NFL 2019 Super Bowl: the restless shade of Mike Martz

[DanteGabriel]

Willing to accept title ideas. I'm just amazed we went 36+ hours without an active NFL topic, but then again, it's hard to capture the excitement of Pro Bowl weekend.

Seth Wickersham, who earlier this season had those long articles about the dysfunction in the Patriots' organization, has done the same on the Browns and the fidgety reign of Jimmy Haslam. Decent read. Lots of stuff about how competing agendas and dueling power centers with their own turf to protect ended up cancelling out each other's efforts to improve an organization that theoretically had nowhere to go but up. Nothing particularly surprising, I think, but it's just remarkable to see how much a CEO type can fuck up after being so successful in the rest of his business. I guess it's like, sometimes people who are good at hoovering up money can still be totally incompetent at other ventures? I wonder if there are other places where that could apply.

http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/25797430/inside-cleveland-browns-front-office-where-hope-history-collide

Edited January 26 by DanteGabriel

[Triskele]

Not sure if anyone's pointed this out yet but just an interesting little realization:

Same two cities in Super Bowl as in this past Fall's World Series.  

You Boston people have been spoiled rotten this century with your pro sports.  

[Altherion]

Various articles on the internet are revisiting the previous Patriots vs. Rams Owl and a few of them link this very short intro to the game at the end of which, Ricky Proehl (wide receiver of the Rams at the time) does a great impression of the Oracle of Delphi speaking to Croesus. "Tonight, a dynasty is born" indeed...

[Triskele]

15 minutes ago, Altherion said:

, Ricky Proehl (wide receiver of the Rams at the time) does a great impression of the Oracle of Delphi speaking to Croesus. "Tonight, a dynasty is born" indeed...

That's kind of utterly amazing looking back.  It still boggles the mind.  9 Owls in 18 years in an age where that isn't supposed to be possible. 

 

Edited January 27 by Triskele

[Jace, Basilissa]

1 hour ago, Triskele said:

That's kind of utterly amazing looking back.  It still boggles the mind.  9 Owls in 18 years in an age where that isn't supposed to be possible. 

 

So people reference 'in the age of salary cap' a lot with the Patriots, as a qualifier for their greatness.

I reject this concept. There is no qualifier. Best I can tell no Steelers, 49'ers, or Cowboys dynasty lasted 2 goddamn decades.

[Kalbear]

I dont think there's ever been a team in sports that remained this competitive for this long. Maybe the celtics in the 70s? Or the Yankees at one point? I honestly dont know. 

MJs bulls weren't. Kobe and Shaq weren't. No team in baseball in the last 40 years has been. It's pretty incredible. 

[Kalbear]

Then again this kid makes some good points 

 

 

[Altherion]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

I dont think there's ever been a team in sports that remained this competitive for this long. Maybe the celtics in the 70s? Or the Yankees at one point? I honestly dont know. 

I don't think anyone will ever come close to the domination of the mid 20th century Yankees. From 1923 to 1962, they played in 26 World Series and won 20 of them. That is, they won (not just played in the final game, won!) an average of every other year for four consecutive decades including five years in a row from 1949 to 1953. Of course, leaving aside the fact that there were significantly fewer teams, the reason they were able to do this is that all of the mechanisms for maintaining parity hadn't been invented yet. There was no free agency, no draft and no salary cap. What's weird about the 21st century Patriots is that they've somehow managed to dominate for two decades (albeit not quite to the same extent as the above-mentioned Yankees) despite all of these mechanisms intended to force teams to revert to the mean.

[Charles Calthrop]

2 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

So people reference 'in the age of salary cap' a lot with the Patriots, as a qualifier for their greatness.

I reject this concept. There is no qualifier. Best I can tell no Steelers, 49'ers, or Cowboys dynasty lasted 2 goddamn decades.

I think less a qualifier, and more of an enhancer.  When the Steelers 49’ers and Cowboys did it, you could hoard talent.  (In fact, the Cowboys probably came to an early end as free agency was a factor that started pulling away their talent hard as early as the middle of their run. Dawn of the FA era and all that.)

The fact that the Patriots have been as successful as they have for so long, AND done so at a time when a team might have a handful of players in common with the same ‘team’ from 2 or 3 seasons ago makes it more amazing.

Edited January 27 by Charles Calthrop

[Charles Calthrop]

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

I dont think there's ever been a team in sports that remained this competitive for this long. Maybe the celtics in the 70s? Or the Yankees at one point? I honestly dont know. 

MJs bulls weren't. Kobe and Shaq weren't. No team in baseball in the last 40 years has been. It's pretty incredible. 

They didn’t win as many titles as the Patriots, but the Detroit Red Wings were perennially one of the top teams in the NHL through the 90’s and 00’s.  

[unJon]

Not pro sports, but UCLA’s dominance in college basketball 

[BigFatCoward]

11 hours ago, Kalbear said:

I dont think there's ever been a team in sports that remained this competitive for this long. Maybe the celtics in the 70s? Or the Yankees at one point? I honestly dont know. 

MJs bulls weren't. Kobe and Shaq weren't. No team in baseball in the last 40 years has been. It's pretty incredible. 

North American sports?  Because there have been many that totally exceeded this level of performance elsewhere.  Man Utd won 13 titles in 20 years in the premier league. Juve won 14 times in 20 years in Serie A.  Though obviously without the draft/salary cap issues that the Patriots have to contend with. 

[Jace, Basilissa]

Look at what you did, Kal. You couldn't just leave well enough alone could you? 

You brought this horde of uncleans into our thread, YOU DID!!!!

[unJon]

20 minutes ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

Look at what you did, Kal. You couldn't just leave well enough alone could you? 

You brought this horde of uncleans into our thread, YOU DID!!!!

Get thee to a nunnery, go. Farewell. Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool, for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them.

[Fez]

10 hours ago, Altherion said:

I don't think anyone will ever come close to the domination of the mid 20th century Yankees. From 1923 to 1962, they played in 26 World Series and won 20 of them. That is, they won (not just played in the final game, won!) an average of every other year for four consecutive decades including five years in a row from 1949 to 1953. Of course, leaving aside the fact that there were significantly fewer teams, the reason they were able to do this is that all of the mechanisms for maintaining parity hadn't been invented yet. There was no free agency, no draft and no salary cap. What's weird about the 21st century Patriots is that they've somehow managed to dominate for two decades (albeit not quite to the same extent as the above-mentioned Yankees) despite all of these mechanisms intended to force teams to revert to the mean.

The '50s/60s Celtics era wasn't as long lasting as the mid-century Yankees, but it's peak was even more impressive I think. They won 11 titles in 13 years with Bill Russell! The other two years, one was a fluky finals loss and the other was a division finals loss to the 76ers the one year that Wilt Chamberlin decided to be a team player rather than a ball hog just to prove that he could do it if he wanted to.

Granted, there were only 8, and then later 14, teams in the league at the time; and around half the future hall of famers of the era played on the Celtics (some years literally all 5 starters were). But it's still a hell of a thing.

[DanteGabriel]

15 hours ago, Kalbear said:

I dont think there's ever been a team in sports that remained this competitive for this long. Maybe the celtics in the 70s? Or the Yankees at one point? I honestly dont know. 

MJs bulls weren't. Kobe and Shaq weren't. No team in baseball in the last 40 years has been. It's pretty incredible. 

The nearest analog has been the Duncan-Popovich Spurs, since that's 15 or 16 years and five titles with one star and coach. Brady-Belichick have outlasted them now though.

And the Spurs could have extended their window if Kawhi had stuck around, but it's hard to say how all that would have shaken out since Golden State is so loaded.

[Jace, Basilissa]

13 hours ago, Charles Calthrop said:

I think less a qualifier, and more of an enhancer.  When the Steelers 49’ers and Cowboys did it, you could hoard talent.  (In fact, the Cowboys probably came to an early end as free agency was a factor that started pulling away their talent hard as early as the middle of their run. Dawn of the FA era and all that.)

The fact that the Patriots have been as successful as they have for so long, AND done so at a time when a team might have a handful of players in common with the same ‘team’ from 2 or 3 seasons ago makes it more amazing.

Yeah, I recognize this bent of it and it's the poor phrasing by most professionals I am taking issue with. Peeps just talking isn't really fair grounds for this kind of hyper-specific criticism, but they repeat what they hear and find agreeable from aforementioned professionals. 

And in their efforts to espouse extra virtues of this dynasty, 'enhancing' as you appropriately put it, they inadvertently suggest that teams pre-salary cap are even comparable in their degree of dominance. 

Does this make any sense at all? I smell toast.

[DMC]

6 hours ago, Fez said:

The '50s/60s Celtics era wasn't as long lasting as the mid-century Yankees, but it's peak was even more impressive I think. They won 11 titles in 13 years with Bill Russell!

While the numbers don't pop out as much, I think the post-WWII Yanks run is a slightly more impressive "peak" run.  From 1947 to 1964 they won 10 of 18 World Series and an additional 5 pennants.  While that's no 11-1 in 13 years, as you mentioned the Celtics only had 8-9 teams in the league for all but the last two (Bill Russell coached) championships in that run.  There were eight teams in each league for most of that Yanks run (MLB started expanding in 1961), meaning talent could be considerably less easily hoarded/concentrated.

Anyway, I think the biggest "caveat" on the Pats is how Brady has never insisted on getting paid at market value.  Hell, according to spotrac, he's never made more than $19.75 million in a single year, which is just ridiculous.  And looking at his cap hit by year, he hasn't been in the top 10 ranked QBs since 2013 (although that site does have him ranked 6th for next year).  Of course, the Pats deserve credit for spending that extra money wisely, but Brady's willingness to take less salary has allowed the financial flexibility that's been integral to their longevity.

[dbunting]

On 1/27/2019 at 4:51 PM, DMC said:

Anyway, I think the biggest "caveat" on the Pats is how Brady has never insisted on getting paid at market value.  Hell, according to spotrac, he's never made more than $19.75 million in a single year, which is just ridiculous.  And looking at his cap hit by year, he hasn't been in the top 10 ranked QBs since 2013 (although that site does have him ranked 6th for next year).  Of course, the Pats deserve credit for spending that extra money wisely, but Brady's willingness to take less salary has allowed the financial flexibility that's been integral to their longevity.

I think this is a pretty big part of the longevity. There are several teams who have a quarter of their cap space pretty much eaten up by a  QB who has never even won a SB let alone multiple.  I looked for a list and kept getting different results (so don't kill me if I'm wrong on his place) but Brady wasn't even in top 15 even after getting 5 mill in incentive bonuses. 

This article lists 43 players that are paid more than Brady in 2018...Brady was right between Tyrod Taylor and Josh McCown

https://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2018/8/9/17671350/tom-brady-contract-2018-serious-bargain-blake-bortles-ahahahah

 

Another big part is drafting well and player development. They seem to get the most out of a player and then cut em loose when they peak.

[Kalbear]

Having a 41 year old QB who can still be awesome and not having to try and miss on qb prospects is the big deal. The cap saving is nice but probably not as big a deal as not having years of mediocre QB play.