The New England Patriots may be the underdogs heading into their AFC Championship Game showdown with the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday night, but Tom Brady has other ideas.

All season long, fans and media pundits have questioned Brady's mortality, wondering if he was finally on his way downhill after an illustrious NFL career.

Those voices became even louder later in the year, when a couple of uncharacteristic performances by Brady had many believing that the cliff had finally arrived.

But, Brady then threw four touchdowns in a Week 17 win over the New York Jets, and last weekend, Brady completed 34 of his 44 passes for 343 yards and a touchdown in a 41-28 Divisional Round win over the Los Angeles Chargers.

Now, ahead of his matchup with Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs, Brady had some strong words for the Patriots locker room:

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That sounds like a man who is truly ready to advance to his ninth Super Bowl.

On the year overall, Brady threw for 4,355 yards, 29 touchdowns and 11 interceptions while completing 65.8 percent of his passes while registering a passer rating of 97.7.

Now, many NFL teams would love to get that type of production out of their quarterback, but because we are so used to Brady posting MVP-caliber numbers, his late-season “struggles” were magnified to a point where it was almost an exaggeration.

Brady and the Patriots met the Chiefs earlier in the season, a 43-40 victory for New England in Foxborough back on Oct. 14.

One interesting tidbit about this matchup, however, is that the Pats have now won an AFC Championship Game on the road since the 2001-02 campaign.