One of the most iconic catches in NFL history — a play that would change Odell Beckham Jr.’s life — started with a misunderstanding and a poor route. Eli Manning is quick to remind his former New York Giants receiver of both whenever the play comes up.
And it always does. It’s one of the more indelible moments in the NFL over the last decade.
“It was kind of like bad, bad, bad … unbelievable. Or, oh, no, no, no … great job,” Manning said. “We laugh more about that. I recognize how good it was and eventually get to (acknowledging) that point, but with your pals, it’s always good to give them a little heat about what it could have been. It could have been a walk-in: double move, beat him by 5 yards, nice easy catch and cruise in for an easy touchdown.
“But that’s not the Odell way.”
For weeks during the 2014 season, Giants players and coaches learned about the “Odell way.” They watched a precocious rookie in practice snatch balls out of the air with a swipe of his hand. They saw him throw, punt and kick field goals, effortlessly launching footballs to improbable depths. They witnessed him nonchalantly perform eye-popping, athletic feats as if he had been doing them all of his life. His former Giants teammate, inside linebacker Jameel McClain, remembers watching Beckham and thinking, “Man, God really did a number on him.”
On Nov. 23, 2014, a MetLife Stadium crowd of more than 80,000 and a prime-time NBC television audience learned what the Giants already knew: Beckham was capable of the extraordinary. His one-handed — check that, three-fingered — 43-yard touchdown catch against the Dallas Cowboys on a ball that sailed behind his head electrified the world and transformed Beckham from an exciting, talented rookie into a sports phenom.
“During the moment, I didn’t know the magnitude of what actually happened,” Beckham said. “I only know the aftermath. It’s been my life ever since.”
November 23, 2014: The Catch. @obj pic.twitter.com/IXtAfUuMxv
— This Day In Sports Clips (@TDISportsClips) November 23, 2020
Beckham says that with a tone of acceptance, but also a tinge of regret. He appreciates the fame and fortune that the catch helped generate. He also resents that the catch is used to minimize the other accomplishments of his career. In many ways, Beckham and his most celebrated play have a love-hate relationship.
He’s 32 now, no longer a phenom but a veteran of 10 NFL seasons. The Miami Dolphins are his fifth team. He is closing in on 600 career catches, 8,000 receiving yards and 60 touchdowns. He might have been the MVP of the Los Angeles Rams’ Super Bowl LVI victory over the Cincinnati Bengals in February 2022 had his left knee not given out, forcing him to miss the rest of the game and the entire next season, altering his football future.
Yet, the one play that has largely defined his career happened exactly 10 years ago Saturday. Beckham’s catch while being interfered with by Cowboys cornerback Brandon Carr adorns countless highlight reels and is commemorated on T-shirts and posters on the walls of sports bars and man caves. It inspired scores of imposters and flashy one-handed catches to come.
A decade later, his connection with Manning is typically the yardstick for which all other acrobatic one-handed catches, such as the one Garrett Wilson of the New York Jets made late last month, are measured.
CATCH OF THE YEAR CANDIDATE FROM GARRETT WILSON
@nyjets pic.twitter.com/A3efxJMIiF
— The Athletic (@TheAthletic) November 1, 2024
“There’s always something about the original, and it was the first time I had seen something like that,” said Cris Collinsworth, the longtime NFL receiver who was in the NBC booth providing color commentary with Al Michaels for the Giants-Cowboys game. “Today, between the gloves, the balls aren’t as slick and these guys are freakier athletes. These guys are 6-4, 225 pounds, and they run 4.3 (seconds in the 40-yard dash). It’s just insane what they are able to do, so I try not to get so freaked out about it anymore.
“But yeah, when it happened, I thought (Beckham’s catch) was the best thing that I’d ever seen.”
It’s stood the test of time, too.
Beckham remembers it vividly. He was playing for LSU against Auburn in 2013 when he soared above the far sideline and tried to make a one-handed snag. He couldn’t haul it in, but he vowed that he’d make that play the next time the opportunity arose.
His inspiration came from LSU teammate Jarvis Landry. The two would spend hours outside their college dorm, throwing footballs to each other and practicing one-handed catches.
“That’s really how it came about,” Beckham said. “It really was a lot of Jarvis’ doing as far as the way he took me being a kid who was going to be good to understanding that I want to be a legend. I want to be remembered forever.”
The 12th pick of the 2014 NFL Draft, Beckham didn’t get his professional career off to a great start. A hamstring injury sidelined him for much of training camp and the first four games of the regular season.
“He had a rocky start, and that New York media wasn’t friendly to him,” McClain said. “I remember having so many different conversations with him, like, ‘All of this is going to pass by, and the time that the world sees who you are is going to come.’”
In his regular-season debut, Beckham caught the game-winning touchdown pass against the Atlanta Falcons. Two weeks later, he had two touchdowns against the Cowboys. In the three games after that, he totaled 21 catches for 357 yards.
Beckham already had caught a 3-yard touchdown pass from Manning midway through the first quarter in the rematch against the Cowboys in Week 12 on “Sunday Night Football.” The Giants had designs on more when they had a first down on the Cowboys’ 43-yard line. It was the area of the field where Giants offensive coordinator Ben McAdoo liked to take deep shots, and the offense had been working extensively on different throws off bootlegs. One, in particular, called for Beckham to make an out-and-up move down the sideline.
As the first quarter ended, the coaches and Manning discussed the merits of a deep shot. Giants head coach Tom Coughlin wasn’t sure it was the best time to try it. Beckham pleaded with Coughlin to keep the call.
“We were trying to figure out what shot to take, and that was one of the shots on the menu,” McAdoo said. “Good thing we didn’t talk ourselves out of that one.”
As Beckham jogged back on the field, it was either Coughlin or Manning who said, “Don’t rush the route.” It, however, was the last three of those words that stuck in Beckham’s head as he lined up outside and to Manning’s right: rush the route.
“We wanted to get a little comeback and go, and we were a little worried if we just did a straight fake and rollout, it would bring the safety over. So, we just kind of did a half roll,” Manning recalled. “I want to take my eyes to the middle safety, hold him a little bit and have a backside post. Pretend that you’re looking at that and then gear up, and you’re throwing the comeback and go no matter what. If we’re getting high (safety), it should be one-on-one. We got the look that we wanted.”
Beckham, indeed, rushed the route and didn’t sell the comeback. Carr wasn’t fooled, either. He was stride-for-stride with Beckham tracking the flight of Manning’s pass.
“Definitely not one of my best routes,” Beckham said. “He tried to squeeze me to the sideline, and I kind of did a basketball move. If somebody is posting you up, you pull the chair. I just kind of pulled the chair. The rest was history.”
Beckham slipped inside Carr, who grabbed the front of the receiver’s jersey and was immediately flagged. Beckham then elevated, reached his right arm well behind his head and secured the ball with three fingers before tumbling into the end zone.
“You can’t see where the ball is, and to still get your hands and fingers on it and somehow be strong enough in your fingers to hold onto that thing and pull it in while falling backward?” Manning said. “It doesn’t quite make sense. One of the all-time great catches.”
In three decades as a broadcaster, Collinsworth remembers two instances where he had to pause because he was stunned by what he witnessed. There was the interception by New England Patriots cornerback Malcolm Butler at the goal line in the final seconds of Super Bowl XLIX, and there was the Beckham catch.
When he spoke about the latter, he told the television audience, “That may be the greatest catch I’ve ever seen in my life.”
To which Michaels replied, “It’s in the conversation.”
“It was just special,” Collinsworth told The Athletic. “There’s some things that the more you slow it down, the better it gets. I thought that was one of those. It was like, ‘Oh, he did that?’ And then he got his feet in and he only got three fingers on it. It just kept adding up. It’s great to have those moments.
“When I was a kid, I can remember things that inspired me to want to play football or sports in general. I’m glad it happened. I’m glad there are Odell Beckhams in the world who can do things that other mere mortals can’t.”
McAdoo still recalls the look of astonishment on the face of the normally stoic Manning as he came to the sideline with the crowd buzzing after the catch. It never subsided throughout a game Dallas won 31-28.
“It was electric,” McAdoo said. “I’ve been a part of some big games, whether it was the Super Bowl, whether it was Aaron (Rodgers) and Brett (Favre) playing for the first time in the Metrodome. The buzz in the stadium after that happened lasted the whole game. It’s going to be hard to beat that catch.”
In many ways, the catch was buoyed by the perfect storm. It was a prime-time Sunday game, and NBC had a multitude of camera angles to do it justice. The game featured two big market teams with deep fan bases.
Beckham’s catch generated oohs and aahs from the crowd as it was shown across the stadium. The gasps kept coming as fans turned to their phones to keep watching clips of the reception.
“We’ve never had a play, I think in sports history, that went as viral,” said former Giants guard Geoff Schwartz, one of the first players to greet Beckham in the end zone. “That was sort of the start of social media being such an important part of our lives. Odell went from a first-round pick to a celebrity overnight.”
Said McClain: “That was one of those defining moments where it was like, ‘OK, world, welcome your new star.’”
Baltimore Ravens top receiver Zay Flowers was 14 when Beckham made the grab. Growing up in South Florida, Flowers saw a replay of the catch on his phone and went around showing his friends the highlight.
“I thought it was fake,” Flowers said. “I remember watching it over and over for like two weeks straight.”
Flowers and Beckham were teammates last year in Baltimore, and Flowers said the play briefly came up in conversation. When it did, Beckham told his teammate that the catch “changed his life.”
Zay Flowers’ locker is right next to Odell Beckham Jr.’s in the Ravens locker room. 😈 pic.twitter.com/9DeM8OvQBi
— Ryan Mink (@ryanmink) September 7, 2023
Beckham immediately achieved almost mythical status in New York, his every move garnering attention and headlines.
“It was like Bon Jovi coming back to the Meadowlands,” McAdoo said. “There was always a vibe about him and he was a performer.”
For Beckham, the true impact of his catch resonated when he’d see young athletes practicing one-handed grabs at schools and at football camps. He has traveled extensively overseas and been asked about the catch in Sweden, Norway and the Netherlands.
He’s flattered that it has inspired others, and he understands that his immense popularity around the globe — his 17.5 million Instagram followers were the most of any NFL player as of earlier this year — traces back to that November 2014 night, when he corralled a ball that seemed destined for out of bounds.
“In the most humble way, I can go almost anywhere in the world and people, for the most part, kind of remember that moment,” Beckham said. “Even people who don’t know football know me, which is a blessing. But, it’s honestly something that I never really foresaw. It came with that moment.”
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The way Beckham sees it, Michael Jordan had his crossover and game-winning shot against the Utah Jazz in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals. LeBron James had his chase-down block against the Golden State Warriors in Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Finals.
He has the one-handed catch against the Cowboys.
“People want to amount my entire career to just one catch, but there’s so many other plays that happened and things that I did, where it’s just hard to be like, ‘Yeah, he only had one catch,’” Beckham said. “I’ve caught the ball multiple times with one hand. Everything in life is about timing, and it was pretty crazy timing. ‘Sunday Night Football.’ New York Giants, Dallas Cowboys. It’s something that I’d never trade for the world.
“Here I am today. It’s taught me the hardships, the good times, all of those things.”
(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photos: Al Bello / Getty Images)
