This Sunday is Super Bowl Sunday. As a football fan, I'm glad it's here, though I feel a little subdued about it because I'm still not quite over the fact that the Cowboys are not playing this Sunday. But it's still the championship game and it's the last football game of the year (Pro Bowl and college all star games don't really count), so there's plenty to be excited about.
This year, it's the Patriots vs. the Giants. It's hard to have a rooting interest in this game other than hoping it's a good game with good commercials. On the one hand, I'm a Cowboys fan, so I usually pull for the NFC team, but it's hard to root for the Giants to win it all as the Giants are one of the Cowboys' biggest rivals. My dad is a Giants fan, but that is not enough to sway me. On the other hand, I'm not that fond of the Patriots. I was glad to see them beat the Rams a few years ago when they were heavy underdogs, but it is getting old seeing them in the Super Bowl. They are getting arrogant and I'm tired of them. I also don't want to see them win their fourth Super Bowl because then they will be within one championship from tying the Cowboys.
But one of the biggest factors is the fact that the Patriots have a chance to complete an undefeated season by going 19-0 making them only the second team to do it since the 17-0 '72 Dolphins. And therein lies the reason I won't have any problem if the Patriots win this game.
Purely from a fan's perspective, I think the chance that an NFL team could go undefeated is pretty amazing. It's been 35 years since the only team to do it did (longer than I have been alive, by the way). As I was growing up, it was just accepted wisdom that it would never be done again. The season was too long, the pressure too great, the parity too equalizing, etc. There were numerous reasons it could not be done. Yet, here we are on the cusp of seeing it happen again. Who knows when it will happen again. Yes, there have been teams that came close, but they crashed and burned in the regular season (see the 1985 Bears whose one loss came late in the regular season, to the Dolphins, no less). But obviously, though there have been good teams with great years, only two have made it through the regular season without so much as a loss.
And that is why I am ready for a team to join the Dolphins. The Dolphins should certainly be proud of the fact that they were the first team to go undefeated and they should be proud of the fact that they stayed the only team to do it for so long. But that record has created an arrogant franchise and an arrogant fan base whose combined arrogance far exceeds their recent accomplishments. This franchise and city live on past glory so much it is sickening.
I was always of aware of the 1972 Dolphins and their little reunion with Champagne each year when the last undefeated team lost. But I have become more acutely aware of it since living here in Miami and it has become quite nauseating. I think a lot of fans are tired of it and it has been amusing to hear the members of that team try to pass it off as some quaint reunion when it reality it reeks of smugness.
I have enjoyed watching the '72 Dolphins up close this year as they have become increasingly nervous. It's bad enough that another team is about to go undefeated, but the fact that it is a rival from within their division just makes it worse for them. It was painfully obvious early in the year that the Patriots were going to challenge for an undefeated season, so the Dolphins have been stewing about it all year. Add on top of that the fact that this year's Dolphins were by far the worst team in football and came awfully close to not winning a game (stupid Ravens...you blew it), and it was an all out bad year for the Dolphins and their "Dolfans" (I hate that term!!!).
The Dolphins have embarrased themselves constantly as they get increasingly defensive about the record. The best example was Don Shula's assertion that there should be an asterisk place by the record because of the incident the first game of the year involving illegal cameras. The funny thing about is I think comments like Shula's have helped fuel the Patriots and give them motivation to finish the year undefeated.
But to me, the most humorous and desperate '72 Dolphin is Mercury Morris. He has been noted in the past, when asked about the prospects of some team going undefeated, as saying "Don't talk to me when they are in my town or my neighborhood, talk to me when they are on my block." Well, Mercury, not only have the Patriots been on your block for a few weeks now, they kicked down your door two weeks ago and they are about to steal your trophy from your fireplace mantle. How do you feel about that?
The '72 Dolphins are a bunch of grumpy old men who need to get over themselves and move on with their lives. So I won't have any problem with the Patriots nudging the '72 Dolphins out of the spotlight on Sunday with a victory. It's true, as some people have said, that the '72 Dolphins will still be one of only two teams to have gone undefeated. But I think the uniqueness will have worn off and the media won't care as much anymore and I, hopefully, won't have to hear about it every year any more.
So, here's to a good game America. Enjoy!
UPDATE: 2/1/08, 1:51 P.M.
This article proves my point.
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