He s Not Up My Butt Well Think Again
This story appeared in ESPN The Magazine's Dec. 4, 2022 event.
It's Nov. 22, 2012, a well-baked, notwithstanding Thanksgiving dark within MetLife Stadium. Surrounded past 79,088 fans, Marker Sanchez crouches confidently under eye at the 31-chiliad line, his team downwardly fourteen-0 with 9:10 to play in the second quarter. For a divide 2d, while staring across at the Patriots' defense and waiting for the snap on first down, everything is still possible for Sanchez and the Jets. The game is still up for grabs. A captive national audience is nonetheless tuned in. Sanchez even so has franchise-quarterback potential. Male monarch Ryan is still the mastermind who will guide New York'south other football squad out of a four-decade angst.
And then everything changes. Sanchez opens to his left, and fullback Lex Hilliard, who is supposed to get the handoff, flashes by on his correct. Sanchez's momentum carries him v yards into the backfield, where he pivots in his black throwback high-summit cleats and begins blindly sprinting toward the chaos at the line of scrimmage. With each step, a perfect tempest begins to course -- of characters, setting, audience, nomenclature and the burgeoning power of social media -- that will produce a corrigendum of such magnitude that it would survive the ultimate criterion for the greatest bloopers in sports: the exam of fourth dimension.
"It all went wrong when Sanchez turned the wrong way," Ryan says. "That was the first indication that it was going to be a bad play. But nosotros had no thought it was going to be a disaster."
In mere seconds, the history of the Jets cleaves into two singled-out eras: everything Before the Butt Fumble (BBF) and everything later on (ABF). So to commemorate its fifth anniversary, ESPN presents the definitive oral history of the best worst play in football.
Remembering the 'Butt Bollix'
Players, coaches and members of the New York media look back on one of the biggest blunders in NFL history.
The play
Greg McElroy, Jets third-string QB, 2012: We had a unproblematic fullback dive chosen 30 Dive. Our halfback dive was called 20 Dive. All Mark's steps and footwork were great ... for 20 Swoop. The actual play was to the correct, though. Marker got nether heart, had a little snafu and was thinking 20 Dive -- just open up to the left and hand information technology to the halfback. That'south when he realized the halfback had already flared out, the fullback had gone through the pigsty and it was actually thirty Swoop.
Hilliard, Jets fullback, 2012: Information technology was botched from the get-go. I was supposed to get the brawl on that play. Xxx Dive happens so quick -- when you open up upwards and the brawl's not at that place, you know something went bad.
Ryan, Jets head coach, 2009-fourteen: You always teach a quarterback, "Don't make a bad play worse." Well, we made it worse. I don't know what [Sanchez] was doing, man. It was but a disaster. When everybody'due south blocking it a certain way and you go the other style, that'due south a bad combination.
Joe Namath, Hall of Fame Jets QB, after the game: It's listen-boggling. Are your eyes closed? You don't run across where you lot're going? I don't know. I really tin can't chronicle to that. I just tin't tell yous what'south going on in Marker's heed when he admits to having idea of another play when he turned out the wrong mode. I don't know where his caput is, man.
Mike Carey, NFL referee, 1990-2013, officiated the game: They were zone-blocking, so there was just no hole anywhere. My primary job is to sentry the quarterback. Sanchez's mind was racing with the idea of "How can I get out of this?" and he had tunnel vision looking for a tiny rabbit hole to escape through. He was going to cut information technology back or slide, and he got caught in indecision and -- bang -- he runs into the biggest, well-nigh obvious thing right in front of him.
Steve Gregory, Patriots safety, 2012-13: We were in a three-deep zone coverage. And based off the formation, we're going to drop one of the safeties into run support. It happened to be me. Y'all tin can read the quarterback. Mark turned around with this look of panic, like, "What do I do at present?" I'm coming down for run support, keeping the ball on my within shoulder. He probably sees me and he tries to cutting it support inside.
McElroy: Marking follows the fullback, and our fullback kind of sold downwardly on the play, and [then-Patriots defensive tackle] Vince Wilfork literally throws our guard Brandon Moore right at Marker, and I mean difficult. Marking was kind of jogging, and it was Moore getting thrown back into Mark, which caused him to go astern and the ball to become dislodged. It was like getting punched in the face by a 300-pound glove. People who know the game saluted Wilfork for what he did as much as they condemned Mark. Wilfork was unbelievable, such a fauna.
Ryan: I become pissed nigh this play because Brandon Moore's in it. For a lot of years, he was probably the best guard in football and nobody had heard of him. He was legit. That year, that offseason, he had literally had both hips replaced. Probably never should have played, simply he did. He gutted it out. On that play, Brandon does a bully job, gets his block, knocks the guy off, so Sanchez turns the wrong way. I don't retrieve people realize what a expert guard he was. They just call up he'southward the guy that had the Butt Fumble.
Rich Cimini, ESPN's Jets beat reporter: That'due south going to be in [Moore's] football bio, the Butt Fumble, and I know Brandon merely hates it. It'southward unfair that he's linked to that. He's a proud, stubborn, grouchy guy, and he was offended by it. He called information technology the weirdest play he had ever seen and complained about how the littlest things plough into internet sensations. Simply he has not come up around the Jets at all since he retired. It'southward weird.
Gregory: It's "What came first, the chicken or the egg?" Moore's getting driven back, Sanchez has his optics closed running forrard and in that location'due south a standoff. Wilfork was a man-child out at that place, peculiarly in run support, and he just drove that lineman back, and Sanchez somehow found Brandon Moore's butt as a landing spot. Mark face-planted into the back of Brandon Moore'due south barrel.
With just over nine minutes left in the 2d quarter, Stephen Gregory returned the fumble 32 yards for New England's third touchdown. Chris Szagola/Cal Sport Media/ZUMAPRESS
The Impact
Cimini: It was a big target, though; Brandon had a pretty big butt.
Carey: [Sanchez] just went weightless. The collision was actually difficult. Think nearly running into a brick wall that'due south almost 700 pounds of forcefulness. That will knock the sense out of anybody.
John Brenkus, ESPN'due south Sport Science host: They collided with more i,300 pounds of force. That'southward more than 10 times the force needed to cause a fumble.
Cimini: Equally before long equally information technology happened, I turned to [ESPN writer] Ian O'Connor and said, "I can't believe this, but I think he just ran into his donkey!" So we all watched the replay and it was like, "Yes, he actually did." I've covered the Jets for 29 years, and this was the craziest thing I've ever seen. People were just aghast in the press box, even the Patriots writers.
Sanchez (in 2012): It's embarrassing. You spiral up the play, and I'm trying to practise the correct matter. It'due south not like I'm trying to force something. I start to slide, and I slide in the worst spot I possibly could -- correct into Brandon Moore. That sucked.
Brenkus: Moving at about x mph, Sanchez spots the safety covering the exterior lane. As he changes his vector to an inside lane, he realizes a collision is imminent and instinctively raises his arm to brace for impact. This leaves the brawl vulnerable.
Cimini: If that had happened today, he'd be in concussion protocol. At that place was some concern almost his cervix or whiplash or something, merely he played the rest of the game and it was actually ane of his better games of the year. He had a passer rating over ninety [94.8], although no one will recall that part.
Carey: Marking goes straight down, flops onto the ground. His body language was, "God I wish I could disappear" -- just total despair. He felt completely helpless. Someone was pinned on his legs and his upper trunk was open up, so I thought he'd reach for the ball, but then he simply kind of flopped over, head straight down into the turf, arms straight out on the turf. Information technology was total despair.
The Patriots rolled over the Jets 49-19 in this unforgettable Thanksgiving Day matchup. Julio Cortez/AP Photo
The Fumble
Gregory: I'k dropping down, and I couldn't really tell where Sanchez was considering you lot got these big guys in forepart of you lot and you're trying to figure out where the ball is. I come effectually the left side, and all of a sudden I'm standing there and the ball is just bouncing in front end of me. I scoop information technology upward and beginning running. It'south almost like information technology happens in slow motion. You don't hear the crowd. Yous're but cruising into the end zone, going, "What the heck simply happened? Did I really just score?" I'yard a guy who grew up in New York Metropolis. All my friends and people I grew up with are mostly Jets fans. To have that type of play and that type of game in my backyard, I'll recollect that for the rest of my life.
Sanchez (in 2012): I approximate I was more than stunned than annihilation. It was simply like a car accident. I was similar, "Whoa, what just happened, the ball is gone?" It was weird, man.
Hilliard: None of u.s. knew it was off the butt. Nosotros just idea it was a regular fumble. Experiencing these plays is a lot dissimilar on the field as a actor. We don't meet it over and over like you do on Television receiver. You know something bad happened by the sound of the crowd. The oversupply just erupted, and I looked upwards at the JumboTron and the ball's going the other way. He was gone. All our receivers and backs are downfield, and we all have our backs to the play. No one was catching him. He was already prancing in the end zone when I finally turned to see what had happened.
Stephen Gregory Sr.: We were in the stands screaming and jumping up and down, and before he even got to the finish zone we were yelling, "He's gonna get the Madden turkey leg!"
Hilliard: On the sideline after the play, I started thinking, "Was it my fault? Did I go the incorrect fashion?" Everyone'southward going over what the playcall was and eliminating whose fault information technology was. The last affair you lot want to practise is have it be your fault, especially on a play like that. Yous're embarrassed by it, and Mark, anoint his heart, he took the brunt of the rut on the whole deal.
The Aftermath
Ryan: I've had my butt kicked several times, just that was the worst. I coached for 30 years; that was the worst quarter in the history of my coaching career, and in that location's been some bad ones. But not even close to that ane. It was brutal.
Manish Mehta, NFL columnist, New York Daily News: Information technology was like an explosion. The Patriots scored 21 points on the Jets in 52 seconds. I don't think yous can score that much that fast in Madden, let lone in real life. The Patriots scored 35 points in the 2nd quarter without having the ball for three minutes. And the Jets committed [3] turnovers in a quarter. How is that possible?
Chris "Mad Canis familiaris" Russo, radio personality: It makes the Jets expect stupid. It makes the Jets look inept. It makes them expect like Abbott and Costello. For a franchise that hasn't been to a Super Bowl since 1969, it's ... information technology'due south fitting is what information technology is.
Carey: You commencement to wonder at that signal, "When is the stadium going to fall in on the Jets likewise?"
Cimini: After the three touchdowns in 52 seconds, which I'k pretty sure is all the same a record, the NBC cameras caught Rex proverb "Un-f---ing-believable" on the sideline.
Ryan: Non i of my prouder moments.
Gregory: Beak Belichick doesn't smile that often, only I think he smiled a little scrap on that play. I bet he went home, saw the play on TV and chuckled a little bit about information technology.
Cimini: [Legendary Jets superfan] "Fireman Ed" used to clothing a Sanchez jersey to games. That night he left the game at halftime. After the Butt Fumble, he said the ridicule was too much. He stopped. He said he just couldn't do the Firewoman Ed thing anymore.
Ed Anzalone (aka Fireman Ed): I have no interest in talking nigh the Butt Fumble. I don't talk negative most the Jets to people other than existent Jets fans.
McElroy: The Tim Tebow factor added something to it too. People wanted Mark to fail just because they were rooting for [then-backup QB] Tebow. People were chanting for Tebow past the finish of that quarter, but really, that had been going on the whole flavour. Marking was such an easy target -- the handsome, cool guy from Southern California, doing a spread for GQ. I think the world of Mark. Anybody loved Mark on that team, but I don't know if Joe Fan loved Mark. I know lots of people loved to detest him. Of course, with Twitter and Vines and GIFs just getting started, it was the perfect amount of video time to share and a way for social media trolls to flex their muscle and put it in as many dissimilar forms as possible and spread information technology every bit far every bit humanly possible.
Ted Spiker, journalism professor, social media expert, University of Florida: At that point, Sanchez was a lightning rod for criticism and embarrassment. So he was ripe to be the main graphic symbol in something like this. If Peyton Manning does it, he probably turns it into an endorsement bargain for underwear.
Sanchez (in 2014): People ever talk well-nigh it being such a rocky route in New York, simply people seem to forget that the first couple of years, we had the world by the tail. Nosotros're knocking on the door of the Super Bowl. We were and then shut. And then: boom.
Cimini: I referred to it in my copy the next day as the butt fumble with lowercase "b" and lowercase "f." I don't know when information technology became Butt Fumble with a capital "B" and capital "F," but the next fourth dimension I wrote about information technology, on November. 28, it was "Barrel Fumble."
Spiker: This was about the fourth dimension when things on social media were really just peaking. It was the confluence of a bunch of factors that are really social media gold, and and then many of those just fabricated Butt Bollix explode. Social media really rewards the extreme and the unusual, and [sportscaster] Cris Collinsworth even said it during the broadcast, something like, "I've never seen something like this before." Obviously, the body part is a huge piece of the puzzle too. It dealt with a body part that is a universal punchline.
Dave Blezow, acquaintance sports editor, New York Post: Nosotros're looking for the picture that volition best tell the story on the back page. Of form, there was a picture of Marking Sanchez's confront smashing into Brandon Moore'due south behind, with the ball coming out. And that goes on showtime. Sometimes, the picture determines what you tin say in the headline.
Josh Egerman, night sports editor, New York Mail: We'll beginning sort of spitballing some headline ideas, and nosotros knew that pretty much any headline we picked had to have the give-and-take "butt" in it. Rump Roast. Barrel of the Joke. But ultimately we went with Barrel Ugly.
Sanchez (in 2014): New York is sensationalized media. It's best or worst. There'due south no in-between. There'southward no one who is just an boilerplate player. Y'all're either a bum or you're Babe Ruth, Derek Jeter or Joe Namath -- and that's information technology. You can't harbor it inside you lot either because that can be mortiferous too. You just have to let it go.
Ryan: You sit dorsum, you probably have a drink or two so you're like, "Flush that one away and get on to the side by side game." At the fourth dimension, I never realized it was going down as the worst play in NFL history. Every bit soon as they coined it Butt Fumble, that was when you knew the play was going to live on and on.
Spiker Butt Bollix. Rhythmically and poetically, information technology works really nice.
McElroy: That next week, watching the film with our QB omnibus, Matt Cavanaugh, it was similar, "It happens. Secure the football game next time. Permit's move on." Just we had already started to realize what a large deal it was and the huge reaction to it. It was a turning betoken.
Hilliard: Nosotros couldn't get away from information technology. That's all we heard about: Butt Fumble this and Butt Fumble that. It was everywhere.
Sanchez (in 2014): The Barrel Bollix? So what? People screw upward. And that happened to be a huge screwup on a huge holiday when anybody is watching football. So it's like, "OK, and so what?" You still gotta play ball. You gotta be similar that. Information technology would be such a shame to permit something like that ruin everything. Why? It became low-hanging fruit for people to grab at. People who didn't know football or who just wanted to say something, it was like, "Yeah, aye, good 1, OK, yous got me."
Marking Sanchez finished with a Total QBR of 13.1 for the game. Robert Sabo/NY Daily News/Getty Images
The Legacy
Mehta: The play was a microcosm of Sanchez's career. He ultimately never mastered the most important element of playing quarterback in the NFL: ball security.
Cimini: Mark handled information technology really well. He took full responsibility for it. He tried to express joy information technology off at beginning. Simply Butt Bollix signaled the end of the Mark Sanchez era with the Jets. It took on a life of its ain. Mark comes from a cracking family, and one twenty-four hour period his brother texted me and said, "When is plenty plenty? When are you guys gonna let it go?"
Gregory: Information technology was shown on TV every twenty-four hours for that entire year. If you get anywhere, it could be a eating place, a movie house, you could be at a charity event on a golf course, it doesn't matter where you are. It'due south like a Jeopardy question. As before long as the trivia comes upwards, "Hey, call up the Butt Fumble?" Merely guess what, who was the guy that scored on that play? You're looking at him right here.
Kevin Negandhi, SportsCenter ballast: That highlight merely represented the worst of the worst, perfectly. It was No. 1 on our SportsCenter Not Meridian x for going on 20 weeks, and I recall thinking, "This affair is never going to lose." Later on 40 weeks, the powers that be made the decision to retire it. They saw that Butt Bollix was an unstoppable force and nosotros had to take matters into our own hands. Retrieve about it: 40 weeks. We were coming back effectually to the next football season. You lot're talking almost awful baseball plays, the entire NBA season, bad higher football plays, awful soccer plays, even ain goals, and for 40 weeks of our Not Tiptop 10, information technology outlasted more than than 400 bad plays. If we hadn't retired Butt Fumble, that play was going to last for a while, a long while. Put it this style, no other blooper has a name.
McElroy: It might have bothered him, merely he never really fabricated it known. If anything, all he said was, "I can't believe I did that." Mark'southward very caring, very respectful and wants to please everybody. He was young too, 26, dealing with arduousness for the first time in his career, and being in New York overwhelmed him. It broke all of our hearts for him.
Spiker: Social media has really capitalized on the idea of paradigm every bit a metaphor for life. Y'all can sum upward your unabridged existence and your complicated feelings in, similar, 4 seconds. And then now the Butt Fumble tin can draw your Mon or getting rejected at work. Butt Fumble has lived on because of that power that nosotros at present put in Vines and GIFs to define our lives for u.s. in 4 seconds.
Gregory: When Thanksgiving rolls around, here comes 50 or lx text messages from all my buddies: "Remember the Butt Fumble?" Thanksgiving is Butt Bollix. Every Thanksgiving, we re-enact the Butt Fumble. Ordinarily my wife plays Marking Sanchez. I play me. We line my father upwards as an offensive lineman, and nosotros take my mother and put her on the defensive line. She knocks my dad back, my married woman runs into him, she fumbles, I choice it upwards and score. Then we go consume turkey ... Come on, I'm joking. We don't practice that.
Ryan: As soon as you say Mark Sanchez, people recall Butt Fumble. Simply we did win a few games together. Sanchez was a proficient quarterback-he just had a horrible moment. Marking won more playoff games than any quarterback in Jets history -- that includes Joe Namath. Everybody has a bad moment in their career that you'd similar to forget. But this one, because of the manner it was labeled and the disaster that the play turned out to be, unfortunately, this one lives on and probably always will.
Cimini: Jets fans impale me every time I brand a Butt Fumble reference. "When are you lot going to let it go?" Only you lot can't allow the Butt Bollix go. It's part of the legend, information technology'due south role of the Jets lore -- forever.
Sanchez (in 2014): I ran into a guy's butt, fumbled and the Patriots scored. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, so that wasn't cool. Information technology was a bummer.
Ryan: Is there anything else I'd like to add? Hell no.
Gregory: See y'all at the 50th anniversary.
Source: https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/21401659/butt-fumble-oral-history-new-york-jets-nfl-king-bloopers-five-year-anniversary
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