Special Teams: The Music City Miracle

the more fun things we get to do. And one thing we're gonna do here now in the coming weeks is we're gonna look back at a couple of special teams each week. What we're gonna do is go back and re examine famous games in NFL college football, Major League Baseball history, the special teams that participated in them, and what became afterwards for both of those teams. Our sport tonight is the National Football League, and we are looking back at the Music City Miracle, one of the

most famous plays in sports history. But we're gonna do it a little differently. You've seen it all from the Tennessee Titans point of view and NASA coming around and figuring out just how did that Pasco Right along the line from I check over to Diyson had it all? We've seen that but we're gonna get into what made that play possible. And when you look at it from the Buffalo Bill side of things, this play takes even

more mythic proportions, right, madness all around. Right, Well, you know the play, you know the family, As you said, it's been broken down by everybody way smarter than us. I mean, Elon musks kid with all the mutant uh symbols and these hot hot hike, I mean, the ex exponents uh exponential growth for the child as we go. I mean, there's a lot of great theories on it.

But you just remember the Buffalo Bills and the time in space and what this meant to the trajectory and and kind of bouncing football history in a whole other angle. So the two thousand Playoffs, the Music City Miracle which the Titans beat the Bills sixteen, is on our docket today. How before we get to the game, how did these

teams arrive at this point? For the Buffalo Bills in the thousand season, Doug Flutie was entering his second year as starter after his Electric Folk Hero debut the year before. Flutie comes back from the CFL after being away for years. He is amazing. He is incredibly smart, he makes plays, he throws in lanes, and Flutie flakes were everywhere, and Doug Flutie was the cult icon in the National Football League. But Doug Flutie versus Rob Johnson wouldn't go away because

they got Doug Flutie as a flyer. Rob Johnson is someone that the Buffalo bill said, Hey, we gotta go get him because when he was in relief of Mark Brunell a couple of years before with the Jacksonville Jaguars, he played pretty well. So after the nineties seven season, the Bills trade a first and fourth rounder and they signed Rob Johnson for five years and twenty five million dollars, which is a really big contract for a quarterback back then.

So they were invested in him no matter what. And this is the crazy part, Mike that I remember is that as good as Flute he was, and you couldn't go anywhere without talking about Flute and and and how much he meant to the game and what a big story was. But still in Buffalo they wanted Rob Johnson to play. Yeah, it felt like every week Flute was playing for his job in Buffalo, when in the rest of the league. He was a superstar because, hey, the Bills made a big move for Rob Johnson. They looked

pretty bad if he could win the starting job. Well, it wasn't winning with style, right, there's different levels. We live in Los Angeles right reside here. When the Lakers are good, there's gotta be some flare to it. Right. The whole campaign that the Clippers put together of you know, the mean streets versus the league lights or and all of those nonsensical billboard even though you went and got two of the top five players in the game, you

know that. You know, we're street tough versus the Lakers. Man, it's high flying, it's showtime all around. In Buffalo. They wanted a little bit of that. That's what Rob Johnson was supposed to bring them, right. The guy with the big arm as opposed to Doug Flutie while we had the Hail Mary from his college days in the pros, you know, made some plays with his legs, extended drives, but wasn't a big explosive offensive threat. And people kept wondering, well,

this is good. But with the big armed guy that we spent so much to get, perhaps it could be even that much more dominant, So when are we going to pull the trigger? So yeah, every week was that debate. You know, how how much and how well did he have to play to retain that job. So Flutie plays well in ninety nine, he goes ten and five and the Bills clinch a playoff spot. And now Flutie wasn't as great as he was his first year. But the

big thing the Buffalo defense was really good. They allowed the second fewest points in the NFL low in franchise history, to nine. This is Ted Washington in the middle of that defense and Sam Cowart who was phenomenal, and the Bills had a really good young defense and thousand was their big coming out party. But they go ten and five and they have a meaningless final week game against Indianapolis. Now Indianapolis was terrific this year. They had won eleven

games in a row. What happens, Well, with nothing to play for, the Bills decide, well, we're gonna start Rob Johnson this game and rest Doug Flutie. What happens Buffalo ends Indianapolis is eleven game win streak thirty one to six. Rob Johnson throws for two eighties, seven and two touchdowns. Okay, well that's nice. He had a nice final week game Week sixteen. Except Buffalo. After seeing this, the Bills bench Doug Flutie for Johnson for the playoffs. The players were stunned,

they were pissed. I can't blame him. Wade Phillips, head coach of the Buffalo Bills, said afterward that Ralph Wilson, the owner, ordered him to make the chain. I mean, Flutie always won more than Rob Johnson. Right, Johnson got hurt when he got the job. Flutie came in and was great. Flutie was great in ninety nine. Then when you get into two thousand, a year after, Johnson was

terrible again. I mean, it's like the Bills didn't know how good they had, and it's like, you know, they were football karma, saying, no, flute is really your guy. Every time Rob Johnson gets a chance, he gets hurt or he's ineffective, and Doug Flutie is the guy. And can you imagine making a change at quarterback solely because the guy you you picked finally had one good game and you go away from your starter the entire season. I can't believe there wasn't a mutiny for the Bills

going into the game against the Titans. Well, just the fact that Wade Phillips, Hey, it was him, he ordered me, he ordered I didn't do it. Yeah, no, he I voted for Kodos like the you he gets. Certainly, Flutie was the locker room guy, right, Everybody rallied around him. They played well. Johnson was the hot shot guy. All these years later, Right, it's still the I don't understand and that I got screwed, and and there's a lot

of negativity that flows out of it. It's like, you know, we we see it in sports all the time, and look at look back to Philadelphia. Right, there's just always this weird dynamic has gone on these last couple of years with Carson Wentz. What happened when he went down and Nick Foles went in, everybody rallied around that guy. Doesn't make sense on a larger scale, no, because when starting played, Okay had his moments, but certainly nothing like the magic of that playoff run that earned him a

statue outside the stadium. Same thing here with Doug Flutie. There was just something about him where you rally. So this always became a sticking point and today with social media, sports talk radio, sports television, uh, to the level that it is now. I mean, you'd be shunned if you you try to do this again. I mean, as an owner, this this is what it gets you to start turning over front office people, coaches, and players with great regularity

because you're hearing it from all ends. Yeah, this is something that, if it was now, would dominate sports talk radio every week. Can you believe that the bill still want to play Rock Johnson all Doug Fluti does his win and he has spark plug plays, and he runs for first downs on third and fifteen and makes clutch throws to the end zone on on fade patterns. I mean, it would be it wouldn't make sense that this would be going on. And we'll be talking about it all

the time. But this is the drama the Bills carried with them into the wild card game against the Titans. Now, the Titans had a great year, all right. They cruised through the regular season. It was the first year they were the Titans. You know, they drafted Javon Curse, who turned into a superstar player for a few years. They went thirteen and three. Eddie George was a stud. This was one of those solid, all around quintessential heritage NFL teams that you would see going to Super Bowls in

the seventies and eighties. Boy, they got a really good defense, they got a really good running game, they got a quarterback and makes play is They get everything they need. Jeff Fisher is is a young up and coming head coach. You know before he was, oh my god, Jeff Fisher. Seriously, this is when Jeff Fisher was, Oh Jeff Fisher. We gotta go get Jeff Fisher. And they go thirteen and three. But Jacksonville goes fourteen and two, so that relegates the

Titans into the wild card game. Steve McNair, as great of a reputation as he had on the field as a playmaker, didn't have a great season. All right. The Titans didn't score a ton of points. He only threw twelve touchdowns, you know, when he ran for eight, which would put his total up, you know, respectable twenty. He also only played in eleven games because McNair was a guy that had tough time staying healthy and really the spark plug. And I can't believe I'm saying this because people.

I remember what he was like with the Jets. But nil o'donald started five games when you thought his career was over all, right, what you go to the Jets and you fail, your career is done. But no, no, no, he comes in relief of McNair, starts five games, throws ten touchdowns in five games. All right, that's to lesson McNair in six less games. So o'donald was really good. The Marcus Mariota, Ryan Tannehill winging around kind of idea, right,

But still McNair was the starter. He was beloved, and he was you know, and he still look he engineered them to a lot of wins. It was nice to have o'donald in relief. So when the wild card game comes, McNair is the quarterback. But it's not like this was a team that boy Tennessee put up a lot of points. You know, this was Tennessee is winning all around solid play, and now we're gonna see what can they do in

the playoffs? How far can this take them? So the Titans, who were eight no at home and healthy, match up against the Bills and what turns into the Music City miracle Coming up next will relive the play, the game, and the crazy things that actually made it possible that I still can't believe twenty years later. That's coming up next right here on Special Teams. We're continuing on with Special Teams as we look back at the Music City Miracle.

The special teams involved the Bills and the Tennessee Titans, and we'll get to the Music City Miracle play coming up in a couple of minutes. But this playoff game that was won by the Titans sixteen and what he's going down with one of the most famous plays in NFL history. In fact, you could probably say, outside of the Immaculate Reception, this is the next most famous play

in NFL history. We've seen it a million times and we've broken it down, but this play, the big home run throwback and Frank why Chick just has some kind of place mythologically. But to say that this was a great game was a bit of a misconception because this game, like this was a terrible game. This is one of those games you watch and go, well, it's an NFL playoff aim on TV, so I'm gonna watch it. I mean, it really had everything was in that final Music City

Miracle play. Oh no, absolutely, it was a lot of build up. At least you got the big finish to it, because I mean when when you're big plays earlier, I think I took a safety. Really, that's that's the guy you're fighting. Yeah, we got a safety. He takes the safety. And yes you celebrate because everybody stands up, does the I Dream a Genie dance and does all that with it.

That you get a little bit excited there, but certainly it's it's not one that inspires great, great confidence overall as to what your offense is bringing to the table. And he got a scoreless first quarter and Buffalo doesn't get out of the gates. This game can be summarized with this sentence. Steve McNair through for seventy six yards in this game. Yeah, Rob Johnson threw for one thirty one and he actually had a worst game the McNair.

You're talking about the two starting quarterbacks that combined in a playoff game to throw for two yards. All right, now, Johnson, like I said, he was worse. He was ten out of twenty two. He got sacked six times and he fumbled three times. What's the biggest shock is that, you know, this is how much from above this game with Ralph Wilson, because as bad as they struggled, Doug Flute was never

put into the game. He doesn't get off the badch How do you not get in the game when Rob Johnson is this bad and and and you have no offense for three and a half, three and two thirds quarters in this game. And because Flutie had played so well during the year, that's the thing, right, It's not like he was hurt or that he'd been grossly ineffective to where you had a true competition even though you're

making the playoffs and you're and you're pushing forward. I mean, he played well for you, and he's sitting there just on the on the bench. Hey, someone just hied his helmet. He's not getting in. I mean that that's I mean, I look at it now. So there's no way they wouldn't go to Flutie if was not bad. There's no way they wouldn't have done. You know, if that, if that was the decision to be made by Wade Phillips, there's there's no question about it. I mean that that's

done at the end of the first quarter, if not before. Yeah, it's it's it's field goals, field goals, field goals. And this game comes down to the end, the final couple of minutes. Let's just say the final couple of minutes, because we had some drama before the Music City Miracle. Buffalo was down. Well that's the other thing, is that as badly as they played there in the game. Yeah, no, no, no, they were in the game. You're right, Buffalo as bad as they were, but their defense was really good. So

was the Titans. And that's why, you know, I wanted to make sure we mentioned that the Bill's defense is really the hallmark of this team as much as it was Flute. He was, like I said, Ted Washington was a big dude man and you couldn't move him and coward and you had a lot of talent on on that Bill's defense, and they were really tough to score on. So the fact that this was that kind of game

is really not that shocking. But when you can't put any offense on the board and your quarterback is getting sacked what they called Johnson robosack, you know, because you know he couldn't stop getting sacked. He was staying in the pocket and get hit. I mean, you have to make a move. You try to, you know, get a get up, some kind of spark on your offense, but they stick with Rob Johnson, and Johnson actually gets Buffalo the sixteen fifteen lead right there, down by two with

a minute forty eight left to go. Right because you're you're talking field goals, field goals, field goals. Rob Johnson throws for a big first down without a shoe on to get Buffalo to the twenty four yard line, and now you're getting inside a minute. He had lost a shoe the play before, he couldn't put it back on. He throws for a big first down, and now with twenty seconds left, Buffalo's got the football at the twenty four yard line of the Titans. They're down by a

field goal. Twenty seconds left, the Bills have no time outs. And this is where things get interesting. Why don't the Bills have any time outs? Well, because they burned one the previous drive on defense because they were all yelling at each other because the Titans had the lead and and they were trying to run the clock out, and the Bills lost their composure and they had to use the time out when they didn't have the ball. Just to hey, hey, guys, let's cooler heads prevail here. Let's

make sure we stopped them. Now, it worked, they stopped there and got the ball back, but they had no timeouts because of this. So the Bills are now faced with twenty seconds left in the game. They have first down at the twenty four yard line. Now this is an eternity, right, and if this was now in the National Football League teams, it's all right. We got plenty of time. We can run a play anywhere we want to.

We can throw the ball to either whatever we want to do and get inside the twenty, get inside the ten and run up, spike it and then come out and kick a field goal. I mean, twenty seconds is an eternity to do that. All you have to do is hope Rob Johnson doesn't get sacked. And you know, look Rob Johnson liked to get sacked. But still yeah, but still you would think they would now they would

run a play easy a league. No, the Bills decide instead of that, we are going to kick the field goal with twenty seconds left, Whereas conventional wisdom now says, we'll run a play, we'll get up there, we'll let the clock tick down to two or three seconds because we have no time out, so it doesn't matter with a bad snap. We can't just call time out and try to kick the ball again on the next play. So we let it go down to two or three seconds, called time out, and we kicked the game winner on

the final play. That's what every team would do, but the Bills didn't do it. Many of the coaches on the sideline wanted the Bills to call run another play, but Wade Phillips said, no, I want to send out Steve Christie to try to kick this field goal. And now there are few kickers that were that were as accurate as Steve Christie. Christie gets on the field makes it forty one yards out. Bills have the lead with

twenty seconds left. Rob Johnson looks like a hero. All the Bills have to do is defend for sixteen seconds and things are gonna be great. But now you're seeing some of the things that played into the fact why the Music City Miracle was able to happen. Bad lock management,

yelling at each other on defense. You go back and watch the video and it's laughable because we see that in games, and now it doesn't force you to call time out, might be a busted play, might be a little out of position, whatever, but your management is usually a little bit better than that. So then we get the Music City miracle and we get the home run throwback and Frank white check throws it back to Kevin Dyson who catches the lateral and goes seventy five yards

for a touchdown. Uh. I remember when this happened, watching it live. I was producing uh sports for KBC here in l A. We were going on the air after the game was over and we had a big football show going on. We're saying to ourselves, I'm like, man, this is a terrible game. What the hell are we gonna talk about? We got this, we got field goals. It's you know, it's all right, but we can talk about it's a terrible game. But it's still the one point game, right right, but still but it's like, okay,

you're looking for some kind of excitement. This has been a crappy game. And then the Music City miracle happens and Dyson goes in for a touchdown, and this all kinds of questions, is the play? Is the play legal? Are they gonna can they all go back and and and look at there was all these different things that we were wondering because it happens like, oh my god, really, just take one throwback to the other side and and

Dicon goes all the way for a touchdown. Because that's what that's what it came to me, was that we've seen crazy plays before, and we've seen touch on. Look the Dolphins touchdown to beat the Patriots on the on the final play a couple of years ago. But you see a lot of change of directions and and and players moving, and then you get too many people on one side of the field, and there's a couple of blocks that are thrown. But this is after the play

change direction two or three times. This was just here's a kick to white Check, who picks it up, throws it across the field, and there's nobody there because Bills have no one there and diceon. It's not like Dyson's gotta run and make this incredible uh play, or there's any more laterals. He's got a convoy all the way to the end zone. So I'm like, how did that happen? Did the Bills just think they were gonna go down the field like zombies and and just and and the Titans,

we're gonna fall on the football. I mean, even if you're staying in your lane on the kickoff team, which is what you're supposed to do in a situation like this. Believe me, I was a kickoff team star in high school. And you've talked about it's really been on hands and everything. I always stayed in my lane. I did not know even if you stayed you're listening to LaVar Ball before you knew, you were listening to lay in yo lane. And even if you do that, you're gonna make a

play on Dipe. But there's nothing even close to a play on Dison on this even close. No, He's able to stroll straight in and it's it all just becomes a You start arguing. He's like, well, we knew the play should have been disallowed. Was the only defense that you had for a lackluster effort to get after Dyson and make any type of play on this? Uh? Is, Well, it was an illegal pass, so it shouldn't account it. So we didn't run after him as hard as we

should have or any anything of that nature. But yeah, caught with their pants down on special teams in a big way because white Check runs all the way to the right side of the field, and all the bills they broke containment, and it's do you really, Frank white Check is not gonna run by all of you into the end zone. Okay, if white Check's got the football, you just gotta wait. He'll run. He'll find you eventually.

All right. The guy's a tight end, but they all broke contain was able to throw it all the way back to the other side of the field. Dyson goes in for a touchdown, and then they stopped because they had to look at it to see if the play was a lateral because if it was, obviously the Titans

get penalized for the legal forward pass. And the referee who is gonna make this decision is Phil Luckett, who you know from all kinds of other controversies, the the the coin flip and Thanksgiving with the Steelers and the Lions, the Vinny Testa Verdi touchdown against the the Seahawks, in all kinds of Phil Lucket stuff that there were, and he was the referee in this game, and he really doesn't even have a role in it because as we

see by replays that we've seen hundreds of times. It looks in every angle we've seen to be a clear lateral. Is one of those rare plays that it goes right along a plane and that's a legal play. It's been dissected so many different ways, right, and you wish you had more cameras. You wish you had this that the other. From all analysis, it works. It stands up one of the more controversial plays of recent memory and one that always gets replay conversations and people wringing their hands about

the whole concept. Right, not not the result of this particular play, but what it means on a larger scale when we get deep into this for football, baseball, whatever it is. But play that is now one of the most famous, as you say on the metal stand for all of NFL history and legend making and career and franchise defining on so many levels. And the reason they're able to review this is because instant replay had come back to the NFL just this year. There were some

miscalls and games that that fans are upset about. There was a big push for review. In fact, Jerry rice Is non fumble call in the wild card game between the Niners and the Packers that was the play that really convinced the NFL that all right, we gotta have replay now. So they have replay in for n And what Phil Luckett is looking at is he's looking at justice see if it is a lateral, it's called a lateral.

And Dyson in pre in interviews afterwards said he thought about going out of bounds because they needed just a field goal to win the game, and there was all kinds of time left right because they kicked off with sixteen too much time on the lock. But for that's never been said ever. Rob Johnson never didn't even get But Dyson said, the only guy that had shot at

me was Steve Christie, and we were blocking him. So I'm just gonna run into the end zone and that's that's what he did, and the Music City miracle happens, and the Titans win and they use this as a huge run to the super Bowl, and the Bills are going home saying what happened to us? But really it's it's you know, they didn't execute on the play, but it was everything leading up to it. There were three or four things they could have done that could have

stopped this play from happening. Don't have to worry about using your time outs when you're yelling at each other on defense. Uh, you know, let the clock tick down, run another play, do something, because had they just run another play and let's say they spiked it with you know, eight seconds left or ten seconds left, Dyson's probably running out of bounds. Oh my god, if I don't get in the end, no no, no, no no, no, maybe he's

he's okay this eight. I gotta get out. We gotta kick the game winning field goal to try to win. Just that psychology, all those things the Bills could have done, and instead they did none of them, and they allowed this play to happen. I mean, it's fascinating to look at it from the Bill's perspective. Buffalo, Yo, all of that disaster, all of those failures throughout the game. Yet wait, and the defense kept them in, made just enough plays

except well, one fail. So the Titans go on to the super Bowl, the Bills go to the off season. What happened with both of these teams, Well, it was the end of an absolute error for one of them, and another one well, let's just say the fortunes of the NFL changed forever because the home run throwback went for a touchdown that's coming up next on special teams. So America is gasping at one of the most thrilling

ends to a football game in NFL history. And as we said many times in the podcast, it's going down to one of the top two or three plays of all time. What did this game? What did this result mean for both teams? Well, for the Bills, it was really the end of the Bill's era. I mean, these teams that we watched go to the Super Bowl year after year after year in the early nineteen nineties. It was the last year for Bruce Smith, Andre Reid, and

Thurman Thomas. At this point they were not quite spare parts, but these were the veterans that are that had seeded the way two younger players. Look, the Bills had gone to Antoine Smith at running back, and you know, these guys were done. They were all released after the season for salary cap reasons. So this really was the end of that era of the Bills up even though Jim Kelly had left a quarterback. You know a few years ago, Buffalo actually goes through one more year with both Doug

Flutie and Rob Johnson the quarterback. I mean, how insane is this? They say, no, No, we're gonna go one more year with both of these guys. They finally commit to Rob Johnson and trade Flutie to San Diego after two thousand, Right, all right, finally Rob's our guy and we're gonna move on. Well. Rob Johnson with a concussion and a rib injury and a leg injury in two thousand,

a broken collarbone in two thousand one. Could never stay healthy, couldn't keep the job, always held on to the football way too long, got sacked way too much, and the Bills eventually had to start completely over again. This shows you what happens when you're going a downward spiral when you picked the wrong quarterback. Because it was like, I feel like the Bills they had this in front of them, they fluty, what about john Tonana? But fluty na, what

about all right? It's like the football God said, listen, we we've given the Bills all kinds of signs. They're not taking them now. They got to start over again, and it took the Bills a long time to get back. Took him a long time to get back to the playoffs, which they didn't do until a couple of years ago. Yeah, I think that's the curiosity of it, right, is you're always trying to figure out what's the how long is

the tail on the back end? Right when you do your statistics and you see you know how you how you roll through? What what are you gonna get for fluty? How long does it ride? Well? But it's working, right. You want to make sure you've got the competent backup, but you don't want to create the controversy and problems and instead what you have here because you paid money, you feel compelled that he's got to be on the field,

or at least that's the thought for management. So it just creates an unnecessary distraction in the locker room and problem on the field, as we see, because well he was never that guy. He was not the guy to lead them forward. And who's to say how long flute he's rain would have been. But certainly you do what they play, other players did when he was on the field, what he meant to that city, and you just tore that asunder. Now for the Titans, they go on to

the Super Bowl before losing to the Rams. With one of the other most top five most famous plays in the NFL history Mike Jones tackle on the final play of the game and the Titans fall a yard short of potentially going to overtime. The Rams win the Super Bowl. But if you're the Titans, you go, all right, well, we had one incredible play that went our way. I think, you know, Lady Luck kind of was, you know, drew us even at the end of the Super Bowl. But

still that moment became so huge. It's still the big It's in team history, the Music City Miracle and that team and that Titans team of thousand is always going to be legendary. But here's where things get really interesting, because you know, we say once in a while there are flashpoints. So there are moments in the history of sports where if one result goes one way, just one play goes one way, then NFL history changes. And it's

incredible to think that way. But you know, we we talked about this on our radio show earlier this year when Don Shula passed away, had the Jets one Super Bowl three, everything changes, you know, the a f L. If the Jets don't win, they don't merge with the NFL. Don Shula probably stays as head coach in Baltimore, doesn't go to Miami, and Miami maybe doesn't go undefeated win the Super Bowl back to back years, and maybe the Colts franchise doesn't move and maybe Elway plays there instead

of Denver, and you know all these things happen. Well, yeah, and then Shula was in the middle of it again with the fake Spike games. You know, will well, well, I promise you will do the fake Spike game in a future episode. Carroll and everything else. It's the same. It's the same idea. Yeah, I'm sorry, I I I get it. It's just you know, I need to be in the right frame of mind to do it, to go through. Understand. And that Kevin Diyson was also in

both these plays. It's kind of exactly. You know, Dyson is the big hero and then he's one yard short at the end, but clearly he was one yard short or half the yard short, and it was boy, he went from I can't believe my fortune too, I can't believe my fortune. Yeah. But let's just say the Music City miracle goes the other way and the Buffalo Bills

win the game. All right, Let's just say Phil Luckett decides dah looked like the ball in a little bit forward, so he all right, I'm gonna say that that's a forward pass. The Bills win the game. If that happens, NFL history changes because Rob Johnson wins a playoff game and he is cemented in as the Buffalo Bill started. I don't know how far they go in the playoffs, but he clearly is the starter. Buffalo commits to him and they move on from Doug Flutie then, and they

trade him when Flutie has got a lot of value. Now, if they trade Flutie after that offseason, then the Chargers don't get him after two thousand So do the Chargers still draft Drew Brees after that? Or they have a different situation at quarterback because they don't have Flutie, because Flutie goes someplace else, and maybe Breeze is not a Charger, which means maybe then he doesn't wind up with the

New Orleans Saints and that changes. Or maybe the Chargers decide, well, we didn't really solve our quarterback problem because we don't have Doug Flutie, so maybe we'll take Michael Vick with the first overall pick in the two thousand and one draft, and maybe then Ladanian Tomlinson winds up with another team, and all of these things push all these star players

in a whole bunch of different directions. Now, maybe maybe things do happen a little bit, you know, alongside those lines, but still without Doug Flutie going to the Chargers a year eater, then maybe things change and Vic is on the Charges in LaDainian tomlinsons somewhere else and he's going to the Hall of Fame as somewhere as with another team, and you know, all those dominoes fall that way. But he never becomes a Jet, so you don't get to claim him as a Jet. Maybe the Jets trade up

and get him early. We had him for his entire career. Wow, how about that? Maybe they do. But yeah, it just shows the it's a game of inches. We we joke about that on Sundays and we talk about the margin of victory. Right, It's most games are seven points are fewer. And the National Football League and here you're talking about three ft less than three ft change the fortunes of a lot of top picks and where they ended up with their careers, and be curious to throw this theory

up at them. So through our Fox family, I think we're gonna have to uh start knocking on some doors. Hey, we talked about this. What do you think. I don't even think life would have been like if we If this is how it going down, well I still got one more for you, and it affects the current National Football League. Right, So Jeff Fisher is still up and coming head coach Jeff Fisher. They go to the Super Bowl and Jeff Fisher gets to stay with the Titans

four years now. I mean he goes all you know, I mean he goes all the way through to as the Titans head coach. He never got to the levels that he got to go to the Super Bowl in that year. So let's just say he loses that playoff game. Jeff Fisher's resume doesn't look as great as it was, right, So does he really make it to his head coach of the Titans. Probably not, So the Titans hire somebody else.

Jeff Fisher goes someplace else, and maybe Jeff Fisher is not coaching the Rams, who then replaced him with Sean McVeigh and he gets them to the super Bowl and turns the Rams into a super relevant team. So this is you're going back twenty years with one play. Maybe the Rams don't get to the super Bowl two years ago because of it. I mean about that, and it never becomes an issue on our show with Eric Dickerson where they've got a call for his ouster Jason Cole

or any of our friends of the show. In terms of what it all meant with Jeff Fisher, yeah, I mean, because you know, going to a super Bowl, he generally buys you a couple of years. Sometimes you have owners that are a little quicker with the trigger finger, or or a guy leaves and doesn't get that legacy because he gets the better offer and bolts. But yeah, for Jeff Fisher, this bought him a lot of time. He was the guy that you know, was successfully moving teams

and all that other stuff to buy him. And he was on the competition committee. You don't forget that. Always forget he was there. Yes, he was there. Yeah, So that helps. So let's play it out, because this tells you about Jeff Fisher is that they go thirteen and three this year and they go to the Super Bowl and lose. Well, they go thirteen and three the next year, but they lose in the first round of the playoffs. Then they go seven and nine Jeff Fisher's first seven

and nine year. Uh. Then they're eleven and five and twelve and four and things are still pretty good. But then in two thousand four, two thousand five, two thousand six, Fisher goes five at eleven four and twelve, eight and eight. At this point, does Fisher still keep his job? Because if that gets you bounce, if you don't have that Super Bowl, you're saying, well, we've been to the playoffs four times, but we haven't really gotten in very far,

and we haven't been there in three years. And Vince Young is in now and he's the offensive rookie of the year, so maybe now is it time to make a change at head coach. And so then Jeff Fisher is out of their years earlier, which means, as I said, he gets a job someplace else, in someplace else, and maybe he doesn't end up with the Rams and then ending up with Sean mcvagh succeeding him. Yeah, Domino's fall, no question about it, because five at eleven, four and twelve,

those two years you're done. You're done. That Super Bowl is already five years, six years in the rear view, mirror, and even though you got back to another a f C title game, you lost that one off at eleven and five season, and then a divisional game against the Patriots two thousand three after another twelve and four season. So I mean, you you had everything stats, you dominated the regular season. Then it couldn't get over. You know, you don't get anymore. Super Bowl bought him, but another

four years beyond that, I mean, it's amazing. Alright, Mike, how'm a little where are they now from the Music City Miracle game? What do you got for us? All right, let's have a little bit of fun. You've got Jason Fisks, defensive tackle. He's an AP chemistry teacher in Vacaville, California. Really, I was terrible at AP chemistry. I was off. I'm like, just right sixty because I'll do enough work to pass, but I'm not gonna do any better than just let

me through succeeds. Yeah, he was a Stanford grad. So smart guy went back to northern California getting it done. You got Dusty Ziegler, Benny. This takes two prongs. The first part decided, Hey, I'm gonna run for Republican and a Republican ticket for a county commission her seat in Georgia. And then after all of that process of being involved in that sphere, well he became an offensive line coach. So there you have Kurt Schultz, the safety. So he

was good. He works for Merrill Lynch and since Kevin Dyson is the man on display, I mean in the hero and well the guy that you had to hug after being one yard short, he got his m s d. And then he works at a middle school where he is the principal grassling in Franklin, Tennessee. Wow, do you think the kids can up and go hey, Mr Dyson? They put their arm out like they're trying to cross the gold line. He came up with a great dance

number for this assembly. What's this? The whole the whole motto for our year is don't be one yard short from by You know, I remember being the Super Bowl we finished one yard short. Don't let this happen to you. Uh So there it is our look back at the Music City Miracle all the dramas surrounding it. If you have an idea for a future episode of Special Team Today, drop us note. Let us know Twitter at how about

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