Todd the CLOD! I hear he's a Wall Street guy and very successful... But a NYJ "LEGEND?" Please aren't we stretching it QUITE a bit? The guy finished with more interceptions than TD's for the Jets and in his career. He always choked in the big game. Most of his success came in losing efforts...remember when he set the record for completions in a LOSING effort - dumping off to Clark Gaines until Gaines' knee finally blew out? The Mud Bowl is the pefect example of a guy who couldn't lead, and couldn't come up big in the clutch. Choke is the word I think of when I think of Richard Todd. That and two other words - Injury Prone. The guy was hurt so often and couldn't play. Legend? Heck, he's not even on the board for best NYJ all Time QB's. He doesn't rate with Namath, O'Brien, Chad, Boomer or even Vinny. Oh, when he flipped off the crowd, I wrote him off. F-Him!
BTW - the 1976 NFL Draft SUCKED! You have to go down to Round 3 pick86 to Jackie Slater to find a Pro Bowler not picked before Todd. Hall of Famer Harry Carson went in Round 4 pick 105. Steve Largent went 117. Carl Hairston Round 7 #191. The Jets chose Richard Todd #6 that year, after - LeRoy Selman, Steve Neihaus, Chuck Muncie, Joe Washington, and Michael Haynes. Selman and Haynes are HOF'ers. No other QB in that draft made anything of themselves.
The 82 team was the best Jets team post Namath. The back to back playoff wins agaisnt the Bengals and the Raiders were among the best played Jets games in the franchises history and Todd was great in both of them. Other than that he pretty much was very mediocre. As Bob Trumpy used to say about Richard Todd, "it's a tragedy the way he always taps the ball before throwing it"
Todd was better than O'Brien and Boomer. Todd played with some pretty bad Jets teams early in his career. Todd won some big games for the Jets. In the regular season in 1981 he beat Miami and Green Bay (who was playing for a playoff spot too) to get into the playoffs. In 1982 he beat the heavily favored Bengals and Raiders in the playoffs, and those were away games. O'Brien NEVER won a playoff game. He was even benched in 1986 before the playoffs. The guy was tough, but he was a tackling dummy. Boomer never lead the Jets to the playoffs and never even had a winning record in any of his seasons with the Jets. It's not all about stats! I agree, Todd failed in the Mud Bowl, but we wouldn't have been even close in the 1981 playoff game against Buffalo if it wasn't for him.
One of my earliest childhood memories is watching a Jets game with my father and uncle, and my uncle cursing a blue streak at Richard Todd before remembering he was in the presence of a three-year-old.
Awesome post, Kronenberg! I completely agree. Todd began his years with the Jets when they were the absolute worst team in the league, and helped to build them into a contender and just one game away from the Super Bowl. O'Brien already had a good team when he took over. Todd is completely underrated when you see where the franchise was when he took over. Look at Favre right now. Even the greats stink when you have no talent around you.
Excellent points. I wasn't aware of the no timeouts, which obviously makes him running it very risky.
If you look back at 1983, it's one of the strangest seasons ever in Jets history, for Todd and the Jets. Todd played great in beating the JOE MONTANA led 49'ers, who were in the midst of their dynasty, in San Francisco,,, beat the high flyin San Diego, Dan Fouts led Chargers in San Diego, beat a very good Rams team led by Eric Dickerson, beat a playoff calibar New Orleans team, in New Orleans on MNF, crushed Buffalo on MNF, crushed New England one game. SOUNDS LIKE A GREAT SEASON. PROBLEM WAS THAT THIS VERY TALENTED TEAM LOST TO NUMEROUS TEAMS THEY SHOULD HAVE BEATEN AND RIDICULOUSLY ENDED UP AT 7-9. WALTON COACHED THIS TEAM AWFULLY THAT SEASON AND TODD WASN'T HALF AS GOOD AS HE WAS THE PREVIOUS TWO SEASONS.
Todd played on some of the most talented teams in franchise history and was surrounded by very good talent almost every year he took any significant snaps.
Yes, 1983 was a strange year, alot of bad luck starting with the home opener at Shea against Seattle...very hot day, the Jets and the fans are pumped, the Jets punt early, Seattle fumbles the ball, the Jets pick it up and run it in for a TD and everyone is going crazy. Oh -wait a minute- the refs decide it was not a fumble- the most ridiculous call of the year for those who remember. the Jets wind up turning the ball over about seven times, the last coming on a deflected INT with the Jets driving for the tying TD. The next week in Foxboro, the Jets are run over by RB Tony Collins to the tune of 230 yards, now the Jets are very suddenly 1-2. Three weeks later in Cleveland, the Jets are 3-2 but forget how to score, they finally tie the game 7-7 with under two minutes left, but the Browns manage to kick a long Fg at the gun to win 10-7. The Browns TD was scored by former Jet Bobby Jones... At 3-4, following a beating at Shea by the Dolphins, the Jets blow a 21-0 lead in the rain to the Falcons losing 27-21 on a couple of long punt returns by Billy 'White Shoes' Johnson...... After the upset of the 49ers the Jets come home for back to back games against the Colts and Bills needing both for a real playoff shot -they blow both games in the final minutes..the Colts score a gift TD in the fourth quarter on a deflected ball off the hands of CB Jerry Holmes into the hands of a Colts receiver for a TD and then Johnny Lamm Jones drops a potential TD pass on fourth down with less than a minute left...against the Bills, the Jets are in FG range with less than two minutes to play only to have RB Dewayne Crutchfield fumble, the Bills scored the game winning TD on the ensuing drive. The Jets did win their next three games but then were blown out by the Steelers in their final game in Shea Stadium to ensure a playoff-less season. Very, very dissapointing with all the talent.
Yes, I must agree. I still say, and will always say, that Shula deliberately had the field tarp removed so it could take in as much water as possible because he new Todd was not a mudder. I will always think of Shula as one of the most unsportsmanlike coaches of all time and should have never been put in the HOF; just like Pete Rose. Bottom line.......he fixed the game; he is scum.
I think it was more about the speed of Wesley Walker and Lam Jones, and the cutback ability of Freeman McNeil, who led the league in rushing that year. Miami's Andra Franklin was second, but he was a bigger back and much more effective in that kind of game. It wasn't so much about stopping Richard Todd.
Bob trumpy was a complete dickhead with that whole tapping the ball bullshit. "Tragedy?" What a tool.
Also true, and Shula is still scum. I say you beat a team fair and square, mostly like the Patriots do all the time; the Pats beat you because they always seem to force a weakness and cause an error by the other team at the most inopportune time. We will forego the Brady quasi-fumble in the Raiders game; besides that's the refs bad call; it is not deliberately changing field conditions to fix the game, i.e. Shula.
