When Buffalo pulled within a few points, the pressure was just too much for an overhyped and underachieving Oilers team - which relied on a gimmick offense - and it eventually cracked. Buffalo, the two-time defending AFC champs, used that cockiness as motivation to keep chipping away at the lead. I’m sure you’ve heard the prevailing narrative: Houston got cocky after jumping out to a big lead. At the very least, you know what happened. If you were an NFL fan who grew up in the 1990s, you’re probably familiar with the story of the Bills erasing a 32-point deficit to beat the Oilers. It certainly wasn’t the case in 1993, when the Bills pulled off the biggest comeback in the history of the NFL playoffs. Instead of saying so-and-so choked or t he losing team just didn’t want it enough, we can point to a particular strategic decision or an illuminating metric as an explanation for why things went the way that they did. Now we have film breakdowns and advanced metrics readily available not long after a game’s conclusion. We no longer have to rely solely on national columnists for a post-mortem on a particular game. While the hot takes are more amplified than ever, there’s more competition for the sports fan’s attention. At the very least, it’s a more enlightened age.
I believe we’re currently in a golden age of coverage. That’s not to say sports coverage was better three decades ago. I’m almost happy that it didn’t happen in this age of sports media. The game was fuel for the hottest of takes. Whoever 1993’s version of Skip Bayless was - it may have been Skip Bayless, now that I think about - would have combusted on live television after firing off a stream of incoherent opinions. The Frank Reich-Jim Kelly debate would have torn #BillsMafia apart. Oilers fans would have demanded coach Jack Pardee be fired on the spot after Steve Christie’s game-winning field goal cleared the uprights in overtime, giving the Bills a 41-38 win in a game they had once trailed 35-3. NFL Twitter would have descended into madness at about the two-minute mark of the third quarter.
It would have dominated the sports conversation for an entire week.
The Bills-Oilers wild card game in 1993 had it all. Multiple questionable calls that ultimately turned the result of the game. A backup quarterback - with a history of leading improbable comebacks - had done it again. A new (at least for the NFL) offensive system that had been under scrutiny by real football men had failed on the playoff stage, as those real football men had predicted.
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