I'm TIred of the Belichick-Brady Greatest Of All Time Combo Hype

The Browns also made the title game in ’64 (beating the Colts 27-0 – I still remember Jim Brown running over everyone in that game in the snow at old Cleveland Municipal Stadium) and ’65 (where they lost to the Packers at Lambeau and Ray Nitschke spent the entire game meeting Jim Brown head on at the line of scrimmage). So they made title games 13 times in 20 years – a Yankee-like standard of excellence that will probably never be repeated in the NFL.

They won the AAFC championship all four years of that league’s existence (1946-1949). In 1950, the first year after the AAFC merged with the NFL, they beat the Eagles in the championship game, where they were almost as big an underdog as the Jets were to the Colts in ‘69 and for the same reason – lack of respect. They lost the title game the next three years, won in ’54 and ’55, didn’t play in the title game in ’56 (the last Giant championship before Parcells), and lost in ’57 (the last Lions championship).

But if the lose they will be 2-2, with 4 appearances in 10 seasons, and that doesn’t crack the top five IMO. If they win, I would put them at 5, ahead of Noll and Bradshaw, but not ahead of any of the others. And I know they have more years left, but everyone wants to anoint them the best of all time now, and I don’t think their record to date merits that.

If you are talking about the greatest of all time then you have to allow for the differences in the structures of the league and the type of play. Otherwise you have to define an era and say these were the best within that era. That may be even harder. Let’s say you take 1980 as the start of the current era. The Steeler dynasty of the 70’s was over, and Walsh was revolutionizing the offense. Or was he? Don Coryell was doing the same types of things with lesser talent in St. Louis and San Diego in the 70’s – Walsh built on that. And didn’t Coryell get most of his ideas from Sid Gilman and his San Diego teams of the 60’s? And Gilman was a disciple of Paul Brown, who expanded the ideas of Halas, who developed the first true passing offenses with Luckman. And by the way, Luckman still holds the NFL record for percentage of TD passes per ATTEMPT – 7.9%. Thinks about that statistic for a moment.

Because getting there 4 years in a row counts for something, along with Sid Gilman and Jack Kemp, Landry and Staubach, Ewbank and Unitas, and Belichick and Brady.