The future face of the NFL for the next decade or two spent overtime Sunday sidelined and yelling for a stop, hoping for a chance that never came.
Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs' offense could only watch as Tom Brady and the Patriots did their thing in 4:52 of overtime, clinching a 37-31 victory and another trip to the Super Bowl. It wasn't the first time Brady and Patriots had gotten the first possession of overtime and closed the door. Look back no further than Super Bowl LI in Houston for another stroke of fortune, where the right call on a coin flip led to an opening-possession win and epic comeback over Atlanta.
Credit coach Bill Belichick, who no doubt has consulted with both Ph.Ds in game theory and arcane masters to divine the ways of the coin flip.
Yes, that's the thing. This isn't about Pats greatness but inherent fairness. Random chance should not come under the heading "breaks of the game." This is one step away from rock-paper-scissors.
As Mahomes told reporters after the game: "It's how the coin tosses, I guess you would say."
You can argue, as some people in the NFL already are, that the Chiefs just needed a stop or to at least hold the Patriots to a field goal and prolong the game. You would also be wrong. How realistic is that after 60 minutes, a frenetic and draining fourth quarter and Brady's precision?
It's not just Brady's special talent. With the pros realizing more and more that all those crazy college offensive coaches may be onto something, an elite team scoring a touchdown on its first OT possession is not exactly challenging.
So what to do?
Unlike the apparent split-the-atom complexity of defining what constitutes a catch or blatant pass interference (sorry, New Orleans), the solution here is fairly simple: Look no further than the college rule.
Each team gets possession at the 25. First one to blink loses. Is it a perfect system? Few things are. It's kind of a bastardization of the game, although not as much as shootouts in soccer.
It's still a clear and vast improvement over the current situation and preferable to the alternatives, including playing one more 15-minute quarter.
Of course, it would take the NFL admitting that it is actually wro- ... wro- ... wrong about something and actually looking elsewhere for a workable solution.
Yes, the college rule would have to be tweaked. For regular-season games, maybe you limit each team to two possessions to break the deadlock to preserve the sacred three-hour TV window.
As numbers-cruncher Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight suggested in the aftermath, how about using the college rule but eliminating field goals as an option?
Regardless of retooling it, the college framework still works in the big picture.
Ever since Alan Ameche plowed over from the 1 in 1958 to give the Baltimore Colts an overtime win over the New York Giants and usher in a new era of football, the NFL has embraced its postseason overtime.
If you want real drama, 21st-century style, how about Texas A&M's seven-overtime win over LSU this past season? You think people may remember that for a while, too?
