Professional Football Researchers Association Forum
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TanksAndSpartans wrote:I think it came up in his episode of A Football Life, but I'm not sure.
Yes, it came up on Payton's A Football Life episode. He pouted for a few minutes in the locker room until his agent told Payton to be gracious and talk to the press.
Maybe Ditka couldn't keep too many things in his head at the same time, so having Walter Payton score a TD in the Super Bowl instead of The Fridge got past him.
JWL wrote:I never understood why this was an issue. Would anyone actually elevate Payton in the all time rankings based on whether or not he scored a touchdown in a blowout game?
If the answer is "no", then there is nothing to consider here. That Payton himself seemingly had a problem is difficult for me to believe since this whole thing falls into diva category nonsense.
Since there is only Jim Brown that he could be elevated above, and that isn't going to happen, the answer is definitely a resounding no.
In the red zone, Payton had 7 runs (one negated by penalty) and a pass thrown to him. None of them happened to reach the end zone. The Bears said later that the Patriots were way overplaying Payton (remember the flow of attention he got on the long pass to Willie Gault). My feeling is that unless Payton changed his jersey number, he wasn't going to get into the end zone that day even if he had 20 attempts in the red zone.
And I think it's ludicrous to think that his not scoring a TD diminishes him one iota. However I absolutely understand his frustration that he didn't get to score, considering the sideshow players (Perry, McMahon) scored 3 TDs between them, and all that Payton had endured and given this team in his 11 seasons up to that point. But that's the way the game can go.