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Is it me or does winning a Super Bowl...


Gastineau Lives

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...not seem like such a big deal anymore. I'm not sure if it's my perception that has changed, or my feelings toward the game or the feeling that becoming Super Bowl champion is more of a random occurrence than a sign of greatness, of being the best team in football.

I know the games used to be blowouts, and that sucked and yes, this is better, but to me, the Ravens weren't the best team in football this year and the Giants were definitely not last year. I'm not certain they weren't, don't even know how you determine that, but they sure didn't feel like Super Bowl champions.

Does anyone else feel this way?

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how old are you ? my hero worshipping days ended when I was about 20. I'm 45 now and sports is just entertainment to me now, not much difference between the game, the ads and the halftime show really

I don't think that's what he's saying. I think it's more about "back in the day," when Da Bears, the Niners, the G Men, etc, all dominated. With salary cap, you get parity, and teams are a lot closer than they used to be.

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There are no great teams anymore. It's a league of parity. Yes there are great organizations who seem to win every year, but that doesn't mean they are like the 49ers of old or the Steelers of old, etc. Remember the 'great' Patriots 'dynasty' a few years back, they always won games by 3 points.

Even the 'best' teams aren't all that great. The 18-0 Patriots were a great offensive team, defense was avg. And they weren't that dominate in the playoffs. The 15-1 Packers that lost in the playoffs had a terrible defense. The Patriots last year at what, 13-3, had a horrible defense.

The best teams over the past decade were the Colts who would go 14-2 or 13-3 every year. But they sucked in the playoffs because their defense wasn't very good and it was the all Manning show. And Manning chokes in the playoffs.

And it might be more about match ups. Elway's Bronco's were not that great of a team. They had some great players, but overall, nobody would ever call them one of the best teams of all time. Elway had some great moments and then like Manning, he kind of choked in the super bowl.

Plus free agency and greed kills great teams. A team like the 49ers could suddenly become this great dynasty. Except they will lose players. Look at the Patriots undefeated team from 2007-2008. There are like what, 2 or 3 players left from that team. And they are a winning organization who always competes for a super Bowl. Thats the biggest difference. Rice, Montana, Taylor, Lott, Rathman, etc were on the 49ers for years. Even after Montana was replaced by Young, Rice stuck around for years. Today, Rice probably would have been gone along with Montana.

It's a league of parity and greed. There is a salary cap. Too many players think they are worth far more than they actually are, but teams will pay them. Look at David Harris. Look at some of the players on the highest paid list. Look at Revis if he does get 16 Million per year. Look at Joe Flacco and his 20 Million per year demand. When a team is paying one player close to 20 Million per year, it will hurt them from signing other good to great players. People just don't like to think about that. If you have 2 or 3 players that take up 40 percent of your cap space, what do you think will happen? And what do you think will happen to players who demand top dollar? They'll jet for another team. So great teams are hard to build and remain intact these days. That's why great organizations seem to know how to replace players. Losing organizations seem to have no clue how to replace.

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how old are you ? my hero worshipping days ended when I was about 20. I'm 45 now and sports is just entertainment to me now, not much difference between the game, the ads and the halftime show really

There's less scripting going on in the ads and halftime shows.

Edit: Ooph.

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is the thread starter suggesting we take the top teams in each conference and put them straight to the SB like college football so we don't get 9-7 teams in the SB anymore?

i'da loved to see Broncos vs Falcons as the SB this year

I'm not suggesting anything. I'm just saying that it feels like some of the luster has worn off from winning the Super Bowl and was wondering if anyone else felt that way or if it was just me not caring as much about the sport, in general.

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how old are you ? my hero worshipping days ended when I was about 20. I'm 45 now and sports is just entertainment to me now, not much difference between the game, the ads and the halftime show really

So, I assume you are on a movie lovers website posting 13,000 times as well? How about one of those hot commercial-lovers websites? I bet you LOVE the CLIO awards!

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is the thread starter suggesting we take the top teams in each conference and put them straight to the SB like college football so we don't get 9-7 teams in the SB anymore?

i'da loved to see Broncos vs Falcons as the SB this year

I hate people who start stupid threads

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I guess it is pretty misleading when a team that wins the Super Bowl isn't even the "best" team in their division.

Baltimore did win their division. The NY Giants won their division last year.

Even with parity, it's not like #5 and #6 seeds are winning super bowls all the time.

NY Giants did it in 2007, Steelers did it in 2005, Packers did it in 2010. But you can't always go by where a team finishes anymore.

The Packers were a team that went 15-1 the following season. Some teams don't live up to expectations or have injuries. The Giants have been that team who starts off 6-2, gets bored, then blows the last month of the season. And the Steelers. Weren't they like 15-1 the year before they won the super bowl?

Look at this year. Ravens and 49ers were both in the Championship games the season before and were too unlucky plays away from facing each other.

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Here is what I took from this SB, and from many other playoff games in recent years: so called good defenses are getting toasted. Both of these defenses were considered to be good ones and they were anything but. Nowadays a "good " defense is one that can get a stop in a big spot. Even if it does allow 30 points in a game.

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There are 3 phases to the NFL season, the regular, the playoffs and the super. The way I see it the relevancy of the games fits within the framework of this raw illustration:

Actual football fans <---------------------------> Casual fans <-----------------------------> Disinterested party goers, advertisers, consumers

Regular season --------------------------------------------->

Playoffs -------------------------------------------------> SuperBowl

-------------> SuperBowl

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The major issues I am seeing are:

1. Parity. The league likes this because "on any given Sunday" people will go to games because they think they can win no matter who they are playing. There is also some level of inherent fairness where teams are not allowed to stockpile talent and keep great players on their bench denying them opportunity and contracts elsewhere. It's not going to change.

2. Too many playoff games. This makes it harder for teams to roll through the playoffs and more likely that some outlier will win a game and **** up the bracket. The league likes this because almost all the teams are in the playoff hunt until the final week and that keeps interest and attendance up. More playoff games increases revenue. Like hockey! It's not going to change.

3. Interleague play. In the old days, the 5th best team in the AFC could be better than the best team in NFC and nobody would know because they wouldn't have played each other. They wouldn't even have common opponents. Remember ye olde days when we used to look at preseason and prior pro bowl matchups to see how players might fare against each other in the big game? Gone. Hell, half the time the super bowl is a rematch of a game that happened within the last season or two.

1+2+3=$$$$$$

So, if anything it is going to move in the other direction.

Then Blackout deserves a lifetime achievement award

Nominated

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The major issues I am seeing are:

1. Parity. The league likes this because "on any given Sunday" people will go to games because they think they can win no matter who they are playing. There is also some level of inherent fairness where teams are not allowed to stockpile talent and keep great players on their bench denying them opportunity and contracts elsewhere. It's not going to change.

2. Too many playoff games. This makes it harder for teams to roll through the playoffs and more likely that some outlier will win a game and **** up the bracket. The league likes this because almost all the teams are in the playoff hunt until the final week and that keeps interest and attendance up. More playoff games increases revenue. Like hockey! It's not going to change.

3. Interleague play. In the old days, the 5th best team in the AFC could be better than the best team in NFC and nobody would know because they wouldn't have played each other. They wouldn't even have common opponents. Remember ye olde days when we used to look at preseason and prior pro bowl matchups to see how players might fare against each other in the big game? Gone. Hell, half the time the super bowl is a rematch of a game that happened within the last season or two.

1+2+3=$$$$$$

So, if anything it is going to move in the other direction.

Nominated

Not going to address #1 but as far as #2 is concerned the NFL playoffs have been three rounds for more than 30 years so I don't see how this has any effect.

Back in the 80s when you had the three division set up you had two wild cards. The three division winners all got byes and the WC teams played and then you had the divisional round, the conference championship and the SB. The in the late 80s or early 90s they added the third Wildcard team and too a bye away from the lowest ranked division champion - same number of rounds.

In the early 2000s they re-organized into the four division set up, went back to two WCs and stuck with three rounds of playoffs before the SB. Nothing has changed.

And as far as your #3 how old are you that you remember a time where there was no inter-conference play? Inter-conference play has been around since the 1970 merger. I am 41 and there has been no time in my NFL watching life that inter-conference play didn't exist.

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Not going to address #1 but as far as #2 is concerned the NFL playoffs have been three rounds for more than 30 years so I don't see how this has any effect.

Back in the 80s when you had the three division set up you had two wild cards. The three division winners all got byes and the WC teams played and then you had the divisional round, the conference championship and the SB. The in the late 80s or early 90s they added the third Wildcard team and too a bye away from the lowest ranked division champion - same number of rounds.

In the early 2000s they re-organized into the four division set up, went back to two WCs and stuck with three rounds of playoffs before the SB. Nothing has changed.

And as far as your #3 how old are you that you remember a time where there was no inter-conference play? Inter-conference play has been around since the 1970 merger. I am 41 and there has been no time in my NFL watching life that inter-conference play didn't exist.

Maybe I'm confusing it with baseball, but I sure don't remember that many interconference games before the mid 80s. Guess I was wrong, but I thought it came with the 16 game schedule. As for how many rounds of playoffs, additional teams make for more chances. Maybe they haven't added rounds, but more teams making it = more non-dominant teams with a chance. They added a division for crying out loud. .

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Maybe I'm confusing it with baseball, but I sure don't remember that many interconference games before the mid 80s. Guess I was wrong, but I thought it came with the 16 game schedule. As for how many rounds of playoffs, additional teams make for more chances. Maybe they haven't added rounds, but more teams making it = more non-dominant teams with a chance. They added a division for crying out loud. .

The 16-game schedule came into being in the mid-1970s so that hasn't changed in more than 30 years either.

They added a division but they didn't add a bunch of new expansion teams and they really haven't added any teams to the playoff mix. There were five playoffs teams per conference from the late 70s to the early 90s and since then its been six teams. When they realigned they added a fourth division but they subtracted a wild card qualifier - you went from three division champions and three wildcards to four division champions and two wildcards.

3+3=6

4+2=6

This isn't rocket science.

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The 16-game schedule came into being in the mid-1970s so that hasn't changed in more than 30 years either.

They added a division but they didn't add a bunch of new expansion teams and they really haven't added any teams to the playoff mix. There were five playoffs teams per conference from the late 70s to the early 90s and since then its been six teams. When they realigned they added a fourth division but they subtracted a wild card qualifier - you went from three division champions and three wildcards to four division champions and two wildcards.

3+3=6

4+2=6

This isn't rocket science.

..and the extra division dilutes the winners. You have teams getting in with worse records than the wild cards would have and getting home games See 8-8 Seattle vs. defending super bowl champ New Orleans.

I don't need to be told it isn't rocket science. I know that I did not research the facts. I'm going from memory on things that happened when I was 8-12 years old. I didn't say these were new things, but it has been a steady march towards this point and things are going to continue in this direction.

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..and the extra division dilutes the winners. You have teams getting in with worse records than the wild cards would have and getting home games See 8-8 Seattle vs. defending super bowl champ New Orleans.

I don't need to be told it isn't rocket science. I know that I did not research the facts. I'm going from memory on things that happened when I was 8-12 years old. I didn't say these were new things, but it has been a steady march towards this point and things are going to continue in this direction.

Yeah, but there were occaisionlly crappy division winners before, that's pretty much what led to the third wildcard in the old system.

None of the alignment changes had nearly the impact of unrestricted free agency and the salary cap.

But the reality of the NFL and all the off and on field rules changes is this: now, more than ever, this is a QB driven league. You think its a coincidence that this was the first time in a dozen years that you had no one named Brady, Manning or Rothliesberger starting at QB in the Super Bowl for the AFC?

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Yeah, but there were occaisionlly crappy division winners before, that's pretty much what led to the third wildcard in the old system.

None of the alignment changes had nearly the impact of unrestricted free agency and the salary cap.

But the reality of the NFL and all the off and on field rules changes is this: now, more than ever, this is a QB driven league. You think its a coincidence that this was the first time in a dozen years that you had no one named Brady, Manning or Rothliesberger starting at QB in the Super Bowl for the AFC?

Yep. These rule changes are another thing. The difference is that I see unrestricted free agency and to a lesser extent the salary cap as being fair. I prefer the free market, but recognize the salary cap as a step to help the players union get concessions from the owners and to assist small market teams. I see a more open financial system as "fair" but feel less fondly about the rest of the changes and pussification of the league. I mean this "defenseless player" rule for WRs? Dear lord, that was what we prided ourselves on - both as DBs decking guys to knock the ball loose and WRs not pulling a turtle and pulling our arms in (Boldin is as tough as anybody and did it once. We'd have busted on him watching the tape)

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This doesn't make any sense. Few things put more strain on the arm than throwing 95 MPH fastballs.

Yeah, but a guy like Jeff Samardzija chose pitching in the majors over playing WR in the NFL. He definitely would have been drafted had he shown ANY interest in playing football. Guy is an OK pitcher. He's made 10 million in five years bouncing back and forth between the minors and the majors. He just signed a one year deal worth 2.64 million and if he matches what he did last year, which is hover around .500 as a starter with an ERA in the high threes and a whip of 1.22, he sign a five year deal next offseason worth about 35 million and nobody ever tackles him.

Bad shoulder and arthritis vs. degenerative brain damage. You pick.

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...not seem like such a big deal anymore. I'm not sure if it's my perception that has changed, or my feelings toward the game or the feeling that becoming Super Bowl champion is more of a random occurrence than a sign of greatness, of being the best team in football.

I know the games used to be blowouts, and that sucked and yes, this is better, but to me, the Ravens weren't the best team in football this year and the Giants were definitely not last year. I'm not certain they weren't, don't even know how you determine that, but they sure didn't feel like Super Bowl champions.

Does anyone else feel this way?

good topic of discussion IMO! I totally hear you. I've had similar thoughts somewhere that you've brought to the forefront. Def a lot of truth to this. Or we're just getting too old and losing our passion for life. One or the other. :)
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how old are you ? my hero worshipping days ended when I was about 20. I'm 45 now and sports is just entertainment to me now, not much difference between the game, the ads and the halftime show really

Yep.. Each year I care less .. Once you have kids it's just not that important anymore

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good topic of discussion IMO! I totally hear you. I've had similar thoughts somewhere that you've brought to the forefront. Def a lot of truth to this. Or we're just getting too old and losing our passion for life. One or the other. :)

Yep.. Each year I care less .. Once you have kids it's just not that important anymore

So it's either a loss of passion for life or a realization that there are more important things? Interesting. I wonder which way I fall.

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So it's either a loss of passion for life or a realization that there are more important things? Interesting. I wonder which way I fall.

NFL rules make the game suck more now too. Refs ruin a lot of games IMO. They did the SB right however. Can't believe Kay and Francesa wanted a penalty last pass. Typical...both those guys are revolting to listen to IMO.
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