Posted by Will Brinson

After eviscerating the Jets on the most public of levels Monday night (a 45-3 final score on the biggest stage in a while), there's little question that Tom Brady is the NFL's current leader in the MVP race, and, frankly, it's not all that close.

The Pats quarterback was the consummate Patriot veteran after the beatdown, giving a standard Belichickian answer to Suzy Kolber on the field.

"When you win say little, when you lose, say less," Brady said, attributing the quote to his coach.

What should he have said? Rhetorical answer: nothing. That's because there wasn't a need to offer anything verbally, when the score, and Brady's performance, said everything that needs to be said.

But back to Brady, who happened to notch a couple of marks on his belt Monday, setting the NFL record for most consecutive regular season home wins (26) and passing Drew Bledsoe (irony alert!) for 13th on the all-time NFL touchdown pass list with 252.

He carved up the vaunted Jets defense, turning what seemed like a great game of chess into a Checkers party where one-side kept kinging themselves repeatedly. Eight different Pats caught passes, which is exactly as many incompletions as Brady had on the evening.

See, for a large portion of this year, Brady was getting MVP love because the Patriots were winning without the same personnel as in previous years. Then people started talking about his dropoff in production after Randy Moss' departure, and it sure does seem like something snapped.

Since an embarrassing loss to the Browns, Brady's gone 70/95 for 877 yards and nine touchdowns (no picks) in three games. That's fairly ridiculous, to say the least.

It's not like his season's was bad before that, either -- he's thrown just four interceptions on the year, even though his raw stats haven't been tremendous up until this stretch (the Pittsburgh game was his first 300-yard passing effort of the year).

And yeah, it's going to be extremely chic to call Brady the clear-cut MVP come Tuesday morning, but the facts are the facts -- and right now, the Patriots are the best team in the NFL.

There are other people that deserve mention in the race, obviously; it's a sick group that includes Manning (maybe if they run the table), Rivers (they've got to win out too), Aaron Rodgers (but his defense is just so good), Matt Ryan (Michael Turner perhaps?) and Maurice Jones-Drew to name a few.

But none of those guys have their team positioned as the top team in the NFL, based primarily on the fact that their play at their position has been strong enough the entire year to overcome significant weaknesses in other areas on the roster. Which is exactly what Tom Brady's done in 2010.

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