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You're right that most of these plays were... entirely forgettable. The thing about Hail Maries is that they're not particularly exciting taken in a vacuum as football plays. For instance, the endless lateral extravaganzas are much more fun than Hail Mary passes. It's only the surrounding circumstances (or stakes) that make them exciting. When you take the stakes away, you end up with a list of plays like these, that nobody remembers.

Of the 12 on this list, the only two I remembered were the Shaun Hill one, and like you described, the Hail Mary pass is not why one would remember that game, and also the Aaron Rodgers one, which to its credit has become one of the more iconic plays in NFL history, despite the loss, but that's got more to do with that it was thrown by an all-time great in a playoff game than the play itself.

The thing with Hail Mary passes is that it takes no inherent skill to do them. There is no pattern of great players being systematically more successful on them than poor players. It's mostly just luck, and the laws of physics. That's not fun, which is why nobody really cares about Hail Mary passes just because they're Hail Mary passes. They care about them because they're plays that dramatically swing the tide late in close games, and if a Hail Mary pass doesn't fit that description, nobody cares, and it ends up on a list like this.

Good post here Peter. This was a fun stroll down memory lane.

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Thank you for your thoughtful comment! I'm glad you enjoyed the post. You make some great points about the nature of Hail Mary plays and why they're often forgettable without high stakes. I especially like your insight about how the excitement usually comes from the context rather than the play itself. Thanks for adding to the discussion and for taking the time to share your perspective!​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

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