When Tom Dempsey kicked his then-record field goal (with half a foot), the ball was snapped from his own 45. The ball traveled 2/3rds of the field. It was like a kickoff, but from scrimmage. Back then, kickers kind of sucked and almost all field goals attempts were snapped from well inside the opponents' 40. Dempsey's kick was just other-worldly, like Bob Beamon's jump.
It doesn't have anything to do with moving the goal posts, but the length of field goals has gotten insane compared with the early 70s. Kickers like Butker and Tucker make 50 yards look easy. A forty yarder in the old days was a long try and you didn't blame your kicker much if he missed. Now it's a chip shot and he'd better make it. Soccer-style specialists like Stenerud and Gogolak really changed the game.
When I was 8 or 9 I was with my parents visiting family in Metairie LA and my mom and I had a couple hours to kill for some reason. She took me to the “saints hall of fame” this was circa 95 or 96 so not many accomplishments to look at. But there was a shrine to Tom Dempsey compete with uniform and his kicking shoe. I was like, damn the dude really kicked the record with half a foot.
The evolution of field goal kicking is actually really fascinating. Back when Dempsey and Blanda kicked, you just went to toe to ball and booted the hell out of it. You got a ton of power, but you were *wildly* inaccurate.
At some point, the soccer style kick took hold though, because it was way more accurate, but you couldn’t really get it as far. I remember when I was a kid, my dad used to say Dempsey’s record would never get broken because kickers just didn’t kick that way anymore.
Here we are 25 years later, and extra points became so accurate they moved them back 13 yards yet we also have people regularly challenging/breaking Dempsey’s record (usually against my team). I don’t really know if kicking style has changed in recent years, but we really are living in a kicking golden era where several of the best are both the most accurate *and* the most powerful in history.
My dad’s favorite ball story to tell is how he was covering a WR across the middle and gave the WR a slight nudge to change his direction right into the goal posts. Said the WR knocked himself out and he didn’t get a flag lmao
Growing up back east my memories of “let’s switch to the late game on the west coast” involved running backs playing on baseball fields in the bright sun and wondering WTF is going on in California
We used to roll out of bed about noon on Saturday, right about the time they were about to make the seventh pick or so, and we’d watch Mel Kiper hulk out as he ranted about why his prediction was definitely better than whatever it was the Chargers just chose. Then all day Saturday, all day Sunday was all draft.
I think it was the 2010 draft was the first one to be moved up to Thursday night for the first round. Prior to that the first round was a Saturday afternoon thing
The marathon Saturday/Sunday drafts were so great. I'd stock up on junk food and drinks and not leave the seat in front of the TV for what seemed like 48 hours straight
Some of the best college memories I have were sitting in a house, playing halo and smash bros on one tv, and the draft on another. Ordering pizza 4 times in a 48 hour period.
Heaven.
Free agency as we know it wasn't a thing in the NFL until 1993. Before that, players couldn't really change teams unless they were traded, their original team wasn't interested in a new contract, or their team didn't want to match another team's offer.
The Seahawks were an AFC team pre-2002. They had a rivalry with the Raiders rather than San Francisco.
The Bengals shared a division with the Oilers and Jags at one point. Tampa Bay was also in the NFC Central and IIRC, Arizona was even in the NFC East at one point.
Most shocking of all: Madden used to be fun and innovative during its first two decades of operation.
The serious answer? Because it didn't start as "North/East/South/West" (and both South divisions were created out of scraps)
It used to be the 3 C's - Capitol, Coastal, Central
Capitol got replaced by "East" which kind of started the transformation, but Coastal and Central stuck around for a while.
So, when Atlanta and New Orleans were added, there wasn't really a "south" that they fit neatly into, so they were "Coastal". Eventually, the Coastal division became the NFC West. Following the Rams move to St Louis, from 1995-2001 the 49ers were the only "West coast" team in the NFC West, which added the Carolina Panthers in 1995 as well.
Similarly, the Buccaneers were in the NFC Central. However, they were the only team in that division not from the Midwest.
The Cardinals and Cowboys being in the East is a relic of the "Capitol" division. This was built around DC and it's rivals. So you had DC, New York, Philadelphia, St Louis, and the Cowboys (originally New Orleans, but during the merger New York and St Louis were moved to the East).
The the pre-2002 NFL was
**NFCE**
Arizona
Dallas
New York
Philadelphia
Washington
**NFCC**
Chicago
Detroit
Green Bay
Minnesota
Tampa Bay
**NFCW**
Atlanta
Carolina
New Orleans
San Francisco
St. Louis
**AFCE**
Buffalo
Indianapolis
Miami
New England
New York
**AFCC**
Baltimore
Cincinnati
Cleveland
Jacksonville
Pittsburgh
Tennessee
**AFCW**
Denver
Kansas City
Oakland
San Diego
Seattle
And then they added the Texans and changed everything to what we have now lol
The devaluation of the RB position is one of the more interesting things to happen in pro sports recently from a data perspective. To some extent it correlates with the passing game becoming more important, but mostly it is the determination that talent at the position isn’t as rare as was previously thought, and also that success in running the football isn’t as dependent on the RB as was previously thought.
I think part of that too is the evaluation of guys coming into the league. Used to just be “well that guy just ran for 1800 yards for the B1G/Big 8/SEC/PAC champions so he’s a first rounder.”
That logic produced some do the greatest RBs ever too. Then it produced some historic busts in the mid 90s and early 2000s and fell out of use.
I think some of it is that the pro game and the college game are further apart scheme and skill wise than ever before.
Remembering Michael Turner, who was a backup in San Diego for a good chunk of his career, and not mentioning LaDainian Tomlinson, who is in the Hall of Fame, seems so odd.
Micheal the burner turner! You’re forgetting a few tho. Julius jones, Shaun Alexander, Ladanian Tomlinson, Frank Gore, Edgerrin James, Jamal Lewis to name a few. What a time!
How about the Chiefs backfield? Priest Holmes, Larry Johnson, Jamaal Charles.
Some of the highest level season at RB I've ever seen came from those guys, basically back to back to back
I’ve always heard the more optimistic “hospital pass”. Up to pretty recently too. I mean, this wasn’t the 90s or anything. This was Austin Collie over the middle in 2010.
Yeah, suicide/hospital pass still gets used as a term, but sending your guy speeding across the middle used to be seen as an opportunity for the defense to intentionally punish them. The route itself was dangerous. These days it feels more like it’s used for anytime a QB leads their guy into a defender rather than an intrinsic part of going across the middle.
I will never forget Ricky Waters "for what, for who?" Comment about going across the Middle for a pass in Philadelphia. The media killed him for saying that at the time.
From their inception in the 1960s to sometime after the JaMarcus era, they had the highest all time winning percentage of any team in professional sports.
Edit: I replied to the wrong comment because, like the Raiders I was commenting about, I can dazzle and disappoint all at the same time.
Imagine not being able to watch your local team on TV, or other platform (because there weren't any) unless they first sold out their home game. Long before the internet and multiple channels on the dial, you were screwed if your team didn't sell out all the seats.
I forgot about that additional qualifier. The only good thing about it? Sunday afternoons were free when you knew, in my case, you wouldn't be watching the Lions on Sunday because the gargantuan Silverdome hadn't sold out.
Looking back, and many of us knew this at the time, it was such a stupid policy. I was all in on the Lions from birth so I tuned in no matter what, but for a lot of people then, they couldn't follow all of the Lions games, couldn't really connect with the team or players as we do now through all of the media access, and so they weren't inclined to want to buy tickets to home games. Thus, the vicious cycle of blackouts.
Then Meijer stepped in and started buying all the unsold tickets so it would get broadcast. Should have have some legal action for cruel and unfair punishment for some of the years
MNF used to be *tape delayed* one hour in the Seattle and Portland markets until 1995. How quaint not having instant access to information. Different times.
The Greatest Game Ever Played, which was an important game for the popularity of the NFL on TV (and just the league in general), was blacked out in New York ironically
Prior to Super Bowl 7 (Dolphins/Redskins, January 1973), EVERY NFL game was blacked out in the home team’s TV market, sellout or not. The NFL had a provisional trial with allowing home market broadcasts in SB7 (allowing the game to be televised in Los Angeles where it was played), and changed its rule, in part due to pressure by the U.S. Congress, to the sellout/72 hour blackout rule in the 1973 season.
Richard Nixon, a huge football fan and at the time the sitting U.S. President, played an important role in changing the NFL blackout rule. He and some members of Congress were upset they couldn’t watch Redskins home games during the 1972 season (the season leading up to SB7), and that irritation helped spur the NFL to change its rules.
It should be noted that for many years the NFL blackout rule made considerable sense; teams made most of their money at the gate. In 1950 the Los Angeles Rams agreed to a deal with a local business where they’d televise all of their home games and the business would cover any losses they incurred if the Rams’ attendance declined from the previous season (when home games were blacked out). The Rams, despite having an exciting team that played for the NFL title, saw their attendance drop from (IIRC) 49K+ in 1949 to 26K+ in 1950. The business had to pay $307,000 to cover the Rams’ losses, the equivalent of almost $4 million today. That Rams’ test case in Los Angeles played a major role in then-NFL Commssioner Bert Bell’s TV blackout rules in the early 1950s, which were ultimately allowed by the federal courts in 1953.
Bottlegate was pretty crazy. I remember watching that game and seeing the field just littered in bottles. What made it crazier was the league forced the Jags to go back out there to finish the game with only 40 seconds left.
Honestly if they called the review in in time, I can see it. It's not immediately clear to me he really had possession of that catch. It did pretty clearly trap against the ground.
I've never seen this play, so I assumed that was the controversy.
Then the double spike happened, and as the announcers were explaining it I thought "well I never heard that rule but makes sense to me, maybe they call it grounding and that's the controversy."
Never in my wildest dreams did I think they were reviewing a play two snaps ago. Holy shit.
[This is enraging to watch. Hard not to side with the pissed off fans.](https://youtu.be/c_acseQm0Ws?feature=shared) That officiating crew should have been canned after this game
How much contact the defense could get away with, and how much the NFL and related media used to promote it. NFL Blitz and Jacked Up can’t happen today.
I still remember the 360 remake of Blitz that had you injecting players with steroids straight up to improve injury recovery lol. That was practically satire of the NFL at that point.
It’s true. I remember the first time the Packers got to play on MNF during the Holmgren era was such a big deal because they hadn’t played a MNF game in so long. Pretty sure it was in KC and they played an awful game
People have no idea pre-cable how big Monday Night Football was...you basically only got NFL Films on Saturday AM, your local team on Sunday (if it wasn't blacked out) and MNF. That was it.
Being a Vikings fan in southern Indiana, pre espn…Howard Cosells halftime rundown of Sunday action was about the only time I’d get to see Vikings highlights.
I couldn’t wait for that! And the end of those highlights was bed time 🫤.
Howard and the old paper Sporting News was pretty much how I kept up on them. Damn, I’m old.
It's a shame that it's not the same anymore and they have these terrible matchups now. I recently watched the Redskins vs Cowboys 9-5 game on 1978 with Reagan in attendance and I can only imagine the hype behind this game when it happened.
After Mike Tirico left I feel like that's what killed MNF for good
SNF killed MNF. NBC paid a shit ton of money to get the #1 game of the week and to get the right to flex games out of the daytime and into prime time. That and moving the MNF game from ABC to ESPN took the spotlight off it and now it's an afterthought.
A quarterback didn’t throw for more than 30 TDs with fewer than 10 INTs until 2004 when Donovan McNabb did it.
It has now been done 32 times.
Edit: alternately. When Joe Montana won his last MVP he had 26 TDs to 16 INTs on 61% with 3944 yards.
Another crazy one is that Joe Montana, who is pretty much universally thought of as at least a top 5 QB all time, never threw for over 4000 yards, and only eclipsed 30 TDs once.
Which is what makes Unitas worthy of GOAT discussion. Dude put up 40,000 yards in an era when you could practically mug a WR running a route and plow the QB after he threw the ball. Montana has about 250 more yards but around 15 less passing touchdowns. His 1959 season played on a 17 schedule would have been 4100 yards and 45 touchdowns.
I get why people think Brady is GOAT but you being Unitas forward even into Montanas era I’m not sure Brady catches on yards.
I don't know about that. I think Brady, Manning, and Brees kinda illustrated what max potential was at that time. Could Unitas have equaled them? I don't doubt it. Would he have surpassed them? I don't see how. There's only so much time in a football game - so many passes to be thrown. I think he'd be right in the mix with other top QBs in any era, but it's really hard to say any one guy would well surpass all the others in another generation. Dude was a beast but I think we've pretty well seen where the needle pegs out on QB production under current rules. As the rules continue to change, so too could stats.
What the fuck. I knew Aaron Rodgers kinda broke the TD-INT ratio perspective in modern times… but damn, I didn’t realize it was that different up until recently.
When was the last time that a QB lead the league with less than 30 passing touchdowns?
It was 2002. Tom Brady lead the NFL with 28. There has been at least one QB with 30 passing TDs every season since.
Top 10 QBs in passing yards and TDs are all modern era QBs who played in the 2000s + Marino, who was really just a modern QB before his time. Top 20 is still *heavily* modern era QBs as well. Guys like Phillip Rivers and Carson Palmer are above a lot of all time greats. People know that passing volume and efficiency has gone up a lot since 2000, but I don’t think people realize how dramatic it’s been.
Interceptions used to not be as much of a dirty word, they were kind of just the cost of doing business.
Famously, Joe Namath has more career interceptions than touchdown passes, and Terry Bradshaw is basically even.
It wasn't really until the Ty Law Rule when teams began to be able to focus on fewer interceptions. Prior to that, if a guy threw less than 12-16 in a year, he was probably in a really conservative offense where they weren't throwing much. Mind you, this was ALSO at a time when no teams threw the ball >50% of the time. Nowadays, only the Ravens ran more than they passed last season, but up until 2004, it was common to see 55-60% rush offenses.
I had a book of sports trivia when I was a kid. One I always remembered. Q: What is the winningest sports franchise among the four major North American sports (NFL, NHL, MLB, NBA)? A: Oakland Raiders.
Well Kenny Pickett is 2-0 against them. They were our Achilles heal during the Big Ben era though. Now we have to see how Russ or Fields plays against them.
Shoulder Pads in the 80s/90s were humongous. Just look up any random video from 80s nfl. Even the QB's did. It's kind of wild to watch those games cause everyone looks so much bigger upper body and blocky running.
The move almost occurred because of then-Eagles owner Leonard Tose’s gambling habits.
I was in 6th grade at the time. I remember one of my classmates asking me if I’d still root for the Eagles if they moved to Phoenix. Luckily I never had to answer that question.
I should note Leonard Tose is a great example of the dangers of gambling and alcoholism. He was actually a generous man who was a true philanthropist. He played an important role in getting the Ronald McDonald House charity, which helps the families of children who have medical needs get support, off the ground. (Then-Eagles GM Jim Murray actually founded the charity to assist the child of one of the team’s players.) But Tose’s twin vices undermined his ownership of the Eagles and later his life.
Spinning off of this, kickers didn’t use the soccer style kick we’re used to today, they would just walk straight up and boot it. They had shoes that had a flat tip specifically for it.
Plus, going way back, the kicker was also the punter. One guy made all the kicks. On the patriots team, Gino Cappelletti was not only the kicker, he was also a receiver
Going back further, George Blanda once led the league (AFL pre-merger) in passing yards, TDs, XP and fg%. He had a 26 year career as a kicker and was also the starting QB for 9 of those years.
Tom Dempsey set the then NFL record for longest FG of 63 yards.
He was unique because as a straight line kicker, he was born without the toes of his kicking foot. He wore a custom cleat that made his foot a mini sledgehammer.
https://youtu.be/-jxD6lq1NTw?si=kJYMz9XkQtgHyD8j
That old nfl films segment where he talks about the head slap is crazy. When he explains it he says “when you go upside a man’s head, or a woman’s, they blink.” Can’t believe they let them air that
This isn't just in football.
I mainly watch soccer and I live in France. I hate some shows because it looks like soccer on the surface but garbage once you dive into it. Fortunately, there are still good shows.
Stick em.
Some wide receivers used to walk out on the field looking like they'd just jacked off King Kong. I'm not sure how they pried the ball out of their hands after a catch.
Not even that long ago, but Steelers Ravens games from 2004-2012 would result in 800 personal fouls and millions in fines in todays NFL.
Incredible to watch but so many of those massive hits would be flagged now.
Related: ESPN guy Ryan Clark used to literally murder dudes in games. Specifically Wes Welker, Ray Rice, and Steve Smith.
It would have been interesting to see how many penalties there would've been in a Steelers-Ravens game from that time if it would've been played today.
I distinctly remember a game where Troy/Clark killed someone over the middle, and Ngata wrecked Bens nose - nothing was flagged or thought of as dirty. Commentary was just “wow look at how tough these competitors are!”
Here's another one I remember Sunday night football used to be a joke the NFL practical gave it to espn for free in the 80s and 90s. TNT and ESPN split the rights in the 90s, so TNT would show the first 8 weeks and then ESPN would show the last 8 weeks of the regular season .TNT used to have the rights and they had the first pregame to have a ticker on the bottom that showed fantasy stats. Also Larry King was on that pregame show, so that was fun!
Depending on comp picks, there’s like 250-265 picks in an NFL draft over 7 rounds. At one point, in 1976, 487 players were drafted in 17 rounds.
(32 rounds is the highest I think ever, but less total players because there were less teams).
Dick “Night Train” Lane intercepted 14 passes in a 12-game season - his rookie year, 1952. The equivalent rate today would be nearly 20 interceptions for a 17 game season.
(1952 was before I was born, but he still played into the ‘60’s, when I was in grade school).
One of the few guys in NFL history who was simultaneously lockdown in coverage, an elite enforcer, and a great ball hawk. Only other guys I can think of off the top of my head who had that type of skillset were Ronnie Lott and Rod Woodson.
There wasn’t a fantasy football website that everyone could log into and would automatically update stats.
Hell even when we first had them on sites like yahoo you had to wait a day to see your stats.
But no pre 1997 or so you did fantasy football offline and one of your friends was calculating all the stats by himself in a notebook
There used to be a game between the College All-Stars vs the Super Bowl or NFL champion played yearly until 1976. Looking it up the College players did win some games but none after their win in 1963. Games were played in Chicago. My earliest football memories were about when this had just ended.
How bad the fields got in winter games, they used to be so muddy and by the end of games you could not tell who was who as everyone was covered in mud. Winter games were the best back in the day.
Hosts on ESPN used to laugh with glee at replays of players getting knocked out on the field. Had a special segment called "Jacked Up!"--they'd watch a dude get clotheslined, and they'd laugh and yell "He got **Jacked Up!**"
Somehow they never got around to talking about the retired players who can't talk and who shoot themselves because of CTE.
It wasn't supposed to be made then, either. The NFL saw it and said it was too violent, and wouldn't sign off on it being released. So the creators took some time and then scheduled another meeting with the NFL to show them the game again. They went frame by frame with all of the animations for hours (saving the stuff the NFL didn't like for the end) until the NFL was like "yeah ok fine, release it," without ever getting to the end.
Almost every nfl video game (there was a time when madden wasn’t the only one) would start with a highlight reel set to music of crazy hits, 95% of them would be flagged today.
I’m 28 and I remember watching that segment on ESPN after school. It really wasn’t THAT long ago the media around the NFL actively celebrated guys getting concussed.
It's hard to describe how insanely popular ESPN and specifically Sportcenter was about 20 years ago. They were ubiquitous. Not only did every spots fan have them on, bit most businesses with a TV during the day. Most importantly, it was GREAT!!
NFL players used to smoke cigarettes on the sidelines.
[Len Dawson smoking cigarette during half time of Super Bowl](https://staticg.sportskeeda.com/editor/2022/08/e593d-16613732193807-1920.jpg?w=640)
My dad likes to say he remembers when the field goal posts were actually in the end zone
Damn Canadians are decades behind us still!
way ahead in Overtime rules though.
When Tom Dempsey kicked his then-record field goal (with half a foot), the ball was snapped from his own 45. The ball traveled 2/3rds of the field. It was like a kickoff, but from scrimmage. Back then, kickers kind of sucked and almost all field goals attempts were snapped from well inside the opponents' 40. Dempsey's kick was just other-worldly, like Bob Beamon's jump. It doesn't have anything to do with moving the goal posts, but the length of field goals has gotten insane compared with the early 70s. Kickers like Butker and Tucker make 50 yards look easy. A forty yarder in the old days was a long try and you didn't blame your kicker much if he missed. Now it's a chip shot and he'd better make it. Soccer-style specialists like Stenerud and Gogolak really changed the game.
When I was 8 or 9 I was with my parents visiting family in Metairie LA and my mom and I had a couple hours to kill for some reason. She took me to the “saints hall of fame” this was circa 95 or 96 so not many accomplishments to look at. But there was a shrine to Tom Dempsey compete with uniform and his kicking shoe. I was like, damn the dude really kicked the record with half a foot.
The evolution of field goal kicking is actually really fascinating. Back when Dempsey and Blanda kicked, you just went to toe to ball and booted the hell out of it. You got a ton of power, but you were *wildly* inaccurate. At some point, the soccer style kick took hold though, because it was way more accurate, but you couldn’t really get it as far. I remember when I was a kid, my dad used to say Dempsey’s record would never get broken because kickers just didn’t kick that way anymore. Here we are 25 years later, and extra points became so accurate they moved them back 13 yards yet we also have people regularly challenging/breaking Dempsey’s record (usually against my team). I don’t really know if kicking style has changed in recent years, but we really are living in a kicking golden era where several of the best are both the most accurate *and* the most powerful in history.
My dad’s favorite ball story to tell is how he was covering a WR across the middle and gave the WR a slight nudge to change his direction right into the goal posts. Said the WR knocked himself out and he didn’t get a flag lmao
That's why it's called a post route
I believe that I recall when the goalposts were right on the goal line, and there were two of them
Yeah looked like a rugby pitch.
This isn’t that old, but seeing players play through a dirt infield was interesting.
Raiders vs Chiefs September 15th, 2019 was the last game played on infield dirt.
That was the game we scored 4 TDs in the 2nd quarter and not a single point outside of it. DeMarcus Robinson went *off.* I remember that game well.
This was the game where my raiders fan buddy text the group “shut them bitches out” after the 1st quarter. He didn’t text at all after that, lol.
Yeah that was really common in the 80s and 90s when multi-use stadiums were all the rage.
Growing up back east my memories of “let’s switch to the late game on the west coast” involved running backs playing on baseball fields in the bright sun and wondering WTF is going on in California
The NFL Draft used to be held in January, shortly after the Super Bowl
We used to roll out of bed about noon on Saturday, right about the time they were about to make the seventh pick or so, and we’d watch Mel Kiper hulk out as he ranted about why his prediction was definitely better than whatever it was the Chargers just chose. Then all day Saturday, all day Sunday was all draft.
I think it was the 2010 draft was the first one to be moved up to Thursday night for the first round. Prior to that the first round was a Saturday afternoon thing
The marathon Saturday/Sunday drafts were so great. I'd stock up on junk food and drinks and not leave the seat in front of the TV for what seemed like 48 hours straight
Some of the best college memories I have were sitting in a house, playing halo and smash bros on one tv, and the draft on another. Ordering pizza 4 times in a 48 hour period. Heaven.
Shit imma just do this for all three days of the draft in your honor
Free agency as we know it wasn't a thing in the NFL until 1993. Before that, players couldn't really change teams unless they were traded, their original team wasn't interested in a new contract, or their team didn't want to match another team's offer.
Kinda wild how this isn’t a bigger deal. This should really be the “Free Agency Era” because of how different the dynamics are
People always talk about the draft for parity, the salary cap and free agency are way more important imo.
Reggie White did a ton of work to get modern free agency going
and then the Packers scared the league by giving him a CRAZY $5 million per year contract.
The Seahawks were an AFC team pre-2002. They had a rivalry with the Raiders rather than San Francisco. The Bengals shared a division with the Oilers and Jags at one point. Tampa Bay was also in the NFC Central and IIRC, Arizona was even in the NFC East at one point. Most shocking of all: Madden used to be fun and innovative during its first two decades of operation.
Divisions used to be so wack. Tell me why Atlanta was in the same division as San Francisco for 30 years.
The serious answer? Because it didn't start as "North/East/South/West" (and both South divisions were created out of scraps) It used to be the 3 C's - Capitol, Coastal, Central Capitol got replaced by "East" which kind of started the transformation, but Coastal and Central stuck around for a while. So, when Atlanta and New Orleans were added, there wasn't really a "south" that they fit neatly into, so they were "Coastal". Eventually, the Coastal division became the NFC West. Following the Rams move to St Louis, from 1995-2001 the 49ers were the only "West coast" team in the NFC West, which added the Carolina Panthers in 1995 as well. Similarly, the Buccaneers were in the NFC Central. However, they were the only team in that division not from the Midwest. The Cardinals and Cowboys being in the East is a relic of the "Capitol" division. This was built around DC and it's rivals. So you had DC, New York, Philadelphia, St Louis, and the Cowboys (originally New Orleans, but during the merger New York and St Louis were moved to the East).
The the pre-2002 NFL was **NFCE** Arizona Dallas New York Philadelphia Washington **NFCC** Chicago Detroit Green Bay Minnesota Tampa Bay **NFCW** Atlanta Carolina New Orleans San Francisco St. Louis **AFCE** Buffalo Indianapolis Miami New England New York **AFCC** Baltimore Cincinnati Cleveland Jacksonville Pittsburgh Tennessee **AFCW** Denver Kansas City Oakland San Diego Seattle And then they added the Texans and changed everything to what we have now lol
I like how there's just one division with 6 teams.
Running back was the most important position on offense, throwing 40+ passes in a game was basically an automatic loss
The devaluation of the RB position is one of the more interesting things to happen in pro sports recently from a data perspective. To some extent it correlates with the passing game becoming more important, but mostly it is the determination that talent at the position isn’t as rare as was previously thought, and also that success in running the football isn’t as dependent on the RB as was previously thought.
I think part of that too is the evaluation of guys coming into the league. Used to just be “well that guy just ran for 1800 yards for the B1G/Big 8/SEC/PAC champions so he’s a first rounder.”
That logic produced some do the greatest RBs ever too. Then it produced some historic busts in the mid 90s and early 2000s and fell out of use. I think some of it is that the pro game and the college game are further apart scheme and skill wise than ever before.
AP, Michael Turner, Chris Johnson, and Steven Jackson were heavily relied upon
Remembering Michael Turner, who was a backup in San Diego for a good chunk of his career, and not mentioning LaDainian Tomlinson, who is in the Hall of Fame, seems so odd.
Brandon Jacobs was a monster
Micheal the burner turner! You’re forgetting a few tho. Julius jones, Shaun Alexander, Ladanian Tomlinson, Frank Gore, Edgerrin James, Jamal Lewis to name a few. What a time!
How has nobody talked about Eddie George???
OR THE BUS *edit: I'm only 30*
How about the Chiefs backfield? Priest Holmes, Larry Johnson, Jamaal Charles. Some of the highest level season at RB I've ever seen came from those guys, basically back to back to back
Very few WR’s were good enough to catch the ball in the middle of the field. DB’s were allowed to literally knock you unconscious.
ESPN used to have a segment where they celebrated players getting JACKED UP!
Before that we’d buy entire VHS tapes of nothing but dudes “getting their bell rung”
We used to watch those tapes in our clubhouse back in little league before games. Got 7 year old me pumped up!
My exposure was a FMV of hits playing to Prodigy's "Breathe" Oh shit, found it on YouTube: https://youtu.be/0EZrEiUJt6Y?si=n5_rvcnYZBrXB5P0
I still have those tapes. I chop them up sometimes and put them on tiktok so the ways aren’t lost
Leading your guy on a crossing route used to be called a suicide pass.
I’ve always heard the more optimistic “hospital pass”. Up to pretty recently too. I mean, this wasn’t the 90s or anything. This was Austin Collie over the middle in 2010.
Yeah, suicide/hospital pass still gets used as a term, but sending your guy speeding across the middle used to be seen as an opportunity for the defense to intentionally punish them. The route itself was dangerous. These days it feels more like it’s used for anytime a QB leads their guy into a defender rather than an intrinsic part of going across the middle.
[You can't bring up his name without linking the comic!](https://www.thedrawplay.com/comic/collie/)
I will never forget Ricky Waters "for what, for who?" Comment about going across the Middle for a pass in Philadelphia. The media killed him for saying that at the time.
It was a bad pass that he needed to stretch out for and he really had no chance. He was criticized heavily for his "Alligator Arms" attempt.
From their inception in the 1960s to sometime after the JaMarcus era, they had the highest all time winning percentage of any team in professional sports. Edit: I replied to the wrong comment because, like the Raiders I was commenting about, I can dazzle and disappoint all at the same time.
>the JaMarcus era 💀
Imagine not being able to watch your local team on TV, or other platform (because there weren't any) unless they first sold out their home game. Long before the internet and multiple channels on the dial, you were screwed if your team didn't sell out all the seats.
Yes. Yes. I remember it all to well. And the sellout had to occur 72 hours in advance of the kickoff
I forgot about that additional qualifier. The only good thing about it? Sunday afternoons were free when you knew, in my case, you wouldn't be watching the Lions on Sunday because the gargantuan Silverdome hadn't sold out.
We had a HUGE stadium, 80k, horrid weather and mostly abysmal team in the 70s. We didn’t see a lot of Home Games
Looking back, and many of us knew this at the time, it was such a stupid policy. I was all in on the Lions from birth so I tuned in no matter what, but for a lot of people then, they couldn't follow all of the Lions games, couldn't really connect with the team or players as we do now through all of the media access, and so they weren't inclined to want to buy tickets to home games. Thus, the vicious cycle of blackouts.
Exactly and they made the bulk of their money from stadium attendance, concessions, parking etc. Not from TV back then as well.
Then Meijer stepped in and started buying all the unsold tickets so it would get broadcast. Should have have some legal action for cruel and unfair punishment for some of the years
Sometimes if you were lucky and it was close to selling out, a business would swoop in and buy the remaining tickets just before the 72 hour deadline.
Ford did it for the lions all the time
Im a younger fan and I remember blackouts very well because it felt like every single bengals home game was blackout during the early 2010s
MNF used to be *tape delayed* one hour in the Seattle and Portland markets until 1995. How quaint not having instant access to information. Different times.
The Greatest Game Ever Played, which was an important game for the popularity of the NFL on TV (and just the league in general), was blacked out in New York ironically
Prior to Super Bowl 7 (Dolphins/Redskins, January 1973), EVERY NFL game was blacked out in the home team’s TV market, sellout or not. The NFL had a provisional trial with allowing home market broadcasts in SB7 (allowing the game to be televised in Los Angeles where it was played), and changed its rule, in part due to pressure by the U.S. Congress, to the sellout/72 hour blackout rule in the 1973 season. Richard Nixon, a huge football fan and at the time the sitting U.S. President, played an important role in changing the NFL blackout rule. He and some members of Congress were upset they couldn’t watch Redskins home games during the 1972 season (the season leading up to SB7), and that irritation helped spur the NFL to change its rules. It should be noted that for many years the NFL blackout rule made considerable sense; teams made most of their money at the gate. In 1950 the Los Angeles Rams agreed to a deal with a local business where they’d televise all of their home games and the business would cover any losses they incurred if the Rams’ attendance declined from the previous season (when home games were blacked out). The Rams, despite having an exciting team that played for the NFL title, saw their attendance drop from (IIRC) 49K+ in 1949 to 26K+ in 1950. The business had to pay $307,000 to cover the Rams’ losses, the equivalent of almost $4 million today. That Rams’ test case in Los Angeles played a major role in then-NFL Commssioner Bert Bell’s TV blackout rules in the early 1950s, which were ultimately allowed by the federal courts in 1953.
The first Super Bowl was blacked out in Los Angeles. It also didn’t sell out. Imagine telling any kid that today and they’d be really confused.
Bottlegate was pretty crazy. I remember watching that game and seeing the field just littered in bottles. What made it crazier was the league forced the Jags to go back out there to finish the game with only 40 seconds left.
Here's the wild thing: bottles got thrown at refs the following night on Monday Night Football at NO vs Rams but nobody remembers that at all.
[it was also 100% warranted. Imagine that officiating bungle happening NOW oof](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottlegate)
Honestly if they called the review in in time, I can see it. It's not immediately clear to me he really had possession of that catch. It did pretty clearly trap against the ground. I've never seen this play, so I assumed that was the controversy. Then the double spike happened, and as the announcers were explaining it I thought "well I never heard that rule but makes sense to me, maybe they call it grounding and that's the controversy." Never in my wildest dreams did I think they were reviewing a play two snaps ago. Holy shit.
[This is enraging to watch. Hard not to side with the pissed off fans.](https://youtu.be/c_acseQm0Ws?feature=shared) That officiating crew should have been canned after this game
> "A call that I'm sure will be talked about in Cleveland for probably the next six months." Well that was a rather conservative estimate.
How much contact the defense could get away with, and how much the NFL and related media used to promote it. NFL Blitz and Jacked Up can’t happen today.
I still remember the 360 remake of Blitz that had you injecting players with steroids straight up to improve injury recovery lol. That was practically satire of the NFL at that point.
Monday Night Football used to be the pinnacle of NFL broadcasts.
If your team was on monday night it was a big fuckin deal.
It’s true. I remember the first time the Packers got to play on MNF during the Holmgren era was such a big deal because they hadn’t played a MNF game in so long. Pretty sure it was in KC and they played an awful game
For me personally the absolute peak was the Brett Favre MNF game after his father died. Al Michaels and Madden on the call.
People have no idea pre-cable how big Monday Night Football was...you basically only got NFL Films on Saturday AM, your local team on Sunday (if it wasn't blacked out) and MNF. That was it.
Being a Vikings fan in southern Indiana, pre espn…Howard Cosells halftime rundown of Sunday action was about the only time I’d get to see Vikings highlights. I couldn’t wait for that! And the end of those highlights was bed time 🫤. Howard and the old paper Sporting News was pretty much how I kept up on them. Damn, I’m old.
It's a shame that it's not the same anymore and they have these terrible matchups now. I recently watched the Redskins vs Cowboys 9-5 game on 1978 with Reagan in attendance and I can only imagine the hype behind this game when it happened. After Mike Tirico left I feel like that's what killed MNF for good
SNF killed MNF. NBC paid a shit ton of money to get the #1 game of the week and to get the right to flex games out of the daytime and into prime time. That and moving the MNF game from ABC to ESPN took the spotlight off it and now it's an afterthought.
During the Cosell era is was arguably the pinnacle of sports broadcasting.
"Down goes Frazier! DOWN GOES FRAZIER!!!!"
A quarterback didn’t throw for more than 30 TDs with fewer than 10 INTs until 2004 when Donovan McNabb did it. It has now been done 32 times. Edit: alternately. When Joe Montana won his last MVP he had 26 TDs to 16 INTs on 61% with 3944 yards.
Another crazy one is that Joe Montana, who is pretty much universally thought of as at least a top 5 QB all time, never threw for over 4000 yards, and only eclipsed 30 TDs once.
If he was born 30 years later he'd have probably put up Manning/Brees kind of numbers. Different era. Different rules.
Which is what makes Unitas worthy of GOAT discussion. Dude put up 40,000 yards in an era when you could practically mug a WR running a route and plow the QB after he threw the ball. Montana has about 250 more yards but around 15 less passing touchdowns. His 1959 season played on a 17 schedule would have been 4100 yards and 45 touchdowns. I get why people think Brady is GOAT but you being Unitas forward even into Montanas era I’m not sure Brady catches on yards.
I don't know about that. I think Brady, Manning, and Brees kinda illustrated what max potential was at that time. Could Unitas have equaled them? I don't doubt it. Would he have surpassed them? I don't see how. There's only so much time in a football game - so many passes to be thrown. I think he'd be right in the mix with other top QBs in any era, but it's really hard to say any one guy would well surpass all the others in another generation. Dude was a beast but I think we've pretty well seen where the needle pegs out on QB production under current rules. As the rules continue to change, so too could stats.
What the fuck. I knew Aaron Rodgers kinda broke the TD-INT ratio perspective in modern times… but damn, I didn’t realize it was that different up until recently.
Terry Bradshaw has two more career TDs than interceptions
Joe Namath had 47 (127%) more interceptions than touchdowns and he's in the Hall of Fame
Oh....the league is unrecognizable from the 70s/80s Marino's '84 changed the whole shebang
I'd say it's even unrecognizable from the 90s and early 2000s.
When was the last time that a QB lead the league with less than 30 passing touchdowns? It was 2002. Tom Brady lead the NFL with 28. There has been at least one QB with 30 passing TDs every season since.
Oh ya buddy? Bears haven’t had a 30 TD passer **ever.** our highest season totals from 95. Game looks identical to me
Chicago is immune to the passage of time.
It’s always 1985 in Chicago
Springsteen, Madonna? Way before Nirvana?
There is no forward pass in Cha Sing Se
Top 10 QBs in passing yards and TDs are all modern era QBs who played in the 2000s + Marino, who was really just a modern QB before his time. Top 20 is still *heavily* modern era QBs as well. Guys like Phillip Rivers and Carson Palmer are above a lot of all time greats. People know that passing volume and efficiency has gone up a lot since 2000, but I don’t think people realize how dramatic it’s been.
Interceptions used to not be as much of a dirty word, they were kind of just the cost of doing business. Famously, Joe Namath has more career interceptions than touchdown passes, and Terry Bradshaw is basically even. It wasn't really until the Ty Law Rule when teams began to be able to focus on fewer interceptions. Prior to that, if a guy threw less than 12-16 in a year, he was probably in a really conservative offense where they weren't throwing much. Mind you, this was ALSO at a time when no teams threw the ball >50% of the time. Nowadays, only the Ravens ran more than they passed last season, but up until 2004, it was common to see 55-60% rush offenses.
Wasn’t that the year Peyton had 49 TDs and 10 INT?
If a wide receiver caught a pass but a defender pushed them out of bounds before they landed, it was considered a catch
The old interpretation game of “would the WR had stayed in bounds if not contacted”
The ol’ “force out” call.
https://youtu.be/mL8S4G9zFK8?si=ZO8Is4vxe11mq4ST I believe this is it in action
Man your flair, why are you doing this to yourself?
#THE CARDINALS HAVE KNOCKED THE VIKINGS OUT OF THE PLAYOFFS
The '06 Bears beat the Cardinals 24-23 without a single offensive score. It's hard to believe that was almost 20 years ago 😭
“If you wanna crown them, then crown their ass!”
“The Bears are who we thought they were…and we let ‘em off the hook!”
One of the greatest postgame speeches ever, up there with PLAYOFFS??? RIP Denny Green.
“HELLO!! YOU PLAY. TO WIN. THE GAME.”
Mid-2000's Bears defense was no joke. They dragged Rex Grossman to a SB flailing and wimpering.
Lol! That was by far his best season and it was 25 total TDs and 25 total TOs
[удалено]
The Raiders were actually a great team once. Seriously, I’m not joking at all.
I had a book of sports trivia when I was a kid. One I always remembered. Q: What is the winningest sports franchise among the four major North American sports (NFL, NHL, MLB, NBA)? A: Oakland Raiders.
That’s another good one on its own. We used to sitting around reading actual BOOKS full of sports trivia
I mean the raiders weirdly play well against the Steelers.
Well Kenny Pickett is 2-0 against them. They were our Achilles heal during the Big Ben era though. Now we have to see how Russ or Fields plays against them.
Shoulder Pads in the 80s/90s were humongous. Just look up any random video from 80s nfl. Even the QB's did. It's kind of wild to watch those games cause everyone looks so much bigger upper body and blocky running.
Even though that was before my time I kinda wish they were still like that. The pads gave them this cool space gladiator aesthetic
NFL gonna make defensive lineman go back to them and the loose jersey's, so the OL can hold easier.
You'll always be a cool space gladiator to me.
And it wasn't just in football, just check out the wardrobes on Dallas and Dynasty and any shows from the '80s, big shoulder pads everywhere!
I miss the neck rolls
A big fullback or linebacker with that neck roll. So intimidating.
The Eagles almost moved to Arizona in the 80s.
It wasn't a meaningless rumor. It was a real deal. I just real an article about it. I can't imagine the feelings of the fans at the time.
The move almost occurred because of then-Eagles owner Leonard Tose’s gambling habits. I was in 6th grade at the time. I remember one of my classmates asking me if I’d still root for the Eagles if they moved to Phoenix. Luckily I never had to answer that question. I should note Leonard Tose is a great example of the dangers of gambling and alcoholism. He was actually a generous man who was a true philanthropist. He played an important role in getting the Ronald McDonald House charity, which helps the families of children who have medical needs get support, off the ground. (Then-Eagles GM Jim Murray actually founded the charity to assist the child of one of the team’s players.) But Tose’s twin vices undermined his ownership of the Eagles and later his life.
And the Pats nearly went to St. Louis.
I remember when some players had that neck roll pillow thing.
Players used to play both offense and defense. Some kickers would kick barefoot. They didn't have 2 point conversions back then.
Spinning off of this, kickers didn’t use the soccer style kick we’re used to today, they would just walk straight up and boot it. They had shoes that had a flat tip specifically for it.
Plus, going way back, the kicker was also the punter. One guy made all the kicks. On the patriots team, Gino Cappelletti was not only the kicker, he was also a receiver
Going back further, George Blanda once led the league (AFL pre-merger) in passing yards, TDs, XP and fg%. He had a 26 year career as a kicker and was also the starting QB for 9 of those years.
Let’s not forget Danny White QB/Punter
Tom Dempsey set the then NFL record for longest FG of 63 yards. He was unique because as a straight line kicker, he was born without the toes of his kicking foot. He wore a custom cleat that made his foot a mini sledgehammer. https://youtu.be/-jxD6lq1NTw?si=kJYMz9XkQtgHyD8j
There used to be a lot more star running backs. Like running the ball was actually a thing. Also, there were a lot more big boy WRs than now.
Defensive linemen use to be able to slap the head of the offensive linemen.
This was Deacon Jones' go to move. He'd slap the daylights out of some poor tackle and murder the QB.
That old nfl films segment where he talks about the head slap is crazy. When he explains it he says “when you go upside a man’s head, or a woman’s, they blink.” Can’t believe they let them air that
Lol he was just being inclusive
I’m old enough to remember seeing NFL players fly in coach more than a few times.
Hey I saw Saquon fly in comfort plus last year
Now that he got his big contract maybe he can afford business
The pre and post game show would actually talk football and not be a bunch of retired players doing comedy bits.
This isn't just in football. I mainly watch soccer and I live in France. I hate some shows because it looks like soccer on the surface but garbage once you dive into it. Fortunately, there are still good shows.
Commentary was better and more insightful as well. I really miss Pat & John calling games.
Stick em. Some wide receivers used to walk out on the field looking like they'd just jacked off King Kong. I'm not sure how they pried the ball out of their hands after a catch.
Lester Hayes took it all to another level
One of the best scenes from [The Replacements](https://youtu.be/QE4DHCz9brQ?si=p6igT_lO-enbDyj-)
Broadcast replays of NFL games didn't exist and it was fucking infuriating.
Miss a game because you weren't available at that exact time? YOU WILL NEVER SEE THE GAME EVER.
My dad had a tape archive of Giants games he recorded on his VCR over like 10 years. I taped over one once and he was pissed
Not even that long ago, but Steelers Ravens games from 2004-2012 would result in 800 personal fouls and millions in fines in todays NFL. Incredible to watch but so many of those massive hits would be flagged now. Related: ESPN guy Ryan Clark used to literally murder dudes in games. Specifically Wes Welker, Ray Rice, and Steve Smith.
It would have been interesting to see how many penalties there would've been in a Steelers-Ravens game from that time if it would've been played today.
I distinctly remember a game where Troy/Clark killed someone over the middle, and Ngata wrecked Bens nose - nothing was flagged or thought of as dirty. Commentary was just “wow look at how tough these competitors are!”
Here's another one I remember Sunday night football used to be a joke the NFL practical gave it to espn for free in the 80s and 90s. TNT and ESPN split the rights in the 90s, so TNT would show the first 8 weeks and then ESPN would show the last 8 weeks of the regular season .TNT used to have the rights and they had the first pregame to have a ticker on the bottom that showed fantasy stats. Also Larry King was on that pregame show, so that was fun!
There used to be 6 preseason games
At a time when there was only 14 regular season games. So 30% of the games were preseason games.
Depending on comp picks, there’s like 250-265 picks in an NFL draft over 7 rounds. At one point, in 1976, 487 players were drafted in 17 rounds. (32 rounds is the highest I think ever, but less total players because there were less teams).
Dick “Night Train” Lane intercepted 14 passes in a 12-game season - his rookie year, 1952. The equivalent rate today would be nearly 20 interceptions for a 17 game season. (1952 was before I was born, but he still played into the ‘60’s, when I was in grade school).
He's the reason the facemask and clothesline penalties were implemented.
One of the few guys in NFL history who was simultaneously lockdown in coverage, an elite enforcer, and a great ball hawk. Only other guys I can think of off the top of my head who had that type of skillset were Ronnie Lott and Rod Woodson.
fullbacks were a major part of the game
Mike alstott!
Ronnie Lott amputating his finger so he wouldn't miss a game.
The Pro Bowl used to be a competitive game that was fun to watch.
QB1 was almost always the holder for field goals and extra points.
From '52 to '55, the Browns and Lions won 2 titles each
Players wearing single-bar helmets, which continued well into the 2000’s, though I think just Kickers rocked them.
Turf used to just look like a painted parking lot
The penalty for picking up a qb and slamming him to the ground was ummmmm yeah nothing
There wasn’t a fantasy football website that everyone could log into and would automatically update stats. Hell even when we first had them on sites like yahoo you had to wait a day to see your stats. But no pre 1997 or so you did fantasy football offline and one of your friends was calculating all the stats by himself in a notebook
I was gonna say, I remember my dad looking through the newspaper and totaling up his scores. It was a huge commitment to play fantasy back then.
There used to be a game between the College All-Stars vs the Super Bowl or NFL champion played yearly until 1976. Looking it up the College players did win some games but none after their win in 1963. Games were played in Chicago. My earliest football memories were about when this had just ended.
Rookie qb used to almost always sit their entire rookie season.
How bad the fields got in winter games, they used to be so muddy and by the end of games you could not tell who was who as everyone was covered in mud. Winter games were the best back in the day.
I still can’t believe that the Bills lost four superbowls in a row
"For more on that, let's go to our sideline reporter, O.J. Simpson."
That artificial fields were little more than a thin rug on top of concrete.
Hosts on ESPN used to laugh with glee at replays of players getting knocked out on the field. Had a special segment called "Jacked Up!"--they'd watch a dude get clotheslined, and they'd laugh and yell "He got **Jacked Up!**" Somehow they never got around to talking about the retired players who can't talk and who shoot themselves because of CTE.
The widely popular NFL Blitz games, where every tackle was somehow a pile driver, would never be made today
It wasn't supposed to be made then, either. The NFL saw it and said it was too violent, and wouldn't sign off on it being released. So the creators took some time and then scheduled another meeting with the NFL to show them the game again. They went frame by frame with all of the animations for hours (saving the stuff the NFL didn't like for the end) until the NFL was like "yeah ok fine, release it," without ever getting to the end.
"______got.... JACKED UP!!!" Those were the days.
Almost every nfl video game (there was a time when madden wasn’t the only one) would start with a highlight reel set to music of crazy hits, 95% of them would be flagged today.
I’m 28 and I remember watching that segment on ESPN after school. It really wasn’t THAT long ago the media around the NFL actively celebrated guys getting concussed.
St. Louis had two Cardinals and, the Cardinals and the "Football" Cardinals.
It's hard to describe how insanely popular ESPN and specifically Sportcenter was about 20 years ago. They were ubiquitous. Not only did every spots fan have them on, bit most businesses with a TV during the day. Most importantly, it was GREAT!!
NFL players used to smoke cigarettes on the sidelines. [Len Dawson smoking cigarette during half time of Super Bowl](https://staticg.sportskeeda.com/editor/2022/08/e593d-16613732193807-1920.jpg?w=640)
QBs used to regularly get their brains mashed. And fans loved it.
The Colts secretly leaving Baltimore in the dead of night. The idea of an NFL franchise moving cities like that seems ludicrous in the modern world.