For nearly three hours, the NFC Divisional round game between the Packers and the Cardinals was nothing special. The game had its moments, was competitive, and the outcome was very much up in the air going down the home stretch. But the final moments lifted it from a common merely “good” playoff game, to a level of insanity hard to recall in recent memory for a NFL playoff game.
Let’s start here with the Cardinals looking to take the lead in the final minutes opposed to just tying the game with a field goal. Well that’s one way to do it!
So you’d think given this game is labeled “insane”, the Packers would now answer with some ridiculousness of their own right? They did not. They turned the ball over on downs (opposed to punting) and now it was left to the Cardinals to run three times and kick a field goal to go up a touchdown leaving the Packers with no timeouts and around a minute left. This did not happen though……Instead this:
Aaron Rodgers and the offense would now have nearly two minutes but after three plays which included a sack, it didn’t look like it would matter. Than this happened…..on 4th and 20……from their own endzone……while rolling left.
The Packers were in business except they weren’t. Rodgers waffled between spiking and running a play which ultimately led to the majority of the time left bleeding off the clock as well as a motion penalty. The Packers were down to their last play and then this happened.
I mean watch that again. Rolling left, not planting his feet, and getting it all the way to the endzone. Insane! Even more insane were the two catches on that drive for Jeff Janis (who?) equaled his total all season. Janis had seven catches for 145 yards on the day. He went to Saginaw Valley so I don’t blame you for being totally unaware of his existence until now. Also mildly insane, James Jones and Randall Cobb had zero receptions although Cobb had this gem which didn’t count and took him out of the game.
This is some good catching pic.twitter.com/cSZ21Cs1Xg
— Pete Blackburn (@PeteBlackburn) January 17, 2016
On to overtime! But before we got there, I give you first time I’ve ever seen a coin-flip redone because “the coin didn’t flip”. It didn’t though as you can see. How does that happen? Now this feels like a wierd dream. Am I dream blogging right now?
You’d imagine things would settle down a bit but not the case as this was the first play in overtime. You’ll see a lot of interesting things here if you look closely including Carson Palmer doing a spin move and Clay Matthews missing a tackle.
The Cardinals scored two players later. It was a good play-call, but it wasn’t insane like everything else that happened in the moments preceding it. An instant classic and one for the ages for Cardinals fans. On the flip-side the Packers andAaron Rogers last two playoff losses were games they’ve led the majority of the game, went down late, only to force overtime, but never got the ball in overtime. Football is awesome insane isn’t it?
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