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Raiders fans would like to believe that Oakland would have gone on to pull the upsets over the Steelers and the Rams in the weeks that followed, bringing about the first of multiple Super Bowls won by Gruden in Oakland. But as always is the case with the 'What If?' game of sports, the case can be made for any alternate reality to become believable. Their two titles in '03 and '04 are a testament to that. Surely, logic would dictate that the team had the right blend of talent and attitude to eventually win championships. Tuck rule or no tuck rule, Brady's singular greatness was inescapable for the rest of the league, even if that first title was delayed.īut of course, the world can't help but wonder how differently things would have gone for the Patriots if not for the proper enforcement of a strange rule.

TUCK RULE GAME PRO

If there's any 'what if?' that can be eliminated from the conversation, it can be the doubt that Brady needed the tuck rule to become great. Brady has obviously gone on to win seven Super Bowls, earning five Super Bowl MVPs, three NFL MVPs, and 15 Pro Bowl selections while becoming the NFL's all-time leader in every meaningful passing statistic and continuing to play at an MVP level at the age of 44. Get your popcorn ready ? the debate: #ItWasAFumble or #ItWasIncomplete ? Of course, given the controversial nature of the tuck rule, the 'what if?' that hangs over that play has messed with the minds of many sports fans over the years. It was the first of three Super Bowls won by Brady, Belichick and the Patriots in a four-year span, kicking off the most dominant two-decade stretch the NFL has ever seen. The Patriots upset the Steelers in Pittsburgh the following week before pulling off what was at the time the greatest upset in Super Bowl history over the St. For a building without too many fond memories, it was a heck of a way to close the doors.įrom there, everybody knows the story. That was the final play in Foxboro Stadium's history. (Photo by /MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty Images) Adam Vinatieri celebrates his game-winning field goal vs. That set up a much easier kick for Vinatieri this time around, and he of course did not miss. Once in field goal range, the Patriots went to the ground game, and Antowain Smith converted a third-and-5 with an 8-yard run. The Oakland defense showed zero resistance in overtime, and Brady went 8-for-8 for 45 yards, only needing to convert one third down along the way. Perhaps a deep shot to Jerry Rice or Tim Brown would have been a better choice, because the Raiders never touched the football again. (Janikowski had made a 45-yard field goal earlier in the game.)īut Jon Gruden decided to play things 'safe,' calling for Rich Gannon to take a kneeldown and play for overtime. What's kind of lost to history after that is that the Raiders got the ball at their own 35-yard line with 22 seconds on the clock and two timeouts in their back pocket, with an iron-legged kicker of their own in Sebastian Janikowski available if needed. Patten dropped to his knees to secure the catch before popping up and crawling forward for a gain of 13 yards.

In the immediate aftermath of Walt Coleman announcing that the Patriots would retain possession after Charles Woodson had knocked the ball out ouf Tom Brady's hand, Brady delivered a strike to David Patten up the right hash. To say they made the most of their extra opportunity would be a massive understatement. That's due to the way that the proper enforcement of a rule - however odd that rule may have been, it had been enforced before that night, including in a way that adversely affected the Patriots that very same season - gave the Patriots a second life on that fateful evening in the old Foxboro Stadium. Of course, Raiders fans(and Patriots haters) likely refer to the day as the 20th anniversary of the Tuck Rule Game, not the Snow Bowl. And on Wednesday, New England football fans have one heck of a reality to celebrate, as the unforgettable Snow Bowl turns 20 years old. The theoretical domino effect from those points forward is impossible to calculate.Īlas, all we actually have in sports is reality. BOSTON (CBS) - The great mystery of sports always lies within the unanswerable question of ' What if?' Countless moments throughout sports history could have and would have been altered significantly if only this had gone one way, if only that had gone the other.

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