Broadway Joe’s Finest Hour

To put it into perspective, ask any teenager. They don’t have any recollection of the Buffalo Bills in the NFL playoffs. I doubt any 18 or 19 year old would remember back to when they were a toddler when the Bills lost that famous game in Nashville on what became known as the “Music City Miracle”.

That’s the last time the Bills were in the playoffs. But watching the NFL playoffs over the weekend, I got to thinking about some of the greatest games I’ve ever seen.

I’m certainly not a New York Jets fan, but back in 1969, quarterback Joe Namath made a promise that the Jets would win Super Bowl III over the Baltimore Colts. Back then, the Colts were considered one of the best football teams of all time, and the Jets were a 19-point underdog. And for Namath to make such a brash promise, most people thought he was out of his mind, or at the very least a little bit overconfident.

The Jets built a 16-0 lead and held the Colts to just one touchdown to win the game 16-7, give the American Football League its first Super Bowl Championship and prove the upstart league was every bit as good as its rival. It was the only Super Bowl Namath and the Jets ever won, but that game alone was a huge step for Namath a trip to the Hall of Fame.

The Jets Super Bowl victory over the Colts was on January 12, 1969.