GLENDALE, Ariz. – Super Bowl MVP Patrick Mahomes minimize by means of the cigar smoke in Sunday night time’s successful Chiefs locker room, sprinting to embrace teammates, employees members and coaches, with all eyes on what the NFL’s king would do subsequent.
“Don’t you spill that champagne on me now!” Mahomes joked as he hurried previous the receivers to his locker, then threw a wrestling title belt over his proper shoulder.
Professional soccer is Mahomes’ world now. Everyone else is simply dwelling in it:
Five straight AFC title sport appearances. Three Super Bowl journeys within the final 4 years. Two championships. Two league MVP awards. Two Super Bowl MVP awards.
And that man, together with future Hall of Fame coach Andy Reid, selected former Giants receiver Kadarius Toney because the goal for his or her go-ahead-for-good landing goal within the fourth quarter of their 38-35 Super Bowl LVII victory over the Philadelphia Eagles at State Farm Stadium.
“It’s really surreal,” Toney stated with a smile. “You dream about moments like that, and I got to live it.”
That wasn’t even Toney’s greatest second, both. He set a Super Bowl document minutes later with a 65-yard punt return to arrange one other Kansas City rating.
As destiny would have it, two former Giants performed main roles in Sunday night’s melodrama on the Arizona Cardinals’ slippery grass, and each ended the night time with tears of their eyes.
Eagles nook James Bradberry’s eyes welled up within the dropping locker room as he took duty for a killer holding penalty on Chiefs receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster with 1:48 remaining that sealed Philly’s destiny for Kansas City’s go-ahead area aim.
“He ran a pivot and wheel,” Bradberry stated. “I was just trying to get some momentum going and go back with the wheel. Of course I pulled on his jersey so they called it. I was hoping they would let it ride. But it was a holding.”
Toney, alternatively, shed tears of pleasure as pink and yellow confetti fell from the sky when the clock hit zeroes. He had simply made two of the largest performs of, as he put it, “the biggest game of my life.”
“S—t, I was crying,” Toney stated with a smile. “I was thinking about everything I’ve been through, that I’ve overcome, coming over here and winning.”
First, Toney faked a movement inside and caught a 5-yard walk-in landing from Mahomes in the proper flat for a 28-27 KC lead with 12:04 to play.
Then, after an Eagles three-and-out, Toney caught a shanked Arryn Siposs punt exterior the left hash marks, juked a couple of Philly tacklers chilly, and vanished up the proper sideline for the longest punt return in Super Bowl historical past right down to the 5-yard line.
At first, it appeared like Toney had nowhere to run as a wall of Eagles beared down, however Toney didn’t see it that manner.
“Blood in the water,” he stated with a smirk, of his ideas in that precise second. “I knew what I could do with the ball in my hand.”
Joe Judge knew what Toney might do with the ball in his hand. That’s why the Giants’ former head coach drafted him No. 20 total in 2021 after buying and selling again within the NFL Draft.
Toney flashed intermittently in New York, nevertheless, whereas struggling to remain on the sector and failing to show acceptable dedication. So Giants GM Joe Schoen traded him to Kansas City in late October for a late third-round decide and a sixth.
“I really didn’t care then, and I really don’t care now,” Toney stated of being traded.
Toney struggled to remain wholesome with the Chiefs, too. He performed just one snap in Sunday’s first half, really, after getting damage within the AFC Championship Game.
But he stayed locked in and delivered the identical form of distinctive, explosive moments that the Chiefs as soon as had in Tyreek Hill – earlier than they traded him to the Miami Dolphins – and have been trying to exchange after they acquired him.
Reid’s fast assimilation of Toney’s abilities helped, getting him a TD in his second common season sport with the crew again in November. But it meant extra to Toney how Reid trusted him by means of any ups and downs.
“He gave me an opportunity,” Toney stated. “I mean, most coaches [if] anything go[es] wrong, they hissy fit, cry and complain or whatever. Him, you mess up anything, he’ll come over there and crack a joke with you. He’s coming back to you. He’s just a coach you want to play for.”
Bradberry’s departure from the Giants final spring, after all, was a lot completely different.
He was launched as a result of the brand new Giants regime had a decrease opinion of his abilities than the earlier one, plus it saved them cash to dump his large wage cap hit.
He responded by incomes second-team All-Pro honors on a one-year contract in Philly.
“I’m sad, but I’m trying to think about the positives,” he stated Sunday.
At the identical time, he knew he had screwed up when the yellow flag got here out on that “win-or-go-home play” within the pink zone – even when, within the second, it felt just like the officers ought to have allow them to play.
“I would hope in any game that we play they would let the players decide,” Bradberry stated. “But I did pull on his jersey, so I can’t even disagree with the call. I gotta live with it.”
The actuality is also that whereas Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts (4 touchdowns, three dashing) was terrific, he did lose a fumble returned for a TD by Chiefs linebacker Nick Bolton.
Philly’s huge, dangerous cross rush manifestly recorded zero sacks. And Mahomes was an excessive amount of.
“We just gave them too many plays,” Bradberry stated. “Pat Mahomes, he made some plays in the pass game throwing it. We weren’t tight in coverage. He made plays with his legs, got them out of some sticky situations. And they also ran the ball pretty effectively, too. So we didn’t do well in all three phases.”
So it was that two former Giants skilled polar reverse feelings after an exhilarating Super Bowl. And not less than for the Giants’ sake, if Toney gave them something, he prevented the Empire State Building from being lit up in inexperienced and white on Monday.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com