The Goofy-Great Fellowship Of Eli Manning And Tony Romo

The New York Giants will probably find a way to lose at home to the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday. The Dallas Cowboys will probably luck into some crazy play(s) and barely take down the Philadelphia Eagles on the road. Or the opposite. In fact, swap Falcons and Eagles out for anybody on the Giants' and Cowboys' schedule, mix the words of that first sentence in any order you want, and it will still be true, all season long. Some of this is just football being football, but that is also what these two teams do. Given their quarterbacks, it could not be any other way.

One of the NFL's most obvious clichés is that you just need a quarterback who gives you a chance to win. You certainly don't want one who will blow the game and erase terrific performances from every other position. For over a decade, Tony Romo and Eli Manning have been both those quarterbacks, from game to game and even moment to moment. If unpredictably were a measure of greatness both would be locks for the Hall of Fame. It's not, but these two might find themselves there anyway.

This season, both Eli and Romo will likely pass Joe Montana in touchdowns thrown. Eli will pass Montana in passing yards this year and Romo's 97.7 career quarterback rating is higher than Montana's 92.3. Of course, Montana played in a different era when teams still considered a steady running game the key to success. But more importantly, Montana's highlights usually ended with a smile on his face. We've seen every possible emotion represented on Romo and Eli over the years.

The Cowboys' dramatic 27-26 victory over the Giants in Week 1 followed the script that has become familiar where Manning and Romo are concerned. The strangest thing about this script is that the opposite outcome—Romo making some crushing somnambulant mental error in the red zone and Eli Manning leading a game-winning drive—would have satisfied the narrative as well. This time Manning was the bumbling scapegoat and Romo was the legend of the day. But that was just this time.

Romo and Manning have long represented a certain meme-ability in NFL fan culture. They're especially fun to root against because both their blunders and their triumphs have such epic scope; their sad faces have become mascots for the many haters of their respective teams. For Cowboys fans, there's a certain beautiful irony to Eli costing his team a victory by not falling down, just as Giants fans can revel in yet another Dallas receiver comically costing Romo an interception.

The result is a slightly exaggerated and indulgent perception of both as bumblers. And yet, as much as that narrative might have been self-inflicted, it's also less true than this: Eli and Romo are the most successful, consistent NFC East quarterbacks of this century.

Manning hasn't missed a start in 10 seasons and Romo has played through various painful injuries; he finished last season with a broken back. They've won games with multiple generations of receivers, running backs, and defenses. These guys had long-gone legends like Terrell Owens and Michael Strahan as co-stars, but still have the high hopes of New York and Dallas on their shoulders, and both will receive an average salary of at least $18 million for the next four years.

Donovan McNabb's peak seems like an eon ago, but was undeniably impressive. And yet both Eli and Romo have already surpassed McNabb's career touchdown total and Eli has passed him in total passing yards (Romo should pass him early next season). In recent years, quarterback trends—or gimmicks, if you like—have loudly swept through the division without altering anything about Manning and Romo's consistency. The Giants and Cowboys have never incorporated RGIII's read option or Chip Kelly's spread, both because the quarterbacks to which they've committed wouldn't fit those offense and because those quarterbacks have been there long enough that their team's schemes have grown up around them.

At 34, Eli still plays the part of little brother. He opened the season sporting the same semblance of a mustache that most boys wear to tenth grade. The two-time Super Bowl champion still somehow throws off the vibe of someone who receives daily noogies, and he has never played in an NFL where his brother wasn't better than him. He's had a great career without ever quite seeming great. Manning has more in common with Jay Cutler than Tom Brady in terms of production, and yet has won both Super Bowls in which he has faced off with Brady. To call him inconsistent would do a disservice to the long stretches of great play he has put together. But when he's been bad he's been terrible—in 2013 he threw 18 touchdowns and 27 interceptions.

Romo, for his part, has left behind a legacy more tarnished by poor luck than almost any other quarterback in history. He has had to compensate for some very expensive and truly inept defenses; blown routes and unreliable hands on the part of some mostly mediocre receiving corps have accounted for a chunk of his interceptions. His improvisational skills are Favre-ian, and have naturally led to Favre-like mistakes, although Romo's have come at some of the most critical of moments. Romo is a likable, good-natured dude on one of the most hated teams in sports, which has further confused an already confounding career narrative. His lack of playoff success has left even some Dallas fans unappreciative, even as he's rolled up a career record which is by nearly every measure better than that of the sainted Troy Aikman.

Chasing the NFL's elusive and hilariously meatheaded fixation with Elite Quarterback status is a young man's game. Eli and Romo are who they are, and they are past all that: A third Super Bowl won't spark an Eli vs. Peyton debate. And while a Super Bowl victory would likely do wonders for Romo's legacy, that legacy is already pretty clear. At this point, it's more gratifying to embrace Romo and Eli as old rivals, and their careers as long, strange stories that take crazy new twists on a weekly basis.

Eli and Romo will spend the final stage of their careers in two of the highest-pressure and most relentlessly scrutinized jobs in sports. By this point, they seem sufficiently jaded, and somehow unaffected by past and future criticisms. They are who they are, and while both enter their NFL golden years with the luxury of supremely talented receivers in Odell Beckham Jr. and Dez Bryant, their respective places in the hierarchy seem set. This is not to say that they won't change, though. Change is what they do best, and do most. Rooting interests aside, it's the best reason to watch them. Eli and Romo are appointment viewing for the same reason the NFL is—you truly don't know what to expect on any given Sunday.