The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
If you didn't watch the game in real time, I feel sorry for you (well, if you're a football fan. If not, no big deal...).
Two of our great young quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, in the last few minutes of the game, threw improbable, impossible touchdowns to throw the game into overtime, then KC QB Mahomes threw another touchdown to end the game.
I was dumbfounded. But KC won by winning the toss, and making a touchdown, not giving the Bills a chance to respond because of NFL overtime rules. That made the coin toss more important than the on-field play. Some would say that NFL OT rules are unfair. I dunno, but it was sure a great game.
Two of our great young quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen, in the last few minutes of the game, threw improbable, impossible touchdowns to throw the game into overtime, then KC QB Mahomes threw another touchdown to end the game.
I was dumbfounded. But KC won by winning the toss, and making a touchdown, not giving the Bills a chance to respond because of NFL overtime rules. That made the coin toss more important than the on-field play. Some would say that NFL OT rules are unfair. I dunno, but it was sure a great game.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
It may have been the greatest weekend of playoff football ever. Every game down to the wire. Great storylines to follow. Everything right about sports was on display the last couple of days.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
Very true. Here's a great analysis in the WaPo saying exactly that:
The NFL so often punishes its followers for their devotion. Its owners have plundered cities for new stadiums and effectively blackballed a Super Bowl quarterback for protesting police violence. The sport brutalizes its players. The league is withholding the details of an investigation into a culture of sexual harassment within the Washington franchise. It owns a shameful history of equitable hiring for Black coaches. It dares you to love it.
And along comes a weekend like this one. Though it may not offer moral assurance, it provides clarity for why the bargain is struck. The games deliver. They just do, undeniably. If you can brook the behavior of the billionaires in the suites and the suits in the league office, the players and coaches on the field will redeem and obscure it all. They will leave you emitting noises you did not know you could make. They will spur you to send text messages composed only of exclamation points. They will make you forget how long you’ve been grabbing your own hair. They will give you a feeling you remember forever.
The four playoff games of the divisional round created perhaps the greatest weekend in the league’s 102-year history. They stretched imagination, then surpassed it. From Joe Burrow’s cool Saturday afternoon through the ballistic duel between Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes on Sunday night, all four were decided when the final play broke a tie score. Three included a change of possession in the final minute of regulation.
It was an exhilarating, exhausting 36-hour smorgasbord. Snow swirled over Lambeau Field. Tom Brady deleted a three-touchdown deficit with a bloodied lip. The Kansas City Chiefs lost the lead with 13 seconds left then won. Four times, a football flew toward the goal posts as the clock hit zero, seasons and legacies hanging with it in the frigid air. Four times, it sailed through.
The weekend culminated with a game that had people wondering whether it was the greatest game ever played — and wondering with less doubt whether Allen and Mahomes had produced the greatest quarterbacking display ever. The Chiefs’ 42-36 overtime victory determined Kansas City will advance to the next round and that if aliens land and challenge us to a football game, Mahomes gets to be the quarterback.
In a rematch of last year’s AFC championship game, Allen and Mahomes traded laser beam throws and ingenious scrambles all evening. Every little boy in America dreams of playing quarterback, and nobody can play it like them. Not even their most gifted peers can match Allen’s physical force or Mahomes’s plucky inventiveness. At ages 25 and 26, they are the present and future of the league.
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Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
I didnt see the end of the KC game, I did watch the one where Former wolverines QB against former Detroit Lion QB and just when you thought it was over out jumps Ndominic Suh to cause a turnover that made for a pretty thrilling end.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
To me, the problem with that game, while admittedly thrilling, was all the mistakes and rotten play.Motor City wrote: ↑Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:25 pm I didnt see the end of the KC game, I did watch the one where Former wolverines QB against former Detroit Lion QB and just when you thought it was over out jumps Ndominic Suh to cause a turnover that made for a pretty thrilling end.
Whereas the KC/Buffalo game wasn't bad defense, it was great QBs making perfect throws you really can't defend. Heck, there weren't hardly any penalties, either.
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Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
then there was San Fransisco putting down the packers and the upcoming showdown between LA and SFgounion wrote: ↑Mon Jan 24, 2022 12:31 pm To me, the problem with that game, while admittedly thrilling, was all the mistakes and rotten play.
Whereas the KC/Buffalo game wasn't bad defense, it was great QBs making perfect throws you really can't defend. Heck, there weren't hardly any penalties, either.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
That's another one that bugged me (beyond GB losing - they're my team). SF didn't make an offensive TD - the only difference was the blocked FG that was ran in for the only SF touchdown. Again, a mistake made the difference, not great football.Motor City wrote: ↑Mon Jan 24, 2022 1:00 pm then there was San Fransisco putting down the packers and the upcoming showdown between LA and SF
But it is what it is. And I'll say this - I'm ready for an NFL WITHOUT Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady, because quarterbacks such as Mahomes, Allen and Burrow are the Rodgers and Brady of the future, and the future is in great hands. It's not going to be like the hole there was when the NBA lost Micheal Jordan. These guys are superstars.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
Time always marches on. Not so long ago it was guys like Montana. In 25 years of will be some guy who is currently between 3 and 10 years old.gounion wrote: ↑Mon Jan 24, 2022 1:54 pm That's another one that bugged me (beyond GB losing - they're my team). SF didn't make an offensive TD - the only difference was the blocked FG that was ran in for the only SF touchdown. Again, a mistake made the difference, not great football.
But it is what it is. And I'll say this - I'm ready for an NFL WITHOUT Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady, because quarterbacks such as Mahomes, Allen and Burrow are the Rodgers and Brady of the future, and the future is in great hands. It's not going to be like the hole there was when the NBA lost Micheal Jordan. These guys are superstars.
" I am a socialist " Bernie Sanders
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
One would hope. The NBA had a lot of trouble for some time after Micheal Jordan left, as there was no one to fill his void for some time.
But yeah, it could be some kid fixated on Mahome’s “no look” passed that will be throwing the ball over his shoulder or with a blindfold on.
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
gounion wrote: ↑Tue Jan 25, 2022 6:40 pm One would hope. The NBA had a lot of trouble for some time after Micheal Jordan left, as there was no one to fill his void for some time.
But yeah, it could be some kid fixated on Mahome’s “no look” passed that will be throwing the ball over his shoulder or with a blindfold on.
Before Jordan is was DrJ after Jordan it was Kobe after Kobe it was Lebron after Lebron it will be someone else.
My grandfather said Joe DiMaggio was the greatest center fielder who ever lived.
Today people don't know who JoeD was
" I am a socialist " Bernie Sanders
Re: The Greatest Quarterback Duel in NFL Playoff History?
When Jordan retired, there was a big dropoff in NBA sales and ratings, and no one was there to step into the void for a few years.