The NFL in the 21st Century

Between 2001 and 2022, the NFL played 22 different seasons of football -- as many as it played, say, from 1971 to 1992.  What are the best games of the 21st century?  Pro Football Reference picked the NFL's top 100 games in history last year, and here are their picks for the top 10 games in this century, along with where they ranked in the overall top 100:

5.  Super Bowl XLII:  New York Giants 17, New England 14 (Feb. 3, 2008)

8.  Super Bowl XLIX:  New England 28, Seattle 24 (Feb. 1, 2015)

9.  Super Bowl LI:  New England 34, Atlanta 28 (OT) (Feb. 5, 2017)

12.  Super Bowl XLIII:  Pittsburgh 27, Arizona 23 (Feb. 1, 2009)

14.  Super Bowl LII:  Philadelphia 41, New England 33 (Feb. 4, 2018)

15.  2001 AFC Divisional Playoffs:  New England 16, Oakland 13 (Jan. 19, 2002)

20.  Super Bowl XXXVI:  New England 20, St. Louis Rams 17 (Feb. 3, 2002)

21.  2006 AFC Championship:  Indianapolis 38, New England 34 (Jan. 21, 2007)

24.  2017 NFC Divisional Playoffs:  Minnesota 29, New Orleans 24 (Jan. 14, 2018)

30.  Super Bowl XLVII:  Baltimore 34, San Francisco 31 (Feb. 3, 2013)

This list came out last year, so it didn't include the 2021-22 playoffs.  I would certainly put last year's Kansas City/Buffalo game on the list -- I thought it was the best game I'd seen since the Chargers/Dolphins playoff game back on January 2, 1982.  They had that Chargers/Dolphins game as number 4, on their list, but above the Super Bowl where the Giants ended New England's perfect season.  I would fit the Kansas City/Buffalo game in between those two.  In other words, for me it was the best game of the 21st Century.  There were a lot of good playoff games last year, but I think that's the only one that would make the top ten.

I think that from now on, I'm going to try to think of sports more in 21st century terms.  There's so much nostalgia in the sports world now that we aren't giving enough credit to what's happening in front of us.

NFL Update

@MiamiDolphins fans we need 700,000 fans to pay $5,000 to buy the team for $3.5B from Ross. If this can get 700K likes, it can be done 😅 We'll run the team democracy style & have someone like @houtz or @ian693 be the spokesperson. All decisions by ownership popular vote #FinsUp

— Adam (@awilhelm1528) February 2, 2022

 

 

If Mike McDaniel ends up taking the Dolphins' head-coaching position later this week, it'll mean he's not nearly the genius that everyone keeps saying he is. 

I don't think it will happen. He really does seem like a smart guy.

I think McDaniel would be wise now to stick with the 49ers and help engineer a trade with the Dolphins--Jimmy Garoppolo and, say, a fifth-round draft choice for Tua Tagovailoa. Jimmy G is apparently done in San Francisco, and Tua ought to be done in Miami. There was a report earlier this week that McDaniel had a plan of how to win with Tua with the Dolphins, and I do believe that Tua could win a lot more with the 49ers. He's a good quarterback, a tough football player and a charming young fellow. I think he could end up having an excellent career in the right situation, and, if that turns out to be in San Francisco starting next season, McDaniel would be even more highly regarded than he is now.

If the 49ers-Dolphins trade doesn't work out, maybe Tua could go to the Commanders for Ryan Fitzpatrick and a draft choice. Maybe Miami could draft Western Kentucky's Bailey Zappe and have him ready to go in three or four years under the new ownership. (Actually, I doubt this is a possibility; it appears that Fitzpatrick is planning to start a broadcasting career in Buffalo.)

 

Ryan Fitzpatrick is a Buffalo treasure and I will hear nothing else about it!
🦬💙❤️💙🦬#GoBills pic.twitter.com/RjI7lvEBvd

— The Golden Billievers (@DawsonKnoxxx) January 20, 2022

 

As for the Dolphins' current head-coach opening, it suddenly got even less attractive, didn't it? Who's going to want to come coach that team given that it's going to take a couple of years of chaos to pry the team away from Stephen Ross after it has turned out he has been endangering the NFL's whole relationship with gambling? My suggestion for the job would be Brian Flores. He's an excellent coach, and there's no way any other team is going to hire him--we all see what they've done to Colin Kaepernick.

NFL: “End racism” 👍🏻

Brian Flores … on the first day of Black History Month: pic.twitter.com/c1VtTuQYIx

— KimberlEY A. Martin (@ByKimberleyA) February 1, 2022

NFL21 Update

 Dolphins at Bears ... 15:00 to go in the first quarter ... comments flow ...

NFL Draft

 

I hope the Packers trade Aaron Rodgers. That would be exciting. I hope he goes to San Francisco, and then I hope it's Green Bay vs. San Francisco in the NFC Championship.

Check back for more #hottakes like that one in the comments over the weekend ...

NFL73 Draft (Real/Pretend)

I love to pretend, and today I'm pretending that I'm at the 1973 NFL draft, which took place for real at the Hotel Americana in New York. We're just a couple of picks in, and everything just went crazy:

The Baltimore Colts desperately wanted LSU Quarterback Bert Jones, and they mentioned Bubba Smith to the Oilers in exchange for the right to draft first. But when the Oilers held out for more, the Colts traded Defensive Lineman Billy Newsome, a durable player but no Bubba, to New Orleans for the second pick on the first round.

That left the Oilers in a quandary. If they took Jones, they would have three young and possibly unhappy quarterbacks—Jones, Dan Pastorini and Lynn Dickey—with 25 clubs waiting for one to be discarded sometime next August or September. Houston's indecision was obvious when the actual drafting began. Instead of announcing the No. 1 pick immediately, as is customary, Coach Bill Peterson fidgeted for more than half of the allotted 15 minutes before naming Defensive Tackle John Matuszak of Tampa. Scouts strongly doubt that Matuszak is any Bubba Smith. The Colts, drafting next, got the man they wanted, Bert Jones.

That's all real, from the Feb. 12, 1973, Sports Illustrated "Scorecard" section. But it's obviously going to have terrific bearing on my pretend, because we're only 13 selections away from the first choice of the (formerly real) Evansville Crimson Giants (now pretend), right after (pretend) Idaho at No. 14 and before (then real) Oilers (now defunct) again at No. 16.

Comments flow!

Previous and future NFL73 reports:

-- NFL67 wrap (as posted Jan. 13, 2013)
-- NFL68 wrap (as posted Jan. 11, 2014)
-- NFL69 wrap (as posted Jan. 11, 2016)
-- NFL70 wrap (as posted Jan. 17, 2017)
-- NFL71 wrap (as posted Jan. 16, 2018)

-- NFL72 wrap (as posted Feb. 2, 2019)
-- (Pretend) expansion (as posted Nov. 19, 2018)
-- Blockers for O.J. (as posted Oct. 29, 2018)
-- Divisional playoffs (as posted April 4, 2015)

-- NFL78 so far (as posted Jan. 31, 2019)
-- NFL79 so far (as posted April 15, 2015)
-- Welcome to Madisonville, Fran Tarkenton! (as posted Jan. 3, 2009)
-- NFL14 so far (as posted Jan. 28, 2019)

-- NFL15 so far (as posted Sept 13, 2015)
-- NFL16 so far (as posted Jan. 8, 2017)

NFL72 Update

OK, here's where things stand through eight weeks of NFL72 ...

That's per Pro!, the official NFL game program for games of Sunday, Nov. 12, and Monday, Nov. 13, 1972 ...

At some point, I picked up a bound volume of all the Pro!s published for Washington Redskins home games in 1972 ...

I love game programs ...

I'm excited about working on my Football Crossword Puzzle all week ...

And I'll want to be sure to enter the Taster's Choice Super Bowl contest ...

Of course, I don't need all week to discern how I'm going to fill out my Vitalis NFL Man of the Year ballot ...

Tomorrow's game at RFK is Giants at Redskins ...

And, as you can see, I've got pretty big plans for it ...