The Patriots and Tom Brady still terrorising Buffalo – only this time from different directions.