Damn, Flipper!
January 7, 1990 – Giants Stadium – Rams 19, Giants 13 (OT)
The Giants were 12-4 and had their sights set on a another showdown with Joe Montana and the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship game. That showdown never happened.
The 1989 Giants team might have been one of the best teams the Giants have ever fielded.
“We were a good team in ’89,” Parcells said. “Of all the playoff games that I was a part of losing, I think that is the one I remember the most. Not just because of Flipper Anderson, but because we did a couple of things in that game that hurt us and I think it was a little bit coaching, too. Because we were better than the Rams and we didn’t win. I was disappointed that game.”
Of course the silver lining to this is that this loss, much like the 21-0 nothing loss the Bears in 1985, was used as motivation to catapult the Giants the following year to a Super Bowl. In the 1990 season, against all odds, the Giants marched into Candlestick and ended the 49ers attempt at a 3-peat.
Who knows if the Giants went on to win this game what would have happened?…And the memories of 1990 trump this shocking loss. A loss that to this day goes down as one of the most heart breaking losses in Giants history.
I remember being 12 years old and walking silently into my room to literally cry my eyes out. And don’t front, cause if you are old enough to remember this one your ass cried too. This loss stays with me to this day, as this Giants moment and the Yankees World Series loss in 2001 against the Diamondbacks still wake my ass up in the middle of the night in cold sweats. #Nightmares.
Damn, Flipper!