TEAM FOR THE AGES
PHOENIX – Greatest single team ever? No question, say three men highly responsible for three of the NFL’s top dynasties. If the Patriots beat the Giants next Sunday, 19-0 will rule.
“I never envisioned this in the (salary) cap era,” said Terry Bradshaw, quarterback of Steelers teams that won four Super Bowls in six years in the 1970s. “There will be nobody close to them as far as the greatest coaching job and greatest team that has played the game.”
Jimmy Johnson, who coached the Cowboys to Super Bowl wins in the 1992 and 1993 seasons, agreed.
“Changes in rules, length of schedules, the cap, makes comparing apples vs. oranges,” Johnson said. “But none of us can ever say they accomplished what the Patriots will when they beat the Giants to go 19-0.”
Bart Starr, who quarterbacked five NFL champions in Green Bay in seven years, said today’s longer schedule makes the Patriots’ feat more astounding.
“The fact that we didn’t play as many games and still never went undefeated is an even greater tribute to them,” Starr said. “They do this, how do you disagree?”
But the greatest dynasty ever? Apples and oranges are to your own taste, whether that be for the methodical Packers, the devastatingly physical and talented Steelers, or the shrewd Patriots.
“I’ve always been an advocate of great defense,” said Bradshaw, who essentially passed for the last of his four Steelers titles. “I take the team that runs the ball behind a great offensive line and sets up a quarterback for play action.”
Johnson pointed to Bill Belichick as the difference.
“Coaching is what makes the Patriots so special,” Johnson said. “Before the cap, rookies would be on the bench for a year or two learning but they’ve taken new players every year and been successful.
“The dynasties that preceded them could keep their stars in place. So to me, there are three different eras, this one with the cap, the 70s and 80s, and then the 50s and 60s, when I don’t think teams could match up with later teams because the talent became so good.”
Starr disagreed, of course.
“If we had the offseason conditioning and weight-training they have now, our teams could have competed against later great teams,” he said. “But it is hard to compare eras.”
Nevertheless, we do anyway.
Before he died last year, Bill Walsh made the point his 49ers won four titles in nine years while the Redskins won three times and the Giants twice.
“Because of free agency, I don’t think you see the caliber of teams now that you saw then,” he said.
And Walsh’s team didn’t face as many juggernauts as the Steelers, who rose through a Dolphins team that had gone undefeated, dominated the Bert Jones Colts and the Earl Campbell Oilers and, before losing both Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier before the 1977 AFC Championship game against the ultimate Super Bowl champion Raiders, went nine games out of 10 without giving up a touchdown, pitching five shutouts.
The 1970s were deepest in good teams and the Steelers had the most dominating players of any club in history on both sides of the ball, even if their teams had two fewer Hall of Famers (12 to 10) than the Packers.
And, as much as the cap functions as a drag toward parity, pre-cap teams didn’t have the benefit of free agency to add big-time talent on the fly as the Pats have done.
The Steelers had the pre-free agency advantage of keeping together history’s greatest collection of dominating players. Twenty-two Steelers played on all four champions, like 20 Cowboys survived their entire run.
But was that always to their advantage? Smart organizations make changes not just to upgrade talent, but to freshen hunger. So the turnover that leaves only nine Patriots from their first championship probably has helped, too.
“You have to be impressed with the mental discipline that takes to repeat in any era,” Starr said. “But it is more difficult to build today. So I’m tremendously impressed.”
NFL’s time-tested dynasties
Here are the great NFL dynasties (minimum three championships in a 10-year period) and the Hall of Famers
(and likely Hall of Famers) who played on each:
BEARS
Four in seven years, 1940-46.
Hall of Famers (7) – Dan Fortmann, George Halas, Sid Luckman, George McAfee, Bronko Nagurski, Joe Stydahar, Clyde Turner.
LIONS
Three in six years, 1952-57.
Hall of Famers (7) – Jack Christiansen, Lou Creekmur, Frank Gatski, John Henry Johnson, Yale Lary, Bobby Layne, Joe Schmidt, Doak Walker.
PACKERS
Five in seven years, 1961-67.
Hall of Famers (12) – Herb Adderley, Willie Davis, Forrest Gregg, Paul Hornung, Henry Jordan, Vince Lombardi, Ray Nitschke, Jim Ringo, Bart Starr, Jim Taylor, Emlen Tunnell, Willie Wood.
STEELERS
Four in six years, 1974-79.
Hall of Famers (10) – Mel Blount, Terry Bradshaw, Joe Greene, Jack Ham, Franco Harris, Jack Lambert, Chuck Noll, John Stallworth, Lynn Swann, Mike Webster.
RAIDERS
Three in eight years, 1977-83.
Hall of Famers (8) – Fred Biletnikoff, Dave Casper, Mike Haynes, Ted Hendricks, Howie Long, John Madden, Art Shell, Gene Upshaw.
49ERS
Four in nine years, 1981-89.
Hall of Famers and likely Hall of Famers (6) – Ronnie Lott, Joe Montana, Bill Walsh, Steve Young, *Jerry Rice, *Charles Haley.
REDSKINS
Three in 10 years (1982-91)
Hall of Famers and likely Hall of Famers (4) – Joe Gibbs, John Riggins, *Darrell Green, *Russ Grimm
COWBOYS
Three in four years (1992-95)
Hall of Famers and likely Hall of Famers (6) – Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin, *Emmitt Smith, *Larry Allen, *Charles Haley, * Deion Sanders
PATRIOTS
Three in four years (2001-2004)
(Four in seven years if they beat the Giants.)
Likely Hall of Famers (7) – *Bill Belichick, *Tom Brady, *Richard Seymour, *Adam Vinatieri, *Junior Seau, *Rodney Harrison, *Randy Moss
* – Likely Hall of Famers
