Now that Super Bowl XLIV is officially in the books, the first decade of the 2000s is over and done with. Nice round years tend to make people want to compile “best of” lists, so let’s go ahead and look back on the last decade of the NFL. There are really only two choices for team of the decade, but the top five teams make for an interesting debate.
I could have delved into complicated and detailed statistics to come up with this list, but I thought it would be easier to stick with simple figures. I focused on average wins per season, Super Bowl wins and appearances, and playoff appearances. I also took into account division titles and MVP winners. It probably won’t reflect your thoughts and opinions perfectly, but bear in mind that anything like this has to be subjective. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the top five. (I doubt many people will be interested in a complete ranking, and there’s not a lot of difference between #24 Kansas City and #25 Washington anyway.)
5. Baltimore Ravens (average wins per season: 9.2, 1 Super Bowl win (2000), 1 Super Bowl appearance, 6 playoff appearances)
The Ravens found themselves in a virtual tie with the Green Bay Packers and the Denver Broncos in terms of average wins per season, but their Super Bowl win put them up in the top five. The Ravens’ commitment to defense keeps them in the contending teams discussion year after year. But the Ravens aren’t just about defense. QB Joe Flacco and RB Ray Rice do their part to keep the offense moving. If those two live up to their potential and the defense holds up, they could find themselves at the top of next decade’s list, too.
4. Philadelphia Eagles (average wins per season: 10.3, no Super Bowl wins, 1 Super Bowl appearance, 8 playoff appearances)
Philadelphia doesn’t have any championship rings, as any devoted Giants fan will tell you, but they’ve been so consistently good this decade that it’s impossible to keep them off this list. They’ve only had one losing season in the last ten years (6-10 in 2005) and have won the divisional title in the vicious NFC East five times. For comparison, only two teams in the entire NFL have won more divisional championships over the last decade, and they occupy spots 1 and 2 on this list. They also played in the NFC Championship Game a staggering five times, more than twice as many as any other NFC team (New York, Minnesota, Carolina, and New Orleans all have two appearances). A tendency to lose in big games certainly hurts them here, but you have to admire the consistency they’ve shown in at least repeatedly getting there.
3. Pittsburgh Steelers (average wins per season: 10.3, 2 Super Bowl wins (2005, 2008), 2 Super Bowl appearances, 6 playoff appearances)
The Steelers won the same amount of games on average as their Pennsylvanian brethren, but two championships easily propel them to the top three. There’s no question Ben Roethlisberger’s appearance in 2004 ushered in a new era (two titles and no losing seasons since), but it’s not as though they were struggling beforehand. Pittsburgh has been a model of consistency ever since the NFL’s creation. After all, there’s only one franchise that has a ring for the thumb. Their two titles this decade make them a tempting choice to put in the top two, but I feel like these last two teams were a cut above everyone else. Still, two titles are nothing to be ashamed of, and the future certainly looks bright in Pittsburgh.
2. Indianapolis Colts (average wins per season: 11.5, 1 Super Bowl wins (2006), 2 Super Bowl appearances, 9 playoff appearances, 4 MVP awards (Peyton Manning, 2003, 2004, 2008, 2009))
Here’s a fun exercise. Try to think of the last time the Colts failed to qualify for the playoffs.
Give up? It was 2001, when they went just 6-10 and inspired Jim Mora’s famous “playoffs?!?” rant. Mora was fired after that season, the Colts hired Tony Dungy, and they haven’t won fewer than 10 games since. Incredibly, they’ve won at least 12 games every season since 2003, and since that time, they’ve been in a rivalry with the New England Patriots for supremacy in the AFC. The Patriots initially had the upper hand, but lately the tables have turned in favor of the Colts. In fact, had the Colts won Super Bowl XLIV, I was prepared to list them above the Patriots. It might seem crazy, but the Colts have remained an elite team for longer than the Patriots, despite the championship gap. Peyton Manning’s incredible four MVP awards (more than Brett Favre, Jim Brown, or Johnny Unitas) can’t be ignored, either. But Manning’s interception to Tracy Porter sealed it, in my mind. The Colts are a great team. In fact, they’re an excellent team. But they’ve shown a lack of ability to get it done in big games, and so they’ll have to settle for number two here.
1. New England Patriots (average wins per season: 11.2, 3 Super Bowl wins (2001, 2003, 2004), 4 Super Bowl appearances, 7 playoff appearances, 1 MVP award (Tom Brady, 2007))
The numbers don’t lie. Since Tom Brady took over after Drew Bledsoe’s injury in 2001, the Patriots have won three Super Bowls, at least 10 games every season (except for 2002, when they went 9-7), and came inches from winning a fourth championship and a 19-0 season. For the most part, the glory days for this franchise are behind them, since Brady isn’t quite the same as he was before Bernard Pollard knocked him out for the 2008 season, but that doesn’t diminish how incredible those glory days were. At one point, New England had won 21 consecutive games, including a Super Bowl. And at their peak, no one was more intimidating than the Patriots. The Colts consistently inspire fear into their opponents’ hearts. But the Patriots inspired terror. Put it this way. Over the last ten years, the Patriots have had three seasons in which they won at least 14 games (14-2 in 2003 and 2004 and 16-0 in 2007). The rest of the NFL combines for five (2001 Rams, 2004 Steelers, 2006 Chargers, and 2005 and 2009 Colts). The Colts have been consistently great, but for a few years, the Patriots were virtually invincible. It’s a matter of personal opinion which you prefer, but as for me, I’d take the three rings and the 16-0 season any day of the week. Say what you will about New England’s future, but the 2000s were the decade of the Patriots.
I couldn’t agree more. Not just because I am a Patriots fan to the grave, but because inevitably, the point of the whole season is to win the big game. The Patriots did that, more than the Colts, or anyone else did, for that matter. Excellent decision, not that it is much of one. The facts and stats speak for themselves. Take Care.
There can be a debate about the best QB–Brady or Manning. Roethlisberger and Brees get honorable mention, but Brady and Manning are the clear leaders.
There can be no debate about the dominant team. The Patriots went to four Super Bowls; no other team won more than two. They won three Super Bowls; no other team won more than two.
The championship Patriots teams won it by having Brady, a smart, high-percentage QB, and a powerful, if not always particularly explosive, running attack score a reasonable number of points while a bone-crushing defense throttled even high-scoring opponents.
On most teams, a defense keeps a team in the game while the offense wins it. On the Patriots in the early 2000′s, Brady kept the Patriots in the game while Mike Vrabel, Willie McGinest, Tedy Bruschi, Roman Phifer, Ted Johnson, Ty Law, Lawyer Milloy, Rodney Harrison and a cast of thousands shut their opponents down to win the game.
On those championship teams, the linebacking and secondary were so deep that if all their linebackers had gone down hurt at once, they could have fielded a corps of linebackers better than many teams’ starters.
Don’t believe that? OK. Rosevelt Colvin, Ted Johnson, Matt Chatham, Tully Banta-Cain. Think about that. Every one of those guys could play. That would have been far from the worst linebacking in the league–and all four rode the bench for the Patriots in 2003-4.
Think about what happened in 2004. In mid-season, both starting cornerbacks went down. For two games, even their #3 and 4 cornerbacks were down as well. They had Earthwind Moreland starting one corner and had Troy Brown, a 33-year-old wide receiver, playing in the defensive backfield.
They went into the Super Bowl with their #3 and 4 cornerbacks starting. It’s easy to forget that their #3 and 4 cornerbacks were Asante Samuel and Randall Gay, a better pair of corners than most teams’ #1 and 2 corners.
Their best defensive lineman, Richard Seymour, missed large parts of those seasons, including several playoff games–and Jarvis Green stepped up without a hitch.
On offense, Damien Woody, their starting left guard, went down in the playoffs in 2003. Russ Hochstein took over. Warren Sapp gleefully predicted that Kris Jenkins, the behemoth defensive tackle for the Panthers, would eat Hochstein’s lunch. Instead, Hochstein embarrassed Jenkins, who by mid-game was beaten off the snap so many times that he started going offside trying to beat Hochstein.
Law, a cornerback probably heading for the Hall of Fame, left and was replaced by Samuel, who played even better than Law had. Lawyer Milloy, who had been to several Pro Bowls at strong safety, was cut and replaced by Rodney Harrison, who was even better.
At tight end, they went from Christian Fauria to Daniel Graham to Benjamin Watson without a hitch.
By 2007, that great defense was aging and slowing. So the offense stepped up with a monster year to get them to the Super Bowl, which they missed winning by one minute and the most incredible catch in Super Bowl history by the Giants’ #4 wide receiver.
That their entire achievement could not be ascribed to Brady was proven in 2008. Brady was injured in the first game of the year, and Matt Cassel, who had never started an NFL game and had only once played more than a few plays of a game, led them to an 11-5 season in which they beat one of the Super Bowl teams 47-7.
The Patriots of the first decade of this century were the outstanding team of the decade is not even debatable in good faith. I say “in good faith” because Steelers and Colts fans will make preposterous, idiotic arguments to try to dispute that.
Colts and Steelers fans, take your fan glasses off just long enough to be honest with yourselves. Your teams were good in ths last decade, but weren’t even close to the Patriots as a team. Colts fans, your QB was right there with ours.
yeh prepostrous….they got caught cheating..!!!i dont think anyone will ever be able to determine how much the patriots were helped by knowing what play , or defense their opponent is going to run…but they were caught it was proven they were fined….done deal cheaters.$…..i remember the afc championship game against the steelers and it didnt matter what the steelers did they were stopped and that after winning 15 out of 16 games…makes you wonder it really does…..so i am a little biased because i am a steeler fan….the patriots were like a well oiled machine ill give them that..they were and are still a good team…its a tough organization but i dont know how i would feel if bill cowher or mike tomlin were caught cheating…id be really upset and discouraged…..idk i just feel that there should be an asterisk after all this winning but getting caught cheating….
Trace is evidently another Steelers fan whose hatred of the Patriots rises to the level of mental illness. The post is full of half-truths.
“No matter what the Steelers did they were stopped”. Trace, the Steelers’ offense wasn’t affected by taping, because plays were called into Roethlisberger’s helmet, not transmitted by hand signals.
Let’s see. In 2005, the Pats were using the tapes and went 10-6. In 2006, they were using the tapes, and went 12-4. In 2007, they were NOT using the tapes (the tape being made in the season opener was seized before they could ever use it), and went 16-0, including a massacre of the Steelers as Brady embarrassed a loudmouth Steelers defensive back. In 2008, WITHOUT BRADY AND WITHOUT TAPES, they went 11-5.
Oh, yes, the tapes are why the Pats won so many games. You Steelers fans really need to take your meds.
dude i aint really hating imjust saying ..how long was itgoing on??there was 2001 and 2004..so imnot tryin to sound ignorant but if i knew what w defense was going to ploy then i wolud know what plays to run…simply they cheated period…how do you account for that?.they say alot of teams do it??? then why arent many more teams caught doin it??? ive been a football fan since the late 70s and have never heard anything else about a team stealing signals ,(knowing what the other team was gonna do),,that was the first and only time i ever heard anything like that in football history…they were officially caught fined and everything….how should they be recognized in sports history…i agree anthony smith was a loud mouth but still they were caught….how many games they were helped by the winning no one will ever know…but…no other team that ive ever heard of has ever been caught cheaqting and this was during an era where they were dominant and considered a dynasty…if it were my coach and team they should have all been deleted and a total fresh start…cheating is pathetic…they were caught its not like it was suspected they were penalized….asterisk forever…period they were cheaters so if you feel better by justifying there method of operation then you are a cheater too…wipe all that crap out…THEY ARE CHEATERS….
Check your rule book and when that rule was enforced.
(2006) AFTER the Pats destroyed Steward, and the Stealers. (Yes I spelled that right!) I still remember the late hit on Rodney.
Bill B got fined because his understanding of the rule was not accepted by the Commissioner.
Stop crying about, you take away all the good things the Steelers have done lately.
Pats are not done, either. They are setting themselves up, with many high picks last year and 2010 and 2011, for s strong core of young talent.
And if Vince and Logan go – it won’t be without even more picks for the Pats.
A) the decade still has a year left.(calendars start at year 1, not 0)
b) i agree, thus far the pats have been the best team in the current decade.
c) there is no true “team of the decade” (yet) for the first decade of this millenium. a “team of the decade” like the 60′s packers, 70′s steelers, 80′s 49ers and 90′s cowboys has to do 2 things. 1) win at least 3 championships and 2) NOT LOSE ANY championships. that means the colts AND pats are both disqualified, and the steelers would need to win the next superbowl to qualify. (and if you ask me, they’d have to do so by beating the pats in the playoffs) otherwise, this is simply a decade with 3 great teams but no dominant team.
Chris, you just disqualified the Packers of the 1960′s with your definition. Check the 1960 championship game.
The Patriots in this decade are as much of a dynasty as you’re ever going to see in the NFL again.
Are you seriously going to put the Cowboys of the 90′s ahead of the Patriots of the past decade on the basis that, the two teams each having won the same number of Super Bowls, the Patriots lost an additional Super Bowl? Do you realize that you have just said with that that it is better to lose than to win a conference championship?
Just think; if the Patriots had lost that AFCC game against San Diego in 2007, your terms would admit them as a dynasty, but because they won that game, you’re saying they’re not. I’m not trying to be disrespectful to you but to show you the problem in your logic.
Were the Jets of the late 60′s, who went to one Super Bowl and won it, a better team than the Chiefs of the same period, who went to two Super Bowls and won one of them–and in order to get to the Super Bowl that they won, beat the Jets in the first round of the playoffs?
I would also point out that two of the Patriots Super Bowl victories came after beating the Steelers in the AFC championship game–2001 and 2004, and the 2004 AFCC was a blowout. So the Steelers are closer to dynasty status because the Pats knocked them out twice?
Love the arbitrary definition of dominant team of the decade, obviously posted by a Pats hater who arbitrarily decides that losing a superbowl disqualifies them. What if a team wins 9 SB’s in a decade but loses one? Then they aren’t the dominant team of the decade?
There isn’t even a debate here for first place. The Pats won 3 Superbowls, including back to back wins and 3 wins in a four year period. THAT is dominance. In addition they also had the first EVER 16 game undefeated regular season, and had the NFL’s most dominant offense in HISTORY in 2007, setting numerous records.
No other team even comes CLOSE.
you can play what if games all you like. i deal with reality.
allowing the 3 win cowboys in the 90′s was a stretch, especially since they did jack after 1995. allowing the 3 win and 1 LOSS pats to be the “team of the decade” will degrade that title down to nothingness.
but as i said, the pats clearly are #1 of the decade, but unlike the previous 4 top teams of the decade, they did not win all of their games. i know it’s hard for pats fans to understand, but the NFL has been around a lot longer than 2001. so what if they were the first team to go 16-0? that season was a failure. you didn’t see steelers fans running around saying “we were the first AFC team to EVER go 15-1″ or “we were the first team since the Dolphins to win 14 straight in one regular season!” because that season was ALSO a failure. and do you think Peyton Manning is hugging those MVP trophies every night thinking “wow, this is just as good as a lombardi trophy”?
which reminds me, you complain about arbitrary decisions as to who is better, yet by this article writer’s OWN arbitrary standards, the Colts are above the Pats on THREE out of FOUR of his arbitrarily picked standards, yet he arbitrarily decided superbowl wins matter more than MVP awards, total games won in the regular season and playoff appearances. the NFL doesn’t NEED to have a “Team of the decade” every 10 years, the NHL hasn’t had one since the 80′s, MLB doesn’t have one for this decade.
the pats had a great first half of the decade, the Steelers have had a great second half of the decade, and the colts have been “almost but not quite great” all decade. all 3 of them fail at being dominant for a whole decade though, it’s ok, the world won’t end.
and go ahead, call me a pats hater all you like, being completely blind to my criticisms of other teams as well is something Pats fans do best.
no other team has been caught cheating either.!!!!!
no other team was caught cheating either..i guess you forgot to mention that….
1. Cumulative regular season records:
Pats: 112-48 .700
Colts: 115-45 .719
Steelers: 103-57.644
The Colts have a very slight lead on the Patriots in that category; the Steelers are not close.
Just for comparison (Ties are counted as half a win and half a loss):
1960′s Packers: 96-37-5 .714
1970′s Steelers:99-44-1 .691
1980′s 49ers: 104-47-1 .688
1990′s Cowboys: 101-59-0 .631
Let’s compare that with other strong teams of those eras:
1960′s Colts: 92-42-4 .674
1970′s Dolphins: 104-39-1 .726
1970′s Cowboys: 105-39 .729
1970′s Raiders: 100-38-6 .715
1970′s Vikings: 99-43-2 .694
1980′s Redskins: 97-55 .638
1980′s Dolphins: 94-57-1 .622
1980′s Bears: 92-68 .575
1990′s 49ers: 113-47 .706
1990′s Bills: 104-56 .650
The answer is that the Packers and 49ers really did have much better decades than anyone else. the Packers’ won-lost percentage is very high, though not as high as the Colts’ in the past decade and not far above the Patriots’ in the last decade. Again, if losing a championship forfeits dynasty status, their loss in 1960 blows it for them. Of course that’s absurd.
The Steelers, though they had the most championships, and you’re ready to accord them dynasty status, were only fifth-best in terms of won-lost percentage in that decade, and both the Patriots and the Colts, in the last decade, did better than the Steelers did.
The 49ers really were head and shoulders above anyone else simply because they stayed strong for almost the whole decade while other teams were up and down through the decade.
The Cowboys’ won-lost record in the 90′s was really rather undistinguished, not as good as that of any of the three teams that have to be considered in the past decade, and not close to the two teams that you completely excluded; the only team to which they’re close is the one you were willing to keep the door open on.
The past decade has been something of an oligarchy, in which the Patriots are foremost. If the Cardinals pull out the 2008 Super Bowl, the Steelers aren’t even to be considered in the same class as the Pats and Colts.
2. Super Bowls played and won:
The Packers, if one counts NFL championships before the first Super Bowl, are obviously far out in front of everyone else, with championships in 1961, 1962 and 1965 before winning the Super Bowls in 1967. Of the other teams in that decade, only one, the Chiefs, went to more than one Super Bowl, and it lost one of those, 1966.
The Steelers won four Super Bowls without a loss in the 1970′s, as did the 49ers in the 1980′s. In the 1970′s, the Cowboys went to four Super Bowls, but lost three of them. The Dolphins went to three, winning two of them. The Vikings went to three, but lost them all. The Raiders went to only one, but won it.
In the 1980′s, the Redskins went to three Super Bowls, winning two. The Bears, despite some absolutely monstrous teams in the middle of the decade, went only to one Super Bowl, in which they battered the Patriots.
The Cowboys won three Super Bowls without a loss–but that means they only got to the Super Bowl three times. In that decade, the Bills actually played in the most Super Bowls–four–but lost all of them. The Broncos played in and won two Super Bowls. The Packers played in two, but lost one. So the Cowboys certainly had the best post-season record.
The Patriots got to the Super Bowl four times and won it three times. It is better to win your conference and lose the Super Bowl than to lose a conference championship. I have a sneaking suspicion that if the Steelers had won either the 2001 or 2004 AFCC and then lost the Super Bowl to the Raiders or Eagles, you’d be arguing differently; you won’t put up your true colors, but the pattern of your argument suggests that you’re a Steelers fan.
Bottom line? The Patriots have about as good a claim to be called a dynasty as the Steelers in the 70′s had–a better won-lost record, a better point differential, as many Super Bowl appearances, but one fewer Super Bowl win–and a better claim than the 90′s Cowboys had.
The Colts in this decade have been more like the Raiders in the 70′s. They won a boatload of games, went into the playoffs, often deep into the playoffs, almost every year, but came away with only one championship.
The Steelers in this decade have been more like the Redskins of the 80′s than like any of the teams you’ve identified as dynasties. They got to a few Super Bowls and were usually among the best teams, but had several rotten years.
3. Face-to-face competition between these teams. The Patriots dominated their rivalry with the Colts in the early years of the decade, but the Colts, beginning in 2005, have won most of the games between the two teams. The Patriots have pretty much owned the Steelers, with wins over them in 2001 (AFCC), 2002, 2004 (AFCC), 2005 and 2007. The Steelers’ two wins, in 2004 and 2008, came when the Pats were playing without their lead runner (Corey Dillon in 2004; both starting Pats CB’s, Ty Law and Tyrone Poole,also missed the game) or their quarterback (Tom Brady in 2008).
Chris, are you saying you’re not a Pats hater? Oh, you’re not crass about it like most Steelers fans, but it’s pretty clear what colors you sail under.
Ken, did you happen to read any posts, or did your patriot loving glasses blind you to what i typed?
decades run from year 1 through year 0, which is why this decade is not over. the 1960 NFL title game (dec 26, 1960) was the last championship of the decade from 51-60, NOT part of 61-70. unless you live in a world where there was a year 0 on the calendar.
you use the word dynasty, as if i denied they were a dynasty. i did no such thing, being a dynasty and being THE “team of the decade” are two completely different things. the pats fans in this thread just seem to have trouble grasping the concept that they can be the best team of the last ten years, and have had a nice 4 year long dynasty, without actually being the single most dominant team which defines the decade of 2001 NFL season through 2010 NFL season.
as for the cheating allegations, pats fans like to claim they made no difference, then why did such a genius like Bill Belichick blatantly break the rules for years if it didn’t get him an advantage?
other pats fans like to say “well, it made a difference, but only a small one. let’s see, only a small difference? like say…3 points? how many points did the pats win EACH of their 3 superbowls by? oh yeah, 3.
the cowboys dominated their first 2 superbowls of the 90′s, 52-17, and 30-13. their closest game of the 90′s was the 10 point victory over pittsburgh in XXX. and that was 1 point more than the total cumulative score of all 3 pats superbowls. a total of +62
2 of the 49ers of the 80′s superbowls were blowouts, and over two of the greatest QBs of all time. 55-10 over Jon Elway and 38-16 over Dan Marino. yes, tey had 2 single score superbowls as well, won one by 5 and another by 4. total= +76
the 70′s steelers played closer superbowls, winning by 10, 4, 4 and 12. total = +30
the packers 2 superbowls were by 25 and 19, and were so dominant that there were suggestions the AFL was not ready to compete with the NFL yet. they also had a 37-0 thrashing of the giants and 2 relatively close wins. Total = +101
you seriously think the patriots and their 9 points of victory over 3 games should be ranked with any of those 4 organizations? if we include the score in 42, the Pats are a whopping +6 in superbowls this current decade.
to answer some questions you posed. re: the chiefs/jets. nope, again, read my posts, i said the pats are the best team in the last decade, just pointed out they are not the “Team of the Decade” and i also pointed out how one person argues that i am being arbitrary but makes no mention of the original writer’s very own arbitrariness in deciding to rule the pats better than the colts despite the colts having the edge in 3 out of 4 of the writer’s own metrics(personally, again, i agree, those other 3 metrics should really only be tiebreakers in rankings)
as for the steelers being “closer” again, read my original post. i said the steelers would need to win this coming season AND beat the pats in the playoffs this coming season as well to QUALIFY fr the discussion of “team of the decade” and even if they did all of that, i’d pretty much just rule this decade as a decade without a single dominant force that defines it as the “team of the decade” but instead had 2 teams, the Pats in the first half, and the Steelers in the 2nd half. if the colts win next year, then it reverts back to a 3-team cluster for the decade, with the pats clearly dominating the first half. (missing the playoffs both years after winning the SB doesn’t help the steelers case for “Team of the Decade” and equal to the previous 4 “teams of the decade”
as for losing in the championship game, i’d even go so far as to concede that if a “team of the decade” contender loses it’s very first attempt, and never loses the title game again, then they MIGHT qualify, if what they did was particularly great. for example, the NHL’s Oilers(Messier’s team) of the 80′s, they lost their first appearance, to the reigning dynasty Islanders, then returned the next year to knock the Isles off the top, and went on to win 4 more by the end of the decade for a total of 5. but again, that would require some special circumstances, but as i said in my 2nd post, i’m not going to play what ifs, only what is, or was. if some team ever wins 9 out of 10, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.
and a team that got caught cheating and is a total of +6 in 4 superbowl appearances doesn’t merit those special circumstances.
and just in case it still isn’t clear. a Dynasty is pretty well defined as a time period where one team wins the majority of the championships over at least a 5 year span.
the best team in a decade(or any other period of time) is the one that has the most superbowl wins over that time frame, and in case of a tie, the one who has the better win % in superbowls, the better scoring differential in the superbowls, and then the better regular season record.
the “Team of the Decade” that’s a special title for teams that accomplish a dynasty that defines the decade the way the packers, steelers, 49ers and cowboys defined their decades, the Pats have not done that.
and yes, losing in the superbowl(or any title game) is worse than losing before it.
OK, I get it. 1995 was the Steelers’ worst year in the 90′s; after all, they didn’t lose the Super Bowl in any other year. And in 2001 the Patriots did the Steelers a favor by beating them in the AFCC, because the Steelers would have been more likely to lose than to win against the Rams. You’re welcome.
Ken,
Steeler hate issues much? i’ve been here criticizing and praising all of the teams mentioned, all you seem to do is praise the pats and rant on the steelers. i am sorry for thinking i could talk rationally to a patriots bandwagoner.
Chris, actually you’re wrong about the whole decade thing. The decimal system goes from 0 to 9, not 1 – 10. Besides, all that matters is that the same timeframe is used for all comparisons, and the NFL has always defined it’s decades as 1980-89, 1990-99, and so on.
To be honest, as a fan of the Patriots, I wish the decade was defined as 2001-10 because that would eliminate the Patriots only losing season this decade when they went 5-11 in 2000. That would mean that the Patriots would only have to win 8 games in 2010 to have the winningist decade of all time(7 to tie).
One more thing I’d like to add. They say the Colts have the most wins this decade because they have 115 regular season wins to the Patriots 112. Why don’t they count playoff wins for a total count, especially since playoff wins are much more difficult and meaningful? If they did, the Patriots would have the most wins, by far, of any team ever in a decade.
the decimal system has nothing to do with the way our calendars work. the decimal system requires a year 0. there was no year 1 on either the gregorian(current) or julian(past) calendars. on both calendars year 1BC was followed by year 1AD. the completion of ten years from that date was the end of the year 10AD, starting the new decade at year 11AD through year 20AD. and so forth, roughly 2000 years later, it continues, year 2001-2010(inclusive) is the 1st decade of the 3rd millenium AD. just like the year 2000 was the day the “odometer rolled over” but was not the beginning of a new period of 1000 years.
American Heritage dictionary:
decade:n. A period of ten years.
1947-1956 is a decade.
1724-1733 is a decade.
2000-2009 is a decade.
It may not be the first decade of the millennium, but it is a decade.
On another note, in that 10 year period, the patriots have won more games(regular and post season)than any other team.
Lets not forget that the goal(as so many have stated) is to win the “big one”. In order to do that, you have to win post season games, so they should be included in wins per season argument.
One more thing, Chris. It is stupid to say there is no team of the decade if you feel it wasn’t as dominant as past teams of decades. The phrase is “Team of Decade”, not “Team of all time based on decade long performances.” There will always be a team of the decade, even if no team won more than 1 Super Bowl. You still have to look at the sample(the decade), and see who had the most success.
Also, I disagree with your belief that the Patriots weren’t a dominant team of the decade. The best way to measure a team’s success versus past teams, is to compare the standard deviations of all NFL teams wins from a decade, and then measure the deviation difference of the top NFL teams versus the average. In other words, averaging 11 wins a season this decade is much more difficult than it was in the 1970′s and 80′s. The main causes are the salary cap and free agency. Going by that, if you include regular season, playoffs, and Super Bowls, the Patriots are by far the most dominant team of all time.
Now I know you can argue the opinion of that statement, you can’t argue the math. I’ll say it again, in simple terms; the Patriots had the most improbable decade, in terms of winning pct., than any team in NFL history. You can argue all you want about how close their Super Bowls were, but you can’t argue the success that the Patriots had at what every team calls it’s goals: to win football games, especially Super Bowls.
that’s the best way to measure it? why? because it makes the patriots look better?
i think the best way to define a team’s long term success is by deviation of score in championship games per game, when they’re playing against the very best of competition, not lucking out by being in weak divisions for 6 games a year(with a minimum participation of 3 title games, to filter out the one-shot teams). which makes the 60′s packers #1, 80′s 49ers #2, 90′s cowboys #3 and 70′s steelers #4. the pats aren’t even in the discussion.
every other division in the AFC has their top 2 teams over 500 for the 2000-2009 season time period(your decade), while the east only has the pats over 500, and the jets exactly AT 500. if you go with the actual decade(which isn’t over yet), then the Jets fall under 500(71-73), the dolphins fall from almost 500 to 68-76 and the bills have no change(they were 8-8 in 2000). a lot easier to get those 11 wins when your division has no competition.
the cowboys of the 90′s not only had to beat their division with the eagles(1 losing season during the cowboys championship era) and the giants(2 losing seasons during that era), but also with the end of the 49ers dynasty. to be the best, they had to beat the best(and beat them handidly), not a group of has-beens and never was’s like the Rams, Panthers and McChoke Eagles.
the 49ers win 12.1 games a year in the 80′s when you toss out the strike year when they only played 9 games(kinda hard to win 12, when you play 9) and they again beat the best, they won superbowls against the likes of Dan marino and John Elway, and though bandwagoners like to think of the Rams as jokes before their 2 years of greatest show on turf, the Rams had 5 10+ win seasons during the 80s and another 9 win season(6 total playoff seasons). and when the Rams faded, the Saints picked up. and when they made it to their first SB, they went through the previous decade’s 2nd best team, the Cowboys.
the Steelers of the 70′s battled the Oilers with Earl Campbell in their division and the Raiders almost every year in the playoffs. and they beat one of the most talented teams of all time, in the superbowl, twice. the Doomsday II Defense, and on offense the Cowboys had the likes of Tony Dorsett, Roger Staubach, and coached by Tom landry. Hall of famers, all of them. not to mention the “Purple People Eaters” they beat for their first title.
The packers had had to beat the Lions and Bears, and in 1962, just in their division, they had the 11-3 lions(.786) and 9-5 bears(.643) and they still managed to go 13-1 and win the NFL title. in 61, 5 of the 7 teams in their division had winning records. they still managed the best record in the NFL at 11-3. again in 65, 5 out of 7 were 500 or better. this time they managed the 2nd best record, but still won the title. in 66, 4 out of 7 were 500 or better and still pulled off 12-2.
meanwhile, the only years the patriots had more than 1 competitive team in their division were the first year and the year brady was hurt. and before you jump in with “but the pats are so good, they still went 11-5 without brady!” the 1972 Dolphins went 17-0 without Griese for 9 of those games.
that “undefeated” failure of a season for the pats was pretty pathetic for their division, the 2nd best team was 7-9, sure, the Dolphins also had a weak division the year they went unbeaten, but as i said above, they did it with their 38 year old BACKUP QB for most of the season.
as for your 11 wins in a season rant, you do realize that most of the 70′s were played with only 14 games? probably not, since you’re probably another bandwagoner who will claim to be a long time fan after wikiing the history of the franchise. they didn’t play 16 games in a season until 1978, argue all you want with the opinion, but you can’t argue with the math that winning 11 out of 16 is a lot easier than winning 11 out of 14.
Ok Chris, I don’t have time to go into a long rant but I have a couple of replies to your last comment.
First off, the most annoying thing is when sports fans call other sports fans “bandwagoners”.
I have been a Patriots fan(all local teams) my whole life and a diehard fan since I started following football when I was 12 in 1990 and I haven’t missed one Patriots game since. I went through some real bad Patriots seasons in the early 1990′s. Although, I doubt you know this, but the Patriots have the best record in the NFL since the current free agency system started in 1992 or 1993(I forget the exact year).
I know when the NFL regular season extended to 16 games, but my math was based on deviation from the norm as a percentage, not by total wins. Keep in mind that I’m not counting the “norm” as the average mean because, of course, it would always be a .500 win pct. I was going by how far outside the standard deviation a team was during the era.
Also, if you want to compare the divisions the teams played in, you can’t just go by the 2nd place team. First of all, it would be hard to have an equal comparison of the divisions through the decades, because of the change in formats. But if you think the Patriots played in a weak division this decade, you’re sorely mistaken. Yes, in 2007, the AFC East was a very weak division, but you’d be surprised at how competitive the division was just about every other year this decade. Here is some info to back it up: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl00.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl01.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl02.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl03.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl04.htm
find the rest of decades division ratings here: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin-archive.htm
and here is this past season’s: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl09.htm
Based on Jeff Sagarin’s ratings(you can look up his formula, which I think you would agree, is very objective), the AFC East has been the best division of the decade. Even if you just go by win pct., the AFC East was still one of the top divisions.
You claim that I pick a formula to judge a team’s dominance to make the Patriots look good, when it actually seems like you pick a formula to discount the Patriots. If you had a room full of the 50 most objective football fans and asked them to come up with formulas to judge an NFL team or show them every teams accomplishments with everything from Super Bowls, competition, winning pct, record setting, margin of victory, rules, competitive balance, and anything else that you can think of, I’d be willing to bet that the Patriots of the 2000′s would be a lot closer to the top than you think.
Lastly, in terms of the calendar, it doesn’t matter how the Gregorian calendar is formatted. All that matters when comparing teams from different decades, is to use the same reference for each one. And the NFL, the media, and sports fans have referred to the teams of the decades in a time frame from 19×0 to 19×9. You can call their definition wrong, but what’s the point when the whole subject is about comparing teams. And like I said previously, I wish they used your definition of a decade because the Patriots would almost certainly attain all the records for wins and playoff wins in a decade.
I tried to keep it short, but I couldn’t help it. lol. Even though, I know I didn’t change your opinion one bit.
you keep trying to insist that i think the patriots are far from the top in rankings. they 2001-2004 era patriots are pretty clearly the 5th best “dynasty” the NFL has seen,
unfortunately pats fans can’t seem to accept the fact that they’re not the greatest of all time. or at the very least the equal to those other 4 franchises. this is the internet, and you can find anyone at any mcnewspaper to support any notion you want. especially when all you consider is on field statistics. and not factors like getting caught cheating. this is no different than the Cardinals fans who cheered heavily upon Mark McGwire’s return, ignoring all the cheating he did, and calling him the greatest home run hitter of all time because of 2 or 3 seasons of cheating.
as for the AFC east. from 2001-2009, ONLY the patriots have a winning record. period. the only reason the East isn’t among the worst divisions is because the 2 Wests were just horrible. but there was n perennial 2nd contender in the East that tested the pats year after year the way the Ravens tested the Steelers, or the way the Titans and Jags tested the Colts, or even the way the Giants, Cowboys and Eagles all tested each other.
as for 11 wins…
you stated(this is a direct copy/pasted quote): “averaging 11 wins a season this decade is much more difficult than it was in the 1970’s” that is blatantly false. it is HARDER to win 11 of 14 than 11 of 16. period. even IF more teams accomplished it in the 70′s, it would simply mean they were that much better. You focused on a hard number of 11 wins. belying your claim that you know the NFL used to play 14 games almost the entire decade of the 70′s.
and lastly, i’ve been accused of being a blind patriots hater and subjective steelers fan. even though i have praised the patriots as being in the top 5 of all time, praised the cowboys, and raiders. all things that no un-objective steelers fan would do.
meanwhile, my accusers have given zero credit to any of the other great franchises that came before the patriots. now i ask, who is being objective?
as for the calendar, nice attempt at backtracking from your argument about claiming the decimal system is somehow relevant. but i live on earth, where decades, centuries and millenium run from 1-0.
Chris, most or your last statement I agree with and no problem with it. For some reason I was originally just under the impression that you were saying that the Patriots of the 2000s don’t belong in the same sentence as dynasties of decades past.
But, in terms of my statement about 11 wins, I stated wrong what I meant. No, I’m not backtracking, I thought you would just figure out that I meant “winning 11 games out of 16 games this decade, is harder than a doing the same comparable winning pct in any other decade.” My statement worked for the 90′s and 80′s, but your right in that my wording doesn’t accurately describe what I was talking about when referenced to the 60′s or 70′s. The math I was talking about was all used as a winning pct and not total wins, anyway. I thought I tried to clear that up in my last post, but I understand if it’s not too coherent, seeing how I’m always typing these comments between 1am and 5am.
As for the decade thing, I was not back tracking. I’m just saying whats the point of arguing about the definition of when a decade starts and finishes. All that matters is that you compare apples to apples and oranges to oranges when trying to compare teams from different decades and like I said, when people talk about a decade as related to an era, they are referring to 0-9 years of that decade. Plain and simple. I brought up the decimal system because that is how we count and the definition of a decade just means 10 years. So when somebody refers to the 1980′s, they are talking about 1980 to 1989. You’re acting like a decade is only a succession of multiple decades that started at year 1 AD.
And about your argument about the AFC East being weak is still wrong. Here’s a simple way to clarify this argument. Add up the win/loss records of all NFL teams in a division over this past decade, and see which division has the best cumulative record. If what you’re saying is that the Patriots didn’t have an opposing team within the division that was on the same competitive level as the Pats, you’re right. But when it comes to grading a division, you have to consider all teams in the division.
Finally, and I know many people do this, but I have a problem with people labeling a whole fan base and thinking that if one fan said “this”, all fans of that team are the same. So to tell me that “all Patriots fans say/think this” is kind of foolish. First of all, that statement is wrong, and 2nd of all, unless I made those comments, what’s the point?
Thats all for today.
Patriots bandwagoner? Son, I was a Patriots fan when they were the Boston Patriots and their quarterback was Babe Parilli, probably before you were born.
I was their fan when they had their dreadful years in the late 60′s and early 70′s, and and were even worse in 1989-92. I didn’t suddenly become a Pats fan when they started winning Super Bowls.
How about you? Were you there for the 1-13 1969 Steelers? Or did you come aboard during one of their good periods?
I have nothing at all against the Steelers, a great team both in the 70′s and now. I do have an issue with Steelers fans who will do whatever they can to downgrade the achievements of the Patriots.
And I have a problem with your bizarre argument that it is better to lose a conference championship than to win it unless you are likely to win the Super Bowl. That argument is simply nuts, and appears to be invented solely to downgrade the Pats’ achievements.
A) i’m not your son, my father is a WW2 veteran, hero of this nation, and true patriot. not someone who wiki’s the history of a franchise to claim he was there when it all began.
B) how do i know you just wikied the history and weren’t actually there? because if you were there, you’d realize that the concept of NOT LOSING a championship is not anything new, and has been argued for decades. if you were there you’d remember how badly it felt (as a fan) to lose the superbowl in 85 and 96. and not be amongst those rationalizing the 18-1 season as a success, but instead realize that it was the most monumental of failures.
c) i’m NOT degrading the patriots in any way, i’m refusing to downgrade the previous 4 teams of the decade by associating the cheating and barely winning patriots with them.
you might as well say Bush was one of the great presidents because he won 2 elections, and ignore that he only won the first by a fluke of the constitution, and left office as one of the least approved of presidents in history who had a record of manipulating the law and breaking rules. statistically, sure he gets to be in the same breath as other 2 termers, but rationally, like the patriots, he falls short of all the other 2-termers.
Chris, by the way, the term decade is derived from the word decimal. If I recall correctly, you said that the “decimal system has nothing to do with how our calendars work”. This is from a dictionary;
decade
noun
1: a period of 10 years [syn: decennary, decennium]
2: the cardinal number that is the sum of nine and one; the base of the decimal system [syn: ten, 10, X, tenner]
Source: WordNet
Chris, I’m curious if you have read my last couple of comments. If you did, let me know what you think. You made some condenscending comments and I’d be surprised if you let me have the last word.
There is one more thing I’d like to add about your statement that the Patriots had no competitive rival. The Colts, who did start the decade in the same division as the Patriots and went on to play the Pats atleast once every year except for 2002, were the 2nd most dominating team of the decade and actually have the all time record for wins in a decade(2 or 3 ahead of the Patriots, not counting playoffs). Plus, the 2 teams had to go through each other in the playoffs, many times.
the patroits dont deserve to be called a true nfl dynasty