Baker Mayfield and Saquon Barkley bet a chain on the NFL Rookie of the Year Award

The drama was lacking a bit in this year’s NFL Honors ceremony. We knew Patrick Mahomes would take home the MVP and Aaron Donald would take home the Defensive Player of the Year award. However, there was some intrigue regarding the Offensive Rookie of the Year award — and that ramped up even more after the two frontrunners put a wager on it.

The award came down to Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield and Giants running back Saquon Barkley, who decided to attach some stakes to it. Barkley earned the award and that means he’ll have a new piece of jewelry via Mayfield.

Barkley told Cleveland.com’s Mary Kay Cabot that there was a chain riding on the outcome of the award:

“It’s for a chain,’’ he said. “The loser’s got to get someone else a chain. We get to pick the chain and we get to have fun with it because obviously everyone’s talking about who’s going to win, and at the end of the day we’d love to see each other win, but we’d also love to see ourselves win too, but we made a little bet with it just to show how friendly we are that it’s bigger than just the award.’’

Barkley and Mayfield both had tremendously productive rookie seasons. Barkley rushed for 1,307 yards and 11 touchdowns while adding in 721 receiving yards and four touchdowns through the air. Mayfield flourished in the second half of the season after Hue Jackson was fired and Freddie Kitchens took over the playcalling duties. Mayfield completed 68.4 percent of his passes and had a passer rating of 106.2 in the final eight games of the season.

Barkley already bested Mayfield in one Rookie of the Year award before the wager was negotiated. Barkley won the 2018 Pepsi NFL Rookie of the Year award, which is voted on by fans. It was a precursor of things to come.

Congrats to Barkley, who took home bragging rights — and some new jewelry too.