The idea that the NFL is a passing league isn’t a new one, but the inequity between the two conferences has never been clearer. The three best passers in the NFL are all playing in the NFC, and the relative dearth of talent at the position in the AFC is the reason that Vegas has the conference as a 3-point underdog in next year’s Super Bowl already.

Here’s a way to determine whether a team has a decent quarterback in place or not — let’s call it The Matt Ryan Test. Matt Ryan, the Atlanta Falcons quarterback, is an above-average player whose best years are still ahead of him, but he’s unlikely to ever be confused with Joe Montana or Johnny Unitas — the very definition of “decent.” The Matt Ryan Test is this: If you’d trade your team’s quarterback for Matt Ryan in an even exchange, then your team doesn’t have a decent quarterback in place.

In the AFC, only a handful of team’s pass the Ryan Test — the Patriots, the Chargers, the Steelers, and the Texans are the only teams with a starter in place who’s at least as good as Matt Ryan. There’d be serious conversations in Oakland and Cincinnati about it, and regardless of what Broncos fans think, John Elway would have Tim Tebow stuffed in a suitcase before the Falcons hung up the phone.

Football sustains its popularity because it’s keen to devour its own history. Baseball is too often crushed under the weight of it, where every shattered record makes lovers of the game mopey, since at least the debate around whether Roger Maris’ name should come with an asterisk, on to gripes about how Barry Bonds is no Hank Aaron.

In basketball, that scene in Bad Teacher where Jason Segal berates a middle schooler who wants to argue LeBron versus Michael Jordan exemplifies something that keeps younger generations from feeling like they can truly own the game. It’s been almost a decade since that guy laced up his sneakers, yet basketball shoes are still called “Jordans.” And, geez, look at boxing, which slides further and further into irrelevance because it insists that the sport’s legends can never be replaced, making it impossible to believe that what’s happening now even matters.

But football? The all-time greats are just part of the last generation’s drama, and the game changes so quickly that you can’t even compare from one era to the next. In football, the history informs the present, it doesn’t oppress it. The last generation’s heroes are this generation’s in-studio commentators, big-upping the guys on the field today.