1978

Happy Thanksgiving. It's time to get serious about NFL78. We start today (Thursday, Nov. 23, 1978) with Broncos at Lions at 11:30 on Channel 6, and then we have Washington at Dallas at 2:30 on Channel 12. I'm excited.

We're through three quarters of the league's first-ever 16-game season, and it's time to figure out what needs to happen for the Dolphins to go back to the playoffs and get back to winning all of the Super Bowls. Three division winners and two wild-card teams from each conference will advance to the playoffs, and here's how the AFC stacks up going into Week 13 action:

Steelers 10-2

Patriots 9-3

Raiders 8-4

Broncos 8-4

Oilers 8-4

Dolphins 8-4

Jets 6-6

Browns 6-6

Seahawks 6-6

Chargers 6-6

Colts 5-7

You're going to have to win at least eight games to make the playoffs from the AFC, so that means the Bills (3-9), Chiefs (2-10) and Bengals (1-11) are eliminated from postseason contention.

Now here's where the NFC stands in sussing out which team loses to the Dolphins in the Super Bowl:

Rams 10-2

Cowboys 8-4

Washington 8-4

Vikings 7-5

Packers 7-5

Eagles 7-5

Falcons 7-5

Giants 5-7

Buccaneers 5-7

Saints 5-7

Bears 4-8

Lions 4-8

Cardinals 4-8

The number is probably already even higher than this the way the rest of the schedule is set up, but, even on first blush, it's clear that at least seven wins will be necessary to make the playoffs from the NFC. So, sorry, 49ers (1-11). Also, it should be noted that the Saints cannot win the NFC West because the Rams already have more wins than New Orleans could get to.

As I settle in for Channel 12's Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade coverage, I plan to get out the Street and Smith's and look at the scenarios with the schedule over these last four weeks. 

Don't let the YouTube thumbnail there fool you; the real stars of this broadcast are CBS's New York hosts, Linda Lavin and Ron Leibman. Alice and Kaz air back-to-back on Channel 12 on Sunday nights in 1978, and the shows' titular stars are married in real life! What a powerhouse TV moment this broadcast was!

I really am excited about most everything.

1978: Period of MLB

I liked Toni Tennille from the "Love Will Keep Us Together" start, and I have absolutely loved her once we saw her in "The Rainmaker" at Westport Playhouse in St. Louis, and now I am thrilled to discover again that she was on the mic for the national anthem on last night 1978's Game 1 of the World Series from beautiful Los Angeles ...

1978: What's on TV Monday Nights?

Once NFL78 finishes its regular season, Monday nights portend as a Channel 12 situation from prime-time wire to prime-time wire ...

However, football season is only now getting started and extends to 16 games for the first time, and so here's a coin (apparently created by or for a Lexington TV station, now offered by an eBay seller in Bagdad) embossed with the 1978 lineup of ABC's NFL Monday Night Football games in 1978 for us all to coordinate calendars accordingly ...

As for that 7-8 p.m. Central hour before kickoff, I was never that much of a Kotter guy, anyway, so I'm not going to be any too conflicted about giving WKRP ("a hilarious, new comedy with exceptionally strong youth appeal") a try. And I imagine I will stick right with Phyllis George, whom I love (and with whom I once rode on a helicopter from Barkley Regional to a field somewhere down in Graves, Fulton or Hickman counties), until time for Frank, Howard and Dandy Don on Monday nights this fall or M*A*S*H Season 7 and One Day at a Time Season 4 in the new year.

Finally, I want to send a special 1978 Desk shoutout to Lou Grant (and YouTube compiler "mtmepisodes2"). The show's 1977-78 Season 1 (TV78) was fantastic, and Season 2 episodes don't start until Sept. 25. So that leaves us all time to acquaint or re-acquaint ourselves with "Animal," Mrs. Pynchon, Billie, Joe and all of Lou's new friends around the Los Angeles Tribune newsroom.

1978 NFL Predictions

The new NFL season kicks off tonight, Saturday, Sept. 2, 1978, with the New York Giants playing the Buccaneers in Tampa, Florida. However, that game will not be on TV; instead, Channel 3 is showing this:

1978 me is about as excited as I can possibly be to put the game on and then splay out my football cards on the living-room floor and get them all sorted out for the new season. Here's how I project things to go, by the way:

This, of course, would be a crushing result for us Miami Dolphins fans, but the numbers of my super-secret rating system are what the numbers of my super-secret rating system are. And the numbers are significantly worse for the Dolphins after A.J. Duhe was sidelined by injury early and Bob Griese late during the preseason. 

The NFL slimmed from six to four exhibition games this summer, but injuries have remained a huge part of the story of the leadup to the regular season. In addition to Miami defensive end Duhe and quarterback Griese, injuries apparently have shelved for one or multiple weeks of the regular season Baltimore Colts quarterback Bert Jones, New England Patriots wide receiver Darryl Stingley, Cincinnati Bengals qurterback Ken Anderson, Giants defensive lineman Troy Archer and Chicago Bears cornerback Allan Ellis. These players projected among the league's very best players at their positions. How quickly they return to action and which others are sidelined when will have giant influence on how things actually go on the field, and neither of those influences is factored into my predictions.

Nor, really, is the possible impact of rookies. Houston Oilers running back Earl Campbell looks amazing. New Orleans Saints wide receiver Wes Chandler, San Diego Chargers wide receiver John Jefferson, Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Doug Williams, Denver Broncos nose tackle Don Latimer and Dallas Cowboys tight end/fullback Todd Christensen also have looked great. Kansas City Chiefs defensive linemen Art Still and Sylvester Hicks, San Francisco 49ers tight end Ken MacAfee, Cincinnati defensive end Ross Browner, Detroit Lions safety Luther Bradley, Atlanta Falcons tackle Mike Kenn, Green Bay Packers linebacker John Anderson and Los Angeles Rams kicker Frank Corral appear as though have wide-open immediate opportunities to contribute to their team's fortunes in big ways.

And then there's coaching. I came up with my super-secret rating system only last season, and I haven't quite figured out how to suss out the specific impact of coaching. Of course, it is tremendous. The Dolphins (10-4), Cleveland Browns (6-8), Broncos (12-2), Washington (9-5) and Falcons (7-7) all fared significantly better than I projected them to in NFL77, and I can't help but believe that head coaches Don Shula, Forrest Gregg, Red Miller, George Allen and Leeman Bennett (of Paducah!) were the primary reasons why. 

Better projecting the likely impact of rookies and measuring that of head coaches are this season's major points of emphasis in refining my super-secret rating system.

Interestingly, neither Gregg nor Allen is back with the team he coached in NFL77, and now neither is employed by any team as NFL78 dawns. Gregg took an assistant-coaching job with the Chargers but then decided his heart wasn't in it. Allen was hired away from Washington by the Rams, but then Carroll Rosenbloom decided his head hadn't been in it. "I made a serious error in judgment," he was quoted as saying after Los Angeles's 0-2 start in the preseason. He fired Allen and promoted assistant coach Ray Malavasi to guide the Rams.

But Shula is back in Miami, which gives me hope that the Dolphins will outperform my expectations. And Bennett is back in Atlanta, which I bet keeps the sports desks at The Paducah Sun (no longer the Sun-Democrat) and Channel 6 dialed in all autumn. And Miller is back with Denver, which I think is going to win the whole thing. 

For most of the preseason, my super-secret rating system actually had the Broncos going undefeated in NFL78. But then the Oakland Raiders picked up one of the league's top defensive players, cornerback Monte Jackson, from the Rams, and, in perhaps the only moment in my entire actual life that I was happy about the good fortune of the Raiders, that acquisition tipped Week 14 Broncos-at-Raiders in favor of the home team. ("Phew!" 2025 and 1978 me simultaneously exclaimed in honor of the 1972 Dolphins.)

Thank you, Matthew, for inspiring me to work through this fun project over the last several weeks, and thank you, GoHeath, for sustaining my enthusiasm throughout the period. Let's go NFL of every year, indeed!

NFL78 Update: Week 10 (Thanks for the Tip, GoHeath)

Comments flow ...

Previous and future NFL78 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 so far (as posted Jan. 17, 2019)

-- Week 1 (Dateline Atlanta) (as posted Jan. 31, 2019)
-- Week 10 (Thanks for the Tip, GoHeath) (as posted Aug. 5, 2019)

-- Super Bowl XIII revisited (as posted March 22, 2014)
-- Earl Campbell's Restaurant in the Austin, Texas Airport (as posted June 25, 2016)

-- NFL14 so far (as posted Jan. 28, 2019)

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

NFL78 Update: Week 1 (Dateline Atlanta)

Everybody's 0-0. Well, everybody but the Giants and Buccaneers, who opened the whole NFL78 season in Tampa, Florida, on Saturday night (but finished too late for me to read about in the morning papers of Sunday, Sept. 4, 1978).

The defending-champion Cowboys host the Colts (with rookie Mike Kirkland starting in place of injured Bert Jones) on the NFL Monday Night Football game. The AFC-champ Broncos host the (O-VER-RA-TED! clap! clap! clapclapclap!) Raiders in a late-afternoon Sunday showcase. Among the noon Central kickoffs is the Dolphins at the Jets (with Don Strock starting in place of Bob Griese, who was hurt in an exhibition game), and we can only hope Channel 6 chooses to air that one.

I, however, am at Atlanta:

And so are rookie Earl Campbell and the Oilers ...

Week 1, 1978
Earl Campbell makes his debut in Atlanta.
Earl had a great preseason and the 3rd time he touches the ball he goes 73 yards for the TD.
Little known June Jones gets the start for the #Falcons
Despite Campbell’s 137 yards on the ground, #Falcons win 20-14 pic.twitter.com/NKXacZMRRm

— Old Time Football (@Ol_TimeFootball) January 31, 2019

Previous and future NFL78 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 so far (as posted Jan. 17, 2019)

-- Week 1 (Dateline Atlanta) (as posted Jan. 31, 2019)

-- Week 10 (Thanks for the Tip, GoHeath) (as posted Aug. 5, 2019)

-- Super Bowl XIII revisited (as posted March 22, 2014)
-- Earl Campbell's Restaurant in the Austin, Texas Airport (as posted June 25, 2016)

-- NFL14 so far (as posted Jan. 28, 2019)

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

Earl Campbell's Restaurant in the Austin, Texas, Airport

Here are some pictures. If I had bought one of Matthew's cameras, the pictures would've been better than these I took with my phone.

Super Bowl XIII

Thank you, NFL Network, which at this moment is airing the original NBC telecast of Super Bowl XIII, which the defending champion Dallas Cowboys and Pittsburgh Steelers contested Jan. 21, 1979, at Miami's Orange Bowl.