How Would Joe Montana Fare in the NFL if His Prime Was in 2020? The Hall-of-Famer Discusses on Pardon My Take

To begin another week on Pardon My Take, Mr. Cat and Mr. Commenter welcomed on Hall-of-Famer Joe Montana. The four-time Super Bowl winner discussed his unbelievable career, Rudy being a fraud, having cool nicknames, and curing the Notre Dame green jerseys. Mr. Cat also proposed a solid question: What would Joe Montana's career have looked like if he played in today's game?

Mr. Cat: Do you ever do like a projection in your head of what your touchdowns and yards would look like in 2020 if you were prime Joe Montana? And all the rules were slanted towards the offense.

Joe Montana: No, because I don't want to get mad. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. No, I just you know, we talked about how, you know, the rule change makes it easier. And I always say it does make it easier when you can stand there and know that you're not going to get smacked. That used to be what separated everybody back then, was who could stay in the pocket, stand there knowing there's a guy running right down the middle of you. And as soon as you release this ball, you're planted in the back. Can you throw it accurately? And that was the separator for most teams, most quarterbacks. They don't have to deal with that today. Does it make it easier? Yeah, somewhat. The game is still difficult, but someone at that level, it makes it a little bit easier.

Mr. Cat: It is crazy to see, though, in 1980... let's see. Oh no, so you're throwing like 500, 400 passes a season, which really only comes out to, like, I don't know, it's like 24, 25 pass attempts. Like you don't see that really NFL today and you had, you know, you had a season where you led the league in touchdowns with 31 touchdowns.That's probably like the seventh or eighth guy now in 2020 because of the stats being so inflated. 

Joe Montana: Yeah, I mean as a quarterback, you'd love to be playing now. The rules kind of want you to put the ball in the air. With the group that we had when I left, the 49ers with Jerry [Rice], John Taylor, Jones, it's hard to say what could happen.

Bettmann. Getty Images.

If only we could go back and time and see what Joe Montana, Joe Namath, and some of the other greats could have done with today's rules. Fantasy Football with these guys on your roster would be nothing short of electric. However, one thing would remain the same…

… nobody would care about your fantasy team.