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The Denver Broncos face the Cleveland Browns in the week 12 NFL schedule, and our Throwback Thursday post will relive an AFC Championship game played between these 2 teams on January 17, 1988. It was a rematch of the 1986 title game that saw the Broncos winning 23-20 in overtime after John Elway led his team on a 98 yard scoring drive to send the game into the extra period. That game would go down in NFL lore as “The Drive”, and this contest would produce another heartbreaking defeat for Cleveland that would become known as “The Fumble”.

This was the third meeting over a four year span that Denver and Cleveland would meet for the right to represent the AFC in the Super Bowl, with the Broncos winning the previous two. Once again, it appeared that Denver would have it’s way as they jumped out to a 14-0 lead behind an 8 yard Elway to Ricky Nattiel touchdown pass and a Steve Sewell 1 yard plunge. The Browns got on the scoreboard in the second quarter with a Matt Bahr field goal, but another short scoring run from Gene Lang lengthened Denver’s lead to 21-3 at halftime. The Browns, determined to reverse their luck, came alive in the third quarter. Quarterback Bernie Kosar found Reggie Langhorne on an 18 yard TD pass, but Elway countered that with an 80 yard bomb to Mark Jackson for a score. Ernest Byner, who along with Kevin Mack gave the Browns a devastating 1-2 punch in the run game, scored a pair of touchdowns, first on a 32 yard pass from Kosar and then on a 4 yard run. Suddenly the Browns were within 4 points of the lead at 28-24. Rich Karlis’ field goal stretched the Broncos’ lead back to 7 at 31-24. Early in the final quarter Kosar got his club tied at 31-31 with another touchdown pass, this time a short 4 yarder to Webster Slaughter. Elway’s 20 yard TD throw to running back Sammy Winder restored the Broncos’ lead to 7 as the game was winding down.

The determined Browns drove down the field and were within striking distance of tying the game when the infamous play happened. On second down at the Denver 8 yard line, Byner took a handoff and battled his way to the 3, where he would’ve set up first and goal. However, in trying to get into the end zone he was hit by a pair of defenders who jarred the ball loose. The Broncos recovered at the 3 yard line, and after failing to move the ball, coach Dan Reeves had his punter run out of the end zone for a safety rather than risk a blocked punt or a long return. Cleveland had one more shot but ran out of time, and the Broncos escaped with a 38-33 victory.

Byner took the fumble and the loss to heart, as the play went down in history as “The Fumble”. Karma would be kind to him, however. He was eventually traded to the Washington Redskins and would be a major contributor to a pair of Super Bowl wins for that franchise in the early 1990s.

A dejected Byner after his fumble

Two old NFL rivals, the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions, meet this week on the league schedule, and for this week’s Throwback Thursday feature we’ll harken back to the penultimate week of the regular season of 1954 for a game played between these franchises. It took place at Chicago’s Wrigley Field on December 12 of that year. Although the Lions are showing signs of life in the 2023 season, they have been NFL doormats for most of the last 60 years. That wasn’t the case in the 1950s, however. Detroit was a powerhouse club in those days, and going into this contest they had already clinched the Western Division title and a spot in the upcoming championship game. Coach George “Papa Bear” Halas’ Bears were also a force to be reckoned with in this era, but the Lions had gotten the best of them recently, winning 4 straight and 5 of the last 6 meetings.

The determined Bears came out fighting in the first half. Quarterback Zeke Bratkowski threw a 26 yard touchdown pass to Jim Dooley, then the other Chicago QB, Ed Brown, came off the bench and found Harlon Hill for a 35 yard score. Doak Walker got Detroit on the scoreboard with a field goal, but before halftime Bratkowski and Dooley hooked up again for a short TD pass and the Bears went into the locker room with a comfortable 21-3 lead. Being a proud club, the Lions didn’t die easily. Subbing for starter Bobby Layne, quarterback Tom Dubinski got his team back into the contest in the fourth quarter with a pair of touchdown hookups to Jug Girard to bring the score to 21-17. John Hoffman gave the Bears some breathing room, and the Bears’ final score, with a 19 yard touchdown run to put his team ahead 28-17.  Detroit closed the gap to 28-24 on a Dubinski touchdown toss of 40 yards to Jim Doran, but Halas’ forces hung on for the 28-24 win, breaking their losing streak against their Western Division rivals.

The Lions had one more regular season game to play after this one, as they traveled to Cleveland to meet the club they would face for the NFL championship a week later. They prevailed 14-10 to finish 9-2-1 for the year. That game didn’t mirror what would happen when those 2 teams met the next week, again in Cleveland, for the title. The Browns won the crown handily 56-10.

Bears-Lions game program from 12/12/54

The NFL is entering week 10 of it’s regular season schedule beginning tonight, and a game featured on the slate is between the Indianapolis Colts and New England Patriots. We’ll throw it back to January 21, 2007 for this week’s Throwback Thursday post, for a contest that pitted 2 of the era’s top quarterbacks, the Colts’ Peyton Manning and the Pats’ Tom Brady, in a duel for the 2006 AFC Championship and a trip to the Super Bowl.

In the first of what would be a day full of freakish touchdowns, New England’s Logan Mankins recovered a fumble in the end zone to give his team a 7-0 lead. Former Patriot Adam Vinatieri got the Colts on the board with a field goal to close out the opening quarter, but the Patriots surged in the second. Corey Dillon scored on a 7 yard run, then Asante Samuel added another off the wall TD when he picked off Manning and returned it 39 yards to the end zone for a 21-3 New England lead. It was beginning to look like another case of Brady getting the best of Manning in their rivalry. After Vinatieri closed out the first half with another field goal, another odd scoring play got the Colts to within 21-13 when Manning scored on a play he never ran, a 1 yard sneak. Indy then tied the game with a 1 yard touchdown pass from Manning to defensive tackle Dan Klecko, of all people, who was a tackle eligible on the play, and a successful 2 point conversion.

New England went the traditional route to go ahead 28-21 when Brady found Jabar Gaffney open for a 6 yard touchdown pass, but the Colts squared the score again to start the fourth quarter on another freak play – center Jeff Saturday’s end zone recovery of a fumble. The placekickers took over at that point, with Vinatieri sneaking in a 36 yarder between a pair of three pointers from New England’s Steven Gostkowski from 28 and 43 yards out. With a minute left in the contest, the Colts completed the comeback when Joseph Addai ran in from 3 yards out to give his club a 38-34 win and a trip to the Super Bowl. Although he didn’t figure in any of the scoring, Colts’ tight end Dallas Clark was an unsung hero, catching 6 passes from Manning for 137 valuable yards. Indianapolis would finish the job with a rain-soaked 29-17 win over the Chicago Bears in the big game to give Manning and coach Tony Dungy their first titles.

QB Manning at work against Pats’ defense