I first met him many years ago.

There was a three year stretch where Mike and I did Monday night football games.

We did the second Monday night game three years in a row on that opening weekend and one of the years we had the Chargers.

And so we sat down.

We had a production meeting and we actually sat with Philip Rivers and I had the chance to just sit and talk to him for about a half hour.

And let me tell you, if you ever wanna learn something about football, sit and talk to Philip Rivers for a half hour.

I know that he is now going to become a high school football coach rather than he would be an excellent analyst.

The way he sat there and broke down football for me was fascinating and the sort of approach and attitude and and and all of the things that you already know about him, the whole dad gum it of it all.

I just found him to be a fascinating person in every conceivable way, so I've always sort of kept a close eye on.

And this is a very long time ago before he became what he is now, which is, I believe, a full of surefire first ballot Hall of Famer.

Let me give you a couple of numbers.

Not that numbers ever tell the full story of a person's career, Certainly not his, but there are some good numbers.

He is the second quarterback now to throw for 4000 yards in his final season, second in NFL history.

Do you know who the other one Waas?

The other one was Andrew Luck.

Andrew Luck was 29 at the time.

Rivers is 39.

He played 17 years.

16 of them is a Charger started the last 240 games of his career in a row, second longest streak by any quarterback in history.

Behind only, of course, Brett Farve.

He finishes fifth all time in yards and fifth all time in touchdowns, and he will go down as having always been remembered in two separate sets of quarterback groups.

One of them is that during the time that he was playing in the A F.

C, the conference was dominated by Tom Brady and Peyton Manning.

Let me give you an extent to which that impacted Rivers 2006 Rivers goes 14 and two loses to Brady in the playoffs.

2007.

Rivers goes 11 and five loses to Brady in the playoffs.

2018.

Rivers goes 12 and four loses to Brady in the playoffs.

He is the only quarterback in history to lose three playoff games to Tom Brady, and so that's what it ultimately will be.

He was the guy who just couldn't quite get over the top because the very few that were left on the table by Brady during his era were generally snapped up by Peyton Manning or in a couple of cases by Ben Roethlisberger.

And that, of course, is the other group.

You will always remember him with these quarterbacks every now and again.

We remember them for the classes they came out in, and there are some legendary quarterback class is the most famous of them all.

The 83 class that had six quarterbacks in it, three of whom are in the Hall of Fame.

Elway, Marino, Kelly.

The 2004 class, which now has only one of the three legends remaining will also produce three Hall of Famers.

Eli Manning was drafted first that year by San Diego, traded an hour later to the Giants for Philip Rivers, who was drafted fourth that year by the Giants.

And then, of course, Ben, who went a little bit later that day.

We were doing the draft that day.

I remember it vividly.

I remember watching that whole thing unfold, and so I think that I would look at it this way.

In some ways, Philip Rivers legacy as one of the greatest quarterbacks ever not to win a championship kind of justifies Eli Manning and the Manning family not wanting to go to San Diego.

And here's what I mean by that.

When you look at those three quarterbacks from the four class Eli Rivers, Ben, if you ask me which one was the best, which one was the best quarterback?

I think I would say Rivers, I think I would pick Rivers as the best off those three players.

But he's going to go down as the least accomplished because Ben has two championships and Eli has two championships and Philip Rivers only got himself to a conference championship game one time and never started in a Super Bowl.

But I think it is my legitimate opinion that if you just said in a vacuum, which of those three guys was the best player, I think I'd say Rivers, he just didn't win.

Eli got red hot on two separate occasions, parlayed that into two championships and God bless him and he absolutely belongs in the Hall of Fame.

But if you just line them up next to each other and said you could draft that guy or that guy not knowing any of how it was going to go out, I think you would take Rivers.

Ben is a tougher one because band my image of Ben is always of him with, like two guys draped one on one leg and one guy draped on the other leg.

And Ben is just sort of standing in there and still managing to complete a seven yard pass on third and six.

To me, Ben versus Rivers is very close when it comes to which guy you would take at their best.

But it's obviously not close an accomplishment.

Ben Roethlisberger was a two time Super Bowl champion in Pittsburgh and Philip Rivers is not.

And so that is the way I think his career will be remembered shouldn't be diminished.

He is an all time great straight talk wireless, no contract, no compromise.

In the meantime, it also opens up the quarterback spot in Indianapolis.

And if I am a quarterback with some options this offseason, that's one of the first places I look.

You play your game in a dome.

Excuse me.

Your home games are played in a dome.

You've got a coach who was a quarterback himself and who quarterback seemed toe love playing for.

And Frank Reich.

You've got a really good defense.

You've got a really good defensive line.

You're not.

Excuse me.

Offensive line.

You're not in Patrick Mahomes division.

There are a lot of reasons why I think Indy would be a very attractive place if you're Matthew Stafford.

Maybe if you're D Shawn Watson, let's see what winds up happening.

The first place people will look will be Carson Wentz to that, I say no freaking way After the Eagle did what they did, firing their coach, basically giving whence the victory in a power struggle.

I can't see any way they trade him, so the immediate reaction would have been went with Reich.

It makes sense that would have been the place to look right now.

It would be putting two and two together and getting five.

Carson Wentz isn't getting traded, so I don't know who the quarterback of the Colts is gonna be next year, But it isn't going to be Carson Wentz.

It is going to be someone who immediately is in position to make a run at a championship year.

Won the culture that good.

And you know what?

They could easily have beaten Buffalo two weeks ago and who knows where they might be right now?

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