A QB CLASSIC IN THE MAKING, JUST LIKE IN 1969

By STEVE KING
The storyline for Super Bowl 55 is easy, and has been such since the moment opponents were identified.
It will be quarterback Patrick Mahomes, the face of the NFL, and the Kansas City Chiefs trying to defend their title against Tom Brady, labeled by many as the greatest quarterback of all-time, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Quarterbacks drive the NFL, and these two guys drive the league’s current quarterback class.
The last time — and the only other time — in Super Bowl history that a young phenom and a legend at the quarterback position was 52 years ago. It was in Super Bowl 3, coming out of the 1968 season but played on Jan. 12, 1969 at the Orange Bowl in Miami, when Joe Namath and the New York Jets went up against John Unitas and the Baltimore Colts. The Jets were coached by former Browns assistant Weeb Ewbank, who had guided Baltimore to back-to-back NFL titles in 1958 and ’59, while the Colts coach was Don Shula, who followed Ewbank at Baltimore and was a safety with Cleveland for part of the time that Ewbank worked under Paul Brown.

But you have to put an asterisk by this one since Unitas, then 35 and nearing the end of his career, missed most of the season with injuries, giving way to his veteran backup, 34-year-old Earl Morrall. Morrall played well all year, helping lead the Colts to a 13-1 regular-season record. The one loss came against the Browns, 30-20, the only team to score more than 24 points all year against the Colts, but Baltimore came back to rout the Browns 34-0 at Cleveland to win the NFL championship to advance to the Super Bowl. In amassing 402 points, the second-highest total in the NFL while giving up a league-low 144, the Colts were understandably established as solid favorites — 18 points — over a Jets team that had finished the regular season at 11-3 and then edged past the Oakland Raiders 27-23 in the AFL Championship Game.
This is, of course, the “guaranteed win” game in which Namath cooly promised that the Jets would stun the world and win. They did, 16-7, giving the AFL its first Super Bowl champion and doing a lotto level the playing field between the two leagues.
Namath was not brilliant statistically, but he was brilliantly efficient, making throw after throw in crucial situations and not turning the ball over, while the Jets also ran the ball well against a seemingly imprenable Baltimore defense. The Colts pretty much kept up, rushing for 143 yards, one more than the Jets, in 20 less attempts, but Morrall was awful, throwing almost as many interceptions (four) as completed passes (six). The Colts also fumbled the ball away, giving them five turnovers to just one for New York.
When the Jets went ahead 16-0 in the fourth quarter on the last of Jim Turner’s three field goals — they had scored their other points on a four-yard touchdown run by ex-Ohio Stater Matt Snell in the second quarter, Shula, out of desperation, yanked Morrall in favor of Unitas. That got the attention of the Jets, especially Namath. They all watched stiff-necked on the sidelines as Unitas calmly led Baltimore right down the field for a TD to maskebit 16-7.
But Unitas cooled off, throwing an interception, as the Jets hung on for the win. For the Colts, it was another big disappointment as they failed to win a title they seemed destined to win, just like in 1964 when they were 11-point favorites over the Browns in the NFL title game at Cleveland but got routed 27-0.

Namath was the Super Bowl MVP that day and, at just 25, seemed destined for a historic career, but he never got close to returning to that big stage. He played eight more seasons with the Jets before going to the Los Angeles Rams in 1977 for his final year.
Unitas would play five more seasons, the last of which with the San Diego Chargers in 1973.
Now, all these decades later, there’s Mahomes, at 25 and attempting to repeat as the Super Bowl MVP and champion, matching throws with the 43-year-old Brady, in his first season with the Bucs after winning six Super Bowl titles over two decades with the New England Patriots.
It has all the makings of a classic, and if it is as scintillating as the last time it occurred, we’re all in for a real treat.