The Hail Mary King struck once more Monday evening.

Aaron Rodgers, who’s spent a lot of his 20-year profession with an uncanny method about finishing the Hail Mary, delivered his first one as Jets quarterback on the finish of the primary half towards the Payments.

It was the fourth of his outstanding profession. In two of the earlier three, his workforce gained the sport. On Monday evening, Rodgers’ Jets misplaced to the Payments, 23-20.

This time, the Jets had the ball on their very own 48-yard line with eight seconds remaining within the first half and trailed the Payments, 20-10, simply 13 seconds after Buffalo had simply scored a TD to take the 10-point lead.

After dancing round within the pocket for a number of seconds, Rodgers let the ball fly into the MetLife Stadium north finish zone. Allen Lazard, Rodgers’ former receiver in Inexperienced Bay, outleaped three Buffalo defenders and got here down with the ball amidst a heap of our bodies.

After he landed, the ball was jarred out of Lazard’s arms by one of many Payments defensive gamers, which made the followers packing the stadium maintain their collective breath for moments considering it was incomplete.

However Lazard had secured the ball and landed on the bottom after which had the ball knocked out of his arms, and the decision from the officers was “landing.’’

Three gamers surrounded Lazard as he made his soar — Buffalo cornerbacks Taron Johnson and Christian Benford and security Taylor Rapp. Lazard beat all of them to the ball.

Requested when he knew he’d secured the ball, Lazard stated, “After I noticed the ball calling my title.’’

“We follow that at the very least as soon as every week,’’ Lazard went on. “And, being with Aaron at [Green Bay] with six years of doing that, I had a fairly good anticipation of the place the ball goes to be. I used to be very lucky to have the ability to come and are available down with it.

“As soon as it hit my arms, I had a fairly good grasp of the ball, and I knew find out how to safe it to the bottom.’’

The unlikely landing gave the Jets a brand new life getting into the halftime locker room, trailing simply 20-17.

Listed below are Rodgers’ three earlier Hail Marys:

• On Dec. 15, 2015, he threw a 63-yard TD to Richard Rodgers with six seconds remaining to beat the Lions, 27-23.
• On Jan. 10, 2016, he threw a 41-yard TD to Jeff Janis on the ultimate play of regulation to tie the NFC wild-card playoff sport in Arizona that the Cardinals would go on to win in OT.
• And on Jan. 8, 2017, he threw a 42-yard TD to Randall Cobb simply earlier than halftime of a wild-card playoff sport towards the Giants, giving Inexperienced Bay a 14-6 halftime lead in a sport it could go on to win, 38-13.

So, earlier than Monday evening, Rodgers had gained two of the three video games by which he transformed a Hail Mary.

Requested what’s it about Rodgers that provides him the knack to finish the Hail Mary, Lazard stated, “It’s simply the arc of the ball. It’s onerous for me to trace and that’s what I do for my profession. So, I do know it’s onerous for the defenders to have the ability to decide the place the ball goes to land.’’