only 50 years ? It seems like yesterday and only 18 coaches later , Can someone please pass me the pitcher of Kool Aide ?
Cubs didn't win in forever but they were more outright bad than heartbreaking. The Cubs lost and lost but the failures we experienced in a shorter amount of time and the nature of those failures were far far greater in pain than the Cubs 108 years It's not so much about the amount of years, it's what it's inflicted upon you in that period of time We've had it worse than the Cubs
Super Bowl III Jets 16, Colts 7 1 2 3 4 -- Total Jets 0 7 6 3 -- 16 Colts 0 0 0 7 -- 7 2Q (9:03) NYJ, Matt Snell 4 run (Jim Turner kick) 3Q (10:08) NYJ, Jim Turner 32 FG 3Q (3:58) NYJ, Jim Turner 30 FG 4Q (13:26) NYJ, Jim Turner 9 FG 4 (3:19) BAL, Jerry Hill 1 run (Lou Michaels kick) Team statistics Jets Colts First downs 21 18 By rush 10 7 By pass 10 9 By penalty 1 2 Rush yards 142 143 Passing 17-29-0 17-41-4 Pass yards 195 181 Total yards 337 324 Punts 4-38.8 3-44.3 Fumbles-lost 1-1 1-1 Penalties 5-28 3-23 Jets individual leaders Passing Com. Att. Yds. TD Int. Namath 17 28 206 0 0 Rushing Att. Yds. TD Snell 30 121 1 Boozer 10 19 0 Mathis 3 2 0 Receiving No. Yds. TD Sauer 8 133 0 Snell 4 40 0 Mathis 3 20 0 Lammons 2 13 0 Colts individual leaders Passing Com. Att. Yds. TD Int. Morrall 6 17 71 0 3 Unitas 11 24 119 0 1 Rushing Att. Yds. TD Matte 11 116 0 Hill 9 29 1 Receiving No. Yds. TD Richardson 6 58 0 Orr 3 42 0 Mackey 3 35 0 Matte 2 30 0 Hill 2 1 0 Mitchell 1 15 0 Attendance: 75,389
From Newsday today... SportsFootballJets What they were saying 50 years ago when the Jets upset the Colts in Super Bowl III The Jets' 16-7 win over the Colts in Super Bowl III is the rare case in which an old tale has not grown taller over time. Jets coach Weeb Ewbank congratulates quarterback Joe Namath with seconds left in Super Bowl III at the Orange Bowl in Miami on Jan. 12, 1969. The Jets upset the heavily favored Baltimore Colts, 16-7. Photo Credit: AP By Neil Best neil.best@newsday.com @sportswatch Updated January 10, 2019 9:23 PM Print Share Even those of us too young to remember Jan. 12, 1969 — which is most of us — know the basics: The Jets were huge underdogs against the Colts in Super Bowl III, and their 16-7 victory 50 years ago Saturday stunned the football world. But this is the rare case in which an old tale has not grown taller over time. If anything, a review of what people were saying and writing before the game reveals a shocker befitting its reputation. Joe Falls of the Detroit Free Press predicted the Colts would win 270-0, adding of Joe Namath: “He’d better grow that mustache again and that goatee and those sideburns because they’re going to rearrange his face in Miami on Jan. 12.” He added that the Orange Bowl would need more than a scoreboard that day: “They’ll need a computer to keep up with the Colts.” To be fair, Falls was typing in the press box in Cleveland after watching the Colts crush the Browns, 34-0, in the NFL Championship Game, avenging their only loss of the season. Even reporters who knew how good the Jets were seemed awed by the challenge. Subscribe to Sports Now newsletter Sign up By clicking Sign up, you agree to our privacy policy. In the very Newsday story in which he reported on Namath’s famous guarantee that the Jets would win, beat reporter George Usher called the Colts “the awesome National Football League champions.” He added, “The Colts will most likely cut off the running game as quickly and as efficiently as a guillotine.” (The Jets’ Matt Snell ran for 121 yards and a touchdown that day.) Usher was one of two Newsday writers among the five nationally who went out on a limb in their predictions and took the Jets, joining columnist Stan Isaacs. Their colleague, Dick Clemente, had it 27-0 for the Colts. “Baltimore’s front four, incensed at Namath’s antics and remarks during the week, has secretly pledged to make Broadway Joe an older, sadder and wiser young man,” Clemente wrote. Isaacs called Colts defensive end Bubba Smith “the greatest thing since peanut butter” and wrote an entire column in which he imagined an interviewer asking questions of David after his big upset of Goliath. Jets' Joe Namath prepares to pass as Baltimore Colts' Bubba Smith leaps to defend during Super Bowl III in Miami on Jan. 12, 1969. Photo Credit: AP/Anonymous The point spread approached three touchdowns, but perhaps even more startling was that famed bookmaker Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder declared the Colts 7-1 favorites to win outright. “The Colts have the greatest defensive team in football history,” Snyder told The New York Times. (The Colts allowed 10 or fewer points in 11 of their 14 victories leading up to the Super Bowl.) The Jets were quietly confident after a 27-23 victory over the Raiders in the AFL title game, but coach Weeb Ewbank played along with the narrative. Upon arriving in Florida, he cracked, “We didn’t show our men the movies [of the Colts]. I’m afraid I’d have trouble getting them on the airplane.” Namath did not play along. His guarantee was not even the most outrageous thing he said before the game, by the standards of 21st century hot-take social-media fallout. On the charter flight to Florida, the Times’ Dave Anderson sat next to Namath, who listed for him five quarterbacks in the 10-team AFL better than the Colts’ Earl Morrall. Among them was Namath’s 38-year-old backup, Babe Parilli. (There are reasons that reporters no longer fly on team charters.) The Colts were unamused. Said defensive lineman Billy Ray Smith: “I think Namath ought to keep his mouth shut. He’ll keep his teeth longer.” The best thing about time travel is observing people who do not know what is ahead, even though you do. But by early evening on Jan. 12, everyone knew, and football never was the same. After back-to-back blowouts by the Packers, the Super Bowl was validated as a competitive enterprise. “Because of what Joe Namath accomplished in the Super Bowl yesterday, pro football will never quite be the same again,” William Wallace wrote in the Times. (By the way, no one called Super Bowl III “Super Bowl III” at the time. The Roman numerals gimmick came along two years later.) Isaacs called Namath’s performance “one of the most cocky and daring personal triumphs of this sporting time.” The AFL-NFL merger already was in the works for the 1970 season, but the Jets’ victory, followed the next year by the Chiefs’ upset of the Vikings, went a long way toward ensuring public acceptance. In Usher’s lead paragraph in Monday’s Newsday, he quoted a “well-dressed woman” shouting assorted obscenities at media members, most of whom had doubted that the men in white had a chance. “Now what do you SOBs think?” she said. Namath himself could not have said it any better.
There were some people who thought both KC AND Oakland were better than the Jets. That the Jets were a little lucky to beat Oakland at home. And perhaps only the Chiefs defense could've stood a chance against Baltimore, but the Chiefs got murdered in the AFL divisional playoff
Ah that lateral late in the 4th qtr of that game. I lost my voice at that game. Still the best home game I EVER attended
Not that this is filled with insightful analysis, but . . . ++++++ Phil Simms breaks down game tape of Super Bowl III https://www.newsday.com/sports/football/jets/phil-simms-super-bowl-iii-jets-colts-1.25795713 “The Jets whupped them,” Phil Simms said. “I’m really shocked . . . They beat ’em up.” This was at Simms’ New Jersey home on Wednesday after he had time-traveled 50 years back to Jan. 12,1969. At Newsday’s request, the MVP of New York’s second Super Bowl victory watched New York’s first and tried to explain how the biggest upset in the game’s history happened. What Simms, the Giants’ quarterback in Super Bowl XXI and now an analyst for CBS, saw on a scratchy DVD of Super Bowl III at first seemed to be a fluky game in which the Jets took advantage of early Colts mistakes, including Earl Morrall throwing three interceptions in Jets territory and two missed field goals in the first half. But as the second half wore on, players’ jerseys became caked in mud and the mighty NFL champions - nearly three-touchdown favorites — grew increasingly frustrated, Simms saw something else: That the superior team won, 16-7. “The Jets ripped their butt here in the second half,” Simms said. “I don’t remember it this way. It’s amazing.” This was not the first time Simms had seen the game. He watched it live as a 13-year-old. Then, in the mid-1980s, Giants general manager George Young, a Colts assistant coach at that Super Bowl, invited Simms to watch the coaches’ film with him. “He was still mad about it,” Simms said with a laugh. But now he was watching with the perspective of five decades of football history, and as someone who follows a modern game that bears little resemblance to what it was before men walked on the moon. Simms marveled at everything from the more modest dimensions of players to the lack of things we now take for granted such as multiple alignments, shotgun formations, players in motion, personnel changes and the like. (Among the exceptions to the smaller players was Colts tight end John Mackey, who was from Hempstead. “John Mackey has the size and speed of today’s NFL player,” Simms said.) There are numerous other quirks, such as backs not staying in to help with blitz pickups, the Jets’ featured back, Matt Snell, making a tackle in punt coverage and assorted mayhem such as the Colts’ Tom Mitchell — who was not in the game at the time — clobbering Johnny Sample from behind with his helmet on the sideline. No penalty was called. Then there was the rudimentary NBC telecast, featuring Curt Gowdy on play-by-play and minimal analysis from Al DeRogatis. (The DVD was from an NFL Network replay of the game in 2007.) Early on, Simms was surprised by the quickness and athleticism of many players. He also imagined what people watching in 1969 would have thought as the Colts trailed only 7-0 at halftime despite their mistakes. “If you and I were watching this game right now live, we’d be going, ‘Man, Baltimore really looks like the better team,’ ” he said. The Colts had won 14 of 15 games — allowing 10 or fewer points in 11 of them — and were coming off a 34-0 rout of the Browns in the NFL Championship Game. But as the game wore on, the Colts wore out. Joe Namath, who was named MVP, finished 17-for-28 passing for 206 yards, Snell rushed 30 times for 121 yards and a touchdown and right tackle Dave Herman neutralized the Colts’ star end, Bubba Smith The few who thought Joe Namath’s Jets had a chance figured they would turn the game into an AFL-style shootout. Instead, they grinded it out against what was supposed to be a fearsome run defense. Namath took a few deep shots aimed at future Hall of Famer Don Maynard, but Maynard was shut out. George Sauer caught eight passes for 133 yards. The fact that the Jets prevailed that way impressed Simms even more. He said modern schemes are so sophisticated that sometimes an inferior team can win by out-coaching the opponent. Not so 50 years ago, when tendencies were so obvious that Simms almost always was able to predict what was coming. “I don’t think they cared,” he said. “ . . . It wasn’t like ‘we’re going to try to deceive people’ . . . It’s just about who’s the better player.” Simms said he is glad he was not a game analyst in that era, because there was not much to analyze. Gowdy and DeRogatis mostly downplayed the historic implications until late in the game, after Johnny Unitas had come off the bench to lead a late touchdown drive. But the Jets knew what they had accomplished and knew they had proved what they kept telling anyone who would listen: that they were the better team.
I am 41 too. Been a fan since age 9. Keep the faith! It will happen in our life time. Not sure when but hey at least we have a good field general in Darnold. That is as good a starting point then the Jets have had in decades. The arrow is pointing up for sure. J!-E!-T!-S! JETS! JETS! JETS!
Well being a fan since 1965 (JWN signing year) I will advise U that are U R way, way off base with your post. I think instead of using your heart use your head to evulate Chris & MCC & I think U may change your mind concerning your post.
Spot on. Haven't been a fan as long as you, but long enough to know that you're absolutely correct. This franchise isn't going anywhere. It's been 50 years since the last one and, as long as the Johnson family is in charge, it very well could be another 50 before the next one. What we do know for certain is that it'll never happen with Woody and Christopher in charge. This bunch becomes much more enjoyable to watch once you resign yourself to the fact that they're never going to be a successful franchise. Once I realized that I'd never live to see them win a championship, the Jets have actually become more tolerable to watch. It's much easier to laugh at their stupidity when you know there's no reason to get your hopes up when it comes to them actually winning anything or being anything that resembles successful.
For fan thrills, enjoyment, quality of play, see-saw aspect of the lead, deep passing, great players making great plays, and importance riding on the outcome, the AFL championship was the "greater" game. I didn't know if the Jets could win the game beforehand, but it was considered pretty much a toss-up. The game itself was so great, with Namath and Lamonica slinging balls all over the field. It was a classic AFL game, maybe the most classic AFL game ever. SBIII is the Jets most important game ever, and one of the most important games in the history of the NFL. It is one of the biggest upsets in the history of sports. But the issue was never in doubt. The Jets played very conservatively in the second half, and could've score at least 7 -10 more points. The significance of the Jets winning and overcoming the 18 point underdog status, in light of the AFL's presumed inferiority, is what makes this game so important. But I always felt the '68 AFL championship was a greater game to watch.
