All great NFL quarterbacks have a worst game on their resume, and when it comes to Pittsburgh Steelers legendary quarterback Terry Bradshaw, his very well may have been in 1982 and on the road against the Buffalo Bills.
On Dec. 12, 1982, the Steelers played the Bills in Buffalo at Rich Stadium. The Steelers, who were 4-1 entering that contest, were coming off a 35-14 home throttling of the Kansas City Chiefs in which Bradshaw had completed 15-of-20 pass attempts for 231 yards with three touchdowns and one interception. Bradshaw was sacked just once in that big win over the Chiefs and his ANY/A (adjusted net yards per pass attempt) stat for that contest was 11.33. His stat line against the Bills was the complete opposite of that.
Against the Bills, Bradshaw managed to complete just two of his 13 total pass attempts in the game for 3 yards. He was intercepted twice and sacked four times for 26 yards. He also fumbled away the football deep in Pittsburgh’s end of the field on one of those sacks. Bradshaw’s ANY/A stat for that brutal game against the Bills in Buffalo was -6.65, the worst of his NFL career for games in which he attempted more than two passes.
Bradshaw’s 1982 performance against the Bills was so bad that he was benched by Steelers head coach Chuck Noll in favor of QB Cliff Stoudt with 6:17 left in the third quarter and Buffalo leading just 13-0.
Now, it is important to note that it was super cold on that 1982 Sunday in Buffalo. According to reports, the temperature was 22 degrees but with the wind chill factor added it was well below 0 degrees. Bradshaw discussed the challenges the cold presented him after that game.
“Today was a classic case of me just not being able to handle the football,” Bradshaw said postgame, according to Gary Tuma of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “I wasn’t worried about their coverages or anything like that. My hands just felt like they were numb.”
Numb hands due to the freezing weather and all, Bradshaw admitted after the game that he should have been able to function in those conditions.
“I’m not making any excuses,” Bradshaw said. “I should be able to handle it. I’ve played in sloppier conditions than this. I had trouble handling the football, but I’m not going to take anything away from the way Buffalo played. They played well and I played bad. In fact, I played real bad.”
Bradshaw additionally said postgame that the team’s loss that Sunday was the Steelers’ worst offensive performance that he could recall in his then-13 years with the organization. It was also reportedly the first time that Bradshaw had been benched during a game since 1975. Bradshaw addressed his benching after the game.
“I deserved to get the hook,” Bradshaw said, according to Jim O’Brien of The Pittsburgh Press. “I couldn’t do anything in there. I was hurting us.”
So, did Bradshaw rebound from that disastrous 1982 performance against the Bills the following week against the Cleveland Browns? Not exactly. Against the Browns on Dec. 19, 1982, at Cleveland Municipal Stadium, Bradshaw completed just 12-of-39 passes for 144 yards with one touchdown and four interceptions. He was also sacked three times for 20 yards in a 10-9 road loss.
Quite honestly, those two 1982 back-to-back road games for the Steelers might have been the two worsts of Bradshaw’s Hall of Fame career.
If you care to rewatch that Steelers 1982 road loss to the Bills, you can do so below.
