Former Browns assistant Arians stands out

By STEVE KING

I am thrilled — absolutely, positively, beyond-words thrilled — for Bruce Arians.
The former Browns assistant coach is headed to the Super Bowl after the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, for whom he is head coach, of course, did something few thought they could do and notched their second win over the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field this season, this time on Sunday in the NFC Championship Game, 31-26.
You want to see good things happen to good people — at least I do — and Arians is just a really good guy. When he was in Cleveland and was made available to the media, he never gave us silly, nondescript, boring, unusable coach-speak answers to our questions. He would speak honestly and openly, providing real substance to whatever topic it was, and as such he was such a refreshing change.
And that personality of not being staid and conservative but instead daring and open, shone through in the championship game against the Packers. While his counterpart at Green Bay, Matt LaFleur, was taking the ball out of the hands of his iconic quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, in a key situation late in the game, Arians was having his iconic quarterback, Tom Brady, throw into the end zone for a huge touchdown at the end of the first half.
Know this: If head coach Andy Reid and the Kansas City Chiefs aren’t careful, then Arians’ aggressiveness will also make an impact in the Super Bowl. In fact, from that aspect, it should be a great Super Bowl because Reid is obviously aggressive, too, as the Browns found out at the end of their divisional-round playoff loss in Kansas City. Reid has the best quarterback in the game today in Patrick Mahomes, and Arians has possibly the greatest quarterback of all-time in Brady. What a match-up!
Which one — which quarterback, which coach and which team — will be left standing in the end? We’ll soon see.