Columns

NFL's best team ever? It's in eye of beholder

By JOHN ROMANO, Times Columnist
Published January 28, 2008

ADVERTISEMENT [AP photo (1973)] Coach Don Shula celebrates after leading the Dolphins to an unbeaten season with a win over the Redskins in Super Bowl VII.

PHOENIX

I am Don Shula, and I am not grumpy.

Not any more than usual.

But could you blame me if I was a little annoyed with people automatically assuming these undefeated Patriots are somehow superior to my Dolphins of 1972? As if 35 years have dimmed your memories and senses.

Tell me where the legends are in New England. Point out the lockers of the future Hall of Famers. I see Tom Brady, I see Randy Moss, and I see a bunch of guys who couldn't draw a crowd with a megaphone.

Let me ask you this:

Do the Patriots have the No. 1 scoring offense and the No. 1 scoring defense in the NFL? Didn't think so. The Dolphins were the best team in the league on either side of the ball, and that is the definition of dominant.

Yeah, it's true, we had a ridiculously easy schedule. We went the entire regular season without playing a single team that reached the postseason. And Attila the Hun had a cakewalk through Austria and Germany. You play the hand you're dealt, and you celebrate when you win.

If you want adversity, try losing your quarterback in the fifth game of the season. Bob Griese broke his leg in October and didn't return to the starting lineup until the Super Bowl.

Do you suppose the Patriots would have gone 16-0 if Brady had been replaced three months ago by Matt Cassel?

I am Vince Lombardi, and I have no time for this nonsense.

I built squads to win championships, not to debate some silly notion of history's greatest team.

All I will say is during my time in Green Bay, the Packers were 9-1 in the postseason. We won five NFL championships from 1961-67 and were eight yards away from winning another in 1960.

I don't know about free agency. I don't know about salary caps or spygate. But I do know the 1962 Packers rolled over opponents like no one had seen in the modern era of the NFL.

Ever come across a backfield with three Hall of Famers? We had one. Bart Starr handing the ball off to Paul Hornung and Jim Taylor. Two Hall of Famers in the secondary. Two on the offensive line. Two on the defensive line and one at linebacker.

Heck, if we had known it was going to be such a big deal, we would have gone undefeated, too.

Probably a couple of times.

I am Guy Chamberlin, and what's with this forward pass?

In my day, with the Canton Bulldogs in 1923, we played football like real men. We ran, we tackled, we bled. No prima donnas, no drug testing and no Daniel Snyder.

We were the original undefeated team. In the NFL's first season, the Bulldogs went 10-0-2. And then we got better. The '23 Bulldogs went 11-0-1 and outscored the rest of the league 246-19.

Now, maybe our guys were smaller, slower and weaker than today's players. And maybe we didn't grasp this concept of a passing game. But 246-19 sounds pretty special to me.

I am George Seifert, and I don't know what I'm doing in this story.

Okay, so I was the coach of the San Francisco 49ers in 1989. Of the five Super Bowl champions the Niners had from 1981 to '94, that might have been the most impressive team of all.

But, c'mon, I was the Art Garfunkel of 49ers coaches. Bill Walsh created this dynasty - I was just singing harmony. Walsh was there for the first three Super Bowls, and then he handed me the playbook and a roster with Joe Montana, Jerry Rice and Ronnie Lott. And my backup quarterback was a guy named Steve Young.

I may have finished my career with a 1-15 record in Carolina, but that '89 team was as close to unstoppable as any I have ever seen.

I am Mike Ditka, and I think perfection is for pansies.

The 1985 Chicago Bears did not just win a Super Bowl, they turned the NFL upside down.

We had the greatest running back of a generation, we had characters, we had a nasty streak. And we had the most confounding defense anyone had come across in years.

We won one game by 35 points. Another by 44 and still another by 36. And then we got hot. We played 11 quarters in the postseason before giving up a touchdown. At that point, we had outscored three playoff teams 89-3.

I'll grant you, an undefeated season is impressive.

But not as impressive as annihilation.

I am Bill Belichick, and I think you're all afraid.

You know what's about to happen. You know history is being rewritten.

For decade upon decade, fans have argued about the best team the NFL has ever seen. Some might have thought the '72 Dolphins had to be acknowledged; others might have been partial to the majesty of the old Packers.

But no team ever seemed worthy of unanimous acclaim.

Until now.

The Patriots have it all. We have Miami's perfect record. We have the look of Green Bay's dynasty. We have the lopsided scores, and we have a quarterback every bit the equal of Joe Montana and Johnny Unitas.

No one has ever torn apart a regular-season schedule the way we did. We beat division winners North AFC, South (AFC), East (NFC) and West (AFC). And now we have the NFC champions in our sight.

In six days, the arguments end.

The Patriots are history's greatest.

John Romano can be reached at romano@sptimes.com.

[Last modified January 27, 2008, 23:23:00]