NFL 2011 Week 1 - Tom Brady Picks Up Where He Left Off: Shreds Dolphins Defense

Tom Brady Picks Up Where He Left Off: Shreds Dolphins Defense
John Nestor

Brady threw for 517 yards and 4 TDs

Miami, FL, United States

Tom Brady seems to have handled the lockout just fine thank you.

Showing no signs of rust -- he actually looked to be in mid-season form -- Brady shredded the Miami Dolphins Monday night to lead the Patriots to a 38-24 victory.

Brady threw for a team-record 517 yards and four touchdowns. he completed 32-of-48 passes and was intercepted once. The pick was about the only thing that went wrong for Brady as it snapped his NFL-record streak of 358 passes without an interception.

The Patriots and Brady rolled up a franchise-record 622 yards of offense.

"It's a fine line between putting pressure on a defense and playing out of control," Brady said. "I thought at times we did both, and you never really want to play out of control on offense. It was a good pace at times but other times they adjusted to it."

Miami didn't adjust to it all that much. Brady's performance included a a 99-yard touchdown pass to Wes Welker and the 622 yards of offense were the most ever allowed by Miami.

Brady became the 11th quarterback to throw for at least 500 yards. Norm Van Brocklin set the record of 554 yards in 1951.

Miami's Chad Henne wasn't bad either as he threw for a career-high 416 yards and the 906 net yards passing by both teams was an NFL record.

The performances by Brady and Henne were the perfect cap to a wild Week 1 as NFL teams passed for 7,842 net yards and returned 8 kicks and punts for TDs. Both represent the most in any week in NFL history accordig to Elias.