"Well, I sucked pretty bad today but our defense saved us."

-- Tom Brady

FOXBORO -- He's right on both counts.

In a game that fell somewhere between bizarre and classic, Tom Brady was the second-best quarterback on the field in Sunday's AFC championship showdown. He threw a pair of interceptions (and correctly had another two wiped out by penalties), missed a wide-open Rob Gronkowski for a sure touchdown in the first quarter and couldn't put the game away on the Patriots' final drive, making a terrible throw to Aaron Hernandez that was knocked away by Ed Reed on third down.

But Tom Brady -- now a win away from a fourth Super Bowl and an MVP-level Super Bowl performance away from indisputably taking the Greatest Quarterback of All Time (we'll call it GOAT for short, sounds better than GQOAT) crown away from Joe Montana -- was bailed out by Sterling Moore and Billy Cundiff on Sunday. If Lee Evans holds on to the football, Brady is the goat (the no-caps version) and no one is carving a spot for Cundiff on the Mount Rushmore of playoff kicking chokers next to Scott Norwood and Lin Elliott (anyone got a solid fourth candidate?).

"[Flacco] was the best quarterback on the field today, period," Bernard Pollard said at his locker after the game. "All you guys that dogged Joe all week need to shut up. The media doesn't know. They just don't know. It's time to leave the man alone. He's played four years and made the playoffs all four years. He played his [expletive] off today."

Look, Flacco took a beating this week from the media, but let's be fair about this: The only reason there was a national debate about the signal-calling acumen of Joe Flacco was that his future Hall of Fame teammate called him out. So when Ray Lewis and Pollard and Suggs blame the media for making this a story, let's remember where it began. Until Sunday, Flacco had been an average-at-best playoff quarterback and was coming off the worst regular season of his career. All doubts were absolutely justified.

But Flacco was terrific in the loss, save for an admittedly lousy fourth-quarter pick by Brandon Spikes (though it was a great catch by Spikes). Flacco finished 22-of-36 for 306 yards and a pair of touchdowns. And when they needed him most, Flacco brought the Ravens down the field on the final drive of the game, converting a pair of third downs and putting the ball in a perfect spot for Evans in the end zone. I have no idea if this will be the trigger that leads Flacco to Pro Bowls and elite status or if he'll continue to be just another guy, but no player in either game Sunday was under the microscope that engulfed the Baltimore quarterback, and he stepped up.

I'll fully admit that I did not believe the Patriots could survive a postseason Brady stinker. If you had told me before the game that Brady would throw two interceptions and no touchdowns and finish with a passer rating of 57.5 against a career-best playoff game from Flacco, I would have given the Patriots no shot to win. Zero. But the defense -- the best game of Vince Wilfork's career, the kind of performance that lifts a borderline candidate into a Hall of Famer -- and BenJarvus Green-Ellis outplaying Ray Rice (68 yards and a TD on 15 carries for Green-Ellis, 67 yards on 21 carries for Rice) were the difference. 

"I wish I had done a better job today," Brady said. "I'm glad we won, I'm glad we're moving on. Hopefully I can go out there and do better in a few weeks. I think we can do better and that's what it's going to take."

If the Patriots are going to win Super Bowl No. 4 -- could you have imagined that after a 5-11 season in 2000 and an 0-2 start in 2001? -- Brady will again have to be Brady.

Sure, he had his moments on Sunday -- the over-the-top sneak for the TD on fourth down as the unquestioned highlight -- and full credit for blasting himself in front of millions for a subpar effort. And obviously a) his legacy will not be diminished if the Patriots lose and b) there is no reason -- none -- to think there will be any kind of carryover for Brady. What happened at Gillette Sunday will have no impact on Brady in Indianapolis. This is a guy, after all, with 16 playoff wins in 11 seasons (and that's counting 2008). That's four more postseason wins than the Jets have in their 52-year franchise history. 

But the Giants are a better football team than the Ravens. Maybe they weren't three months ago, or three weeks ago, but they are now. This is the most complete team in the NFL: a buffet of pass rushers, top-shelf skill players on offense and a quarterback inching closer and closer to whatever greatness is. I think the Patriots enter Super Bowl XLVI as a slight underdog.

So Brady has his mulligan, but that's it. If he's mediocre in two weeks, the Patriots will lose to Eli and the Giants (and Brady struggled in the regular-season loss to New York; I thought it was his worst game of the season). Brady needs to be great for a fourth Super Bowl. And it won't be easy, of course, but that's how it goes against teams this time of the year. There's a reason the Ravens and Giants are (or were) still around. But he can't expect the defense to save him again.

Brady was lucky to escape the title of goat on Sunday. But will he do enough to earn the title of GOAT in two weeks?