Jets All-Time Top 5 QBs: Guarantees and Comebacks

Chad Pennington gets feisty, Vinny Testaverde gets old, Ken O'Brien gets booed. Guess who gets the girl.

Get ready for some rough sledding, Jets fans.

1.Joe Namath

Namath has had no peer, over the long haul, in attracting crowds to stadiums. Even last year, the Jets, who play most of their home games in poor weather in November and December, sold more than 50,000 season tickets to windy Shea Stadium.

Joe Namath was one of the most visible hucksters in sports. He receives $250,000 a year from Faberge for promoting its men's cosmetics products. He has a line of Arrow shirts named for him. He has been the spokesman for popcorn makers, hamburger grills and lounging chairs.

Indeed, Namath transcended the Jets. And over the years, as more and more of the Super Bowl players left, he had become a symbol of another era. – Gerald Eskenazi, summarizing Namath’s legacy in the New York Times in March. 1977.

Imagine Justin Herbert leads the Chargers to the Super Bowl this year in an upset for the ages: he bests Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes in the playoffs, then guarantees a victory over the 49ers (who sign Tom Brady out of the broadcast booth to get them over the top) and delivers. Also, Herbert replaces Travis Kelce as Taylor Swift’s paramour, then dumps Swift for Beyonce, then dumps Beyonce for Drake. Then both Herbert’s knees explode and he’s nothing but a commercial pitchman five years from now. 

If you can imagine all of that, you get a sense of Namath’s on-field AND cultural impact in the late 1960s and early 1970s.