I'm not afraid to say it: Justin Jefferson is really good at football.
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Hear me out. After his 10-catch, 193-yard and one-touchdown performance against the Buffalo Bills, Jefferson now has 20 games with 100-plus receiving yards. That's the most by any NFL player in his first three seasons, surpassing Randy Moss and Odell Beckham Jr., who each had 19. The Minnesota Vikings wideout also owns the record for the most games with 150 receiving yards in the same time span — seven. The crazy part is the season is barely halfway over.
It has reached a point where Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins will hurl it in Jefferson's direction no matter the coverage because there's a good chance he'll make the catch. That's exactly what happened when the Vikings faced a do-or-die fourth-and-18 late in the game against the Bills. Only this one was different.
Jefferson made the catch of the century.
Justin Jefferson's "Catch of the Century" vs. the Buffalo Bills
https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1591899296051306497?s=20&t=shTshHAQ2uKn_3TCX1PpPw
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Greg Joseph's missed PAT earlier in the fourth quarter put the Vikings in a touchdown-or-bust situation when they got the ball back with 3:26 left in the game. And when Cousins was sacked for a 5-yard loss on the fifth play of the drive — a third-and-13 — Minnesota faced a fourth-and-18 at their own 27-yard line for the game.
Everyone knew Cousins was going to No. 18 when he dropped back, but it didn't matter. He slinged it to Jefferson, who made the outstretched one-handed grab with Bills cornerback Cam Lewis draped all over him.
My words don't do it justice. Lewis was in position to make the interception, but Jefferson slid his hands through Lewis' to snag the ball. Somehow, he was able to hold on while Lewis tried to rip it out on the way to the ground. The once-in-a-lifetime catch brought the Vikings' offense back from the dead, too. They drove down to Buffalo's 1-yard, but Cousins was stuffed on a QB sneak on fourth down with 50 seconds left.
Now that the Bills had the ball back, the game was in the bag — or so we thought. Josh Allen fumbled the snap on first down, and Vikings linebacker Eric Kendricks recovered it in the end zone for a touchdown.
https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1591902232194129920?s=20&t=shTshHAQ2uKn_3TCX1PpPw
Vikings 30, Bills 27.
Of course, Josh Allen being Josh Allen, he led a drive that allowed Tyler Bass to kick the tying field goal and send the game to overtime. However, Minnesota pulled out the victory with a Joseph field goal.
Final score: Vikings 33, Bills 30.
Back to the catch. The part that impresses me most is Jefferson's wrist strength. It shouldn't be possible to maintain control of the ball with one hand while someone is pulling at it with two. That's what makes Justin Jefferson Justin Jefferson, though. What a shock it would be if he's issued a "random" drug test by the NFL in the coming days.
All in all, the Vikings don't take down one of the best teams in the NFL without Jefferson's catch. Put it up there with the greatest of all time.
